As students think about the future of their academic journeys, the question of how they are going to reach their goals arises. Students at Texas State have many options when it comes to choosing a path as they work toward their degree. However, this does not mean all options are easy. Texas State students have the option to take summer courses, but they are hardly accessible while trying to plan for them.
Many students at Texas State take summer classes because of the timely benefits for their graduation plan. According to Forbes Advisor, college students choose to take a summer course to help boost their GPA, graduate on time or even graduate early.
However, for Texas State students who want to take summer classes, it is difficult to find classes that fit within their already planned pathway for graduation. There are not enough summer class options to accommodate students who need to take them.
Tania Trejo, a microbiology senior, tried to sign up for summer classes and ran into frustrating issues due to the lack of options.
“I think there should be more of a variety on the amount of courses they offer,” Trejo said. “It definitely is more difficult than signing up for another term in the school year.”
On the Texas State Self-Service page, the “Plan Ahead” feature offers a list of courses for both the fall and spring semesters of the next academic year, but not for the summer semester.
This system does not allow students the same time to plan summer class schedules as they can for fall and spring which is a problem because registration is quickly approaching.
According to the academic calendar of Texas State’s Office of the University Registrar, registration for summer 2024 opens April 1. Students are not able to see what courses are offered until registration opens. This timeline does not give students enough time to contact their adviser to see if the classes offered align with their plan.
When a student talks with an adviser, oftentimes they are given a “flowchart” of what courses to take to follow their graduation timeline. However, this catalog does not show what courses are available in the summer.
“One thing I don’t really like about the amount of classes they offer is that they would put [options] in the catalog, not just open the options when summertime comes,” Trejo said. “It’s bad because people already have a plan on what they want to sign up for.”
Along with these issues, the courses offered online do not make up for even half of the courses offered in the summer of last year.
Taking online courses is more beneficial in the summertime. Adding more online courses to the summer program would allow students to find a job to save money, complete assignments based on their personal schedule and take the time to relax on their break to prevent burnout.
In addition, the insufficient amount of summer courses prevents a large portion of Texas States students from taking them.
As all Texas State students know, freshmen are required to live on campus. As Texas State grows into a larger school, the class size of the incoming freshman also increases. This fall, the incoming freshman class was record-breaking.
The population of first-year students showed a 3% increase from fall 2022. According to the Texas State Newsroom, this was “the highest enrollment of the past five years.”
With this information in mind, it is critical to note that summer housing is very limited. This means that students who will not be living in San Marcos full-time until the following fall would not have the same opportunity to take summer courses as upperclassmen.
“It actually made me feel relieved [to have optional summer courses] since I was able to go according to my graduation. Having the option of summer classes does help,” Trejo said.
Starting summer courses as a freshman could be very beneficial. However, the accessibility of these courses is very slim for these students.
While having the option of a summer session is an amazing opportunity, these courses should be accessible to the entirety of the Texas State student body. This does not give each student the maximum education opportunity that they deserve and pay for.
Summer course options should be able to be viewed, planned and accessed much earlier than they are now.
-Emma Hall is a journalism sophomore
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