The Official Fall Semester Rant Thread

[bermuDa]

Ok, I realize that the fall semester has just started or will start shortly, and the quarter should start soon for all you weirdos out there

To prevent the boards from being inundated with threads about each person's trouble with the administration/bureacracy/sadistic dean etc, I'm creating this thread for everyone to blow off some steam. So please don't make a new thread to rant about how you've been wronged or how tough this semester is going to be or what a bitch petitioning for graduation is... DO IT HERE! I'll merge all future rant threads for this semester into this one.

requested format: give us the long story (if you want), then sum everything up in one sentence.

I'll start with my own-


The Long Story:

I paid all my dues and busted my ass to get enough credits for senior status, but when it came time to register for classes, I noticed that my date was much later than my other friends who are seniors, and my own sister who just transferred to my school for her senior year. I called the admissions and records department, but had to wait until the following monday since they're apparently closed on sunday.

What I found out was that due to a freaking clerical error by the admissions and records department, I wasn't given credit for an art class I took last semester, and was now three units short of senior status. I wouldn't really give a shit (it was easily rectified) except this meant a registration date two weeks later than it should have been. I got this fixed before the given registration date, but it was still 10 days after it should have been.

Again, I wouldn't really care, but this later registration date meant I have to once again put up with what I spent 4 years busting my ass trying to avoid: trying to add classes I need. I now am in limbo trying to add a typography class that is imperative I take. My major is impacted and I'm in the last class on the old catalog rights system. I've got to take two upper division graphic design classes each semester to graduate this decade. If I don't get into this class I'm essentially set back another semester, because of a FUCKING CLERICAL ERROR. There's other shit but I think that's enough to rant for now.


The Short Story:

Because some monkey in the admissions department didn't do their job, I'm potentially fucked out of a required class.

[Rdr4evr]

Join the club. I have been fucked for 3 quarters in a row because these assholes always manage to cancel at least one of my classes because of their fuck ups. Either they give me the "our systems were down and your class did not go through" even though they told me it went through 3 days earlier or they tell me the class was cancelled for no apparent reason. Not only does that really put me behind, but by the time they actually notify me, all the other classes are full and therefore leave me with 1 or 2 classes short. To top it off, when I approach the so called "counselors" about the situation, they give me a fuck off attitude. You think for fucking 60,000 dollars, these assholes would have the common courtesy and show me some goddamn respect.

[Glava]

I'm ordering older-edition books online to save money, and I hope they get delivered before it's too late. Also, I hate being stuck on campus for two hours with nothing to do. Pretty small rant, eh?

[kurty[B]]

I ran out of condoms, and have to decide between that or my books!!

[BigGov]

Hrm...I'm having a great time at my college, no problems yet. I'm actually kind of hoping I have a boring class either Thursday or Friday so I can straighten out my fantasy football draft board

[la petite moi]

I have to go to school an hour before my first class starts to take thet twenty minutes to drive there, and then somehow find parking. My first day of school I got a parking ticket. Three of my books have not arrived yet, and I got them about a week and a half before school started (I'm on my second week of school now). I finally got a job --at Starbucks-- so I have to go through nine days of training, and then I'll start working on top of taking 13.5 units (six classes). I still live with my parents, and my mother thinks that, even though she doesn't go to work (and yes, she has cancer...but she does plenty around the house and takes hikes), she can still tell me to clean up others' crap after I get home from a tiring day at school and start doing my reading/homework (and most likely, that will even continue when I start actually working). I also live three and a half hours away from the one I love because he's going to a university. I only get to see him every other weekend.

[roachboy]

i have to start teaching students like you in a week.


the complaints above that i sympathize with:

book prices (you can thank ronald reagan for them---he changed the tax code that applies to publishers--that tax change is why books go out of print so quickly--that partially explains the problems with getting older editions--that and the scam that is textbook publishing, in which the color used for the cover graphics gets switched every year, and that forces you to buy a new edition for each class..)...this is a real problem in course design as well--often what you can teach is hamstrung by the extortionate prices of the books you need to do it. my courses usually run about $100-150 a term for books. i try to compensate by paying real attention to which books i order, by encouraging students to shop around to find other editions. but there are situations in which you cant do it, and by using etexts when i can. i dont think anyone operates under any illusions about this area.
i also do alot of music, and find that the riaa idiocy really prevents the development of useful alternatives to paying for things. particularly now, when the riaa has been trying to get universities to turn over lists of students who download too much stuff. while universities have turned over these lists, they have also become jumpy about copyright violation and it is therefore really difficult to figure out ways to allow folk to shell out less for what they need.


