Fall class total to be updated to reflect seminars, task forces

Despite what appears to be 216 fewer courses offered in the fall term compared to this spring’s offerings, the number of courses offered in the fall will be approximately the same, several departmental representatives confirmed.

The Office of the Registrar officially released available courses for the fall 2011-12 term on Thursday morning, and a total of 1,142 courses were initially posted on the registrar’s website under Course Offerings.

This number appears to be down from the 1,358 courses listed for the current spring 2010-11 term. The discrepancy is most notable in the mathematics department and the Wilson School, both of which appear to have reduced their total courses to approximately half the number offered in the current term.

However, the 216-course discrepancy between the two lists is due to a number of departments not yet listing individual classes for the fall term.

Currently, the mathematics department lists 46 courses to be offered in the fall, though 73 courses were offered this spring and 80 were offered last fall.

Mathematics professor Christopher Skinner, undergraduate representative for the mathematics department, said in an email that the question of the discrepancy has come up before but that most of the difference is due to the fact that graduate courses have not yet been listed.

“Many of the 100 and 200 numbered mathematics courses are taught in multiple sections,” he added. “Currently, the registrar’s website lists only the times sections will be offered. As possible, the number of sections at each time will be determined by the number of students who register for each time slot.”

Skinner explained that the number of courses is set to remain the same and that the registrar’s listings will be updated to reflect the accurate number.

Similarly, the Wilson School offered 97 courses this spring and 88 last fall. Only 54 courses are currently listed on the registrar’s website for the upcoming fall semester.

Nathan Scovronick, Wilson School lecturer and director of the school’s undergraduate program, explained in an email that the registrar’s list has not yet been updated to include junior seminar task forces, which are only open to juniors in the concentration, or many of the graduate courses, all of which won’t appear on the registrar’s official listings until later this spring.

The disparity in course numbers is reflected in other departments as well. Spyridon Papapetros, architecture professor and department representative for the School of Architecture, explained in an email that the architecture department has also not finalized the listings for studio courses for juniors and master’s students or for graduate seminars.

However, even if the number of courses remains the same, it is yet to be seen whether the course listings will reflect the increasing size of the undergraduate student body. Admissions for the Class of 2015 will mark the third year in the University’s plan to expand the size of each undergraduate class to 1,300, ultimately increasing the size of the undergraduate body by around 500 students by the 2012-13 academic year.

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Papapetros noted that undergraduate enrollment in architecture courses has recently increased and that the school will be welcoming two new full members of the faculty for the 2011-12 academic year.

“The number of students in our lecture courses, such as ARC 203 and ARC 302, has indeed increased during the last couple of years, which shows that interest in architecture across the campus has also increased,” he said. “Otherwise, the rest of our departmental classes, such as seminars and studios, remain small, as we only accept a limited amount of highly committed students each year.”