the problems associated with having to hold down a day gig while trying to get through school--i had to do it as well--it sucked--i hoped somehow to at least get some stories out of the experience that i could later inflict on other people, but i didnt really. it just sucked.

the other stuff--interacting with administration is a pain, but it is not a big deal--more often than not you can get things fixed that are screwed up--but if you can wait until the semester slows a bit to do it, it is better for you.
what will not help is the idea that because you pay tuition administrators are your servants. trust me on this one. the quickest way to get your situation not handled is to let on at any level that you think this way.

[bermuDa]

I didn't mean that since I paid my dues the administration should be at my beck and call, but I'm fulfilling my requirements as a student; I expect the school to keep their end of the bargain and give me credit for what I've done. I had taken the class and the records department showed I took it and had a grade for it, but someone somewhere didn't hit the button that said "give student credit for this class." I just find that ridiculous.

[Lasereth]

Man, I know exactly how ya feel. The two departments at my school that can ruin the college experience is the Housing department and the Traffic department. I swear they hire the biggest idiots possible for those jobs. None of them know how to do their jobs and they always give wrong info if you call them. I've called Housing three times before (changing my voice so I won't sound the same) and got three different answers from the same person on the same question.

The semester is starting off pretty smooth right now (except for my stats teacher not knowing what he's doing so far). I did lose my stats book, but my teacher found it (thankfully...$110).

-Lasereth

[amonkie]

My only complaint with the semester is continuing to go to school at the same campus where I was an RA for two years. I left because a large group of specific residents had just become impossible to deal with, short of 24/7 babysitting, which was NOT my job. So I still have the pleasure of seeing them around campus, and they still treat me like their RA, and have even started bashing other RAs in front of me. Put a stop to that quickly, but makes the day a little more stressful.

[roachboy]

bermuDa: if you are running into too much idiocy, use your advisor as an administrative flak. he or she will probably be a little pissy about it, but it might be more efficient, particularly since in most cases it is a matter of sending a piece of paper into a maze so that the button can be pushed.

[Ace_O_Spades]

No rants as of yet... but school hasnt started yet

I've managed to get into all my classes... I'm shopping around for used texts right now, and hopefully I can pick all of them up soon. I have wednesdays and fridays off, so I get to sit on my ass all fuckin day until 3:30 when I have football.

I'm sure the ranting will start once I actually have to start doing work.

[sailor]

Well, last semester when registering for this semester, the registration system locked me out for an hour. Dont know why, but when I got in, all the classes I need for my major (and to let me study abroad next year) were already full. I came into this semester without a schedule at all--just enough fluff classes to let me actually enroll. I then had to go spend forever in my counselor's office to try to get things fixed--I dropped 3 of my 4 classes I was registered for and now essentially have a completely new schedule.

Oh, and I just had to spend $560 on fucking books. Assholes.

[sandeep]

I had the pleasure of dealing with a computer glitch that wouldn't recognize any of my pre-requisite classes. I have 1000 level english, music and philosophy courses from last year, but I only had 3.5 credits instead of 5, so I was a "first year". It took me about three weeks of emailing and calling profs and the registrar, only to keep hearing "It should work, try it again, and if it doesn't call us back"

I've gotten into all the classes I needed, so it's done with, but boy did I have to work hard for someone elses mistake.

On a side note though, I really enjoy going to school. It's just setting things up that gets me (and the book prices... of course).

[nanofever]

Originally Posted by kurty[B]

I ran out of condoms, and have to decide between that or my books!!

The student health center at UCSB has a huge basket of assorted condoms (trojans, lifestyles, ect - noticed a big trojan magnum too) on display just inside the front door. The basket has a sticky note affixed to it which reads "please only take one"; I believe that the "one" it refers to is one "variety pack". Thus, my plan is to walk into student health the first day and empty the entire basket into my backpack thus picking up one "variety pack". I plan to run like I just stole a bunch of free from student health after commiting this horrid act.