How to register for your semester of college classes

Don't forget to study in college.

Graduation's tonight. Last year I offered the senior class 14 reasons they should consider going to college. This year I'm going offering free information on how to register for your first semester of college.

I ran into a graduating senior I know from my previous work experience at AJ's the other day and she was confused about how to go about registering for her first semester of college. We talked about it for a few minutes and I realized other graduating seniors, and incoming freshmen in general, might have the same questions. I spent about four seconds searching on Google to see if I could find a cheat sheet on the subject and couldn't, so I'll create one myself.

1. Be your own adviser. You'll most likely get assigned an adviser at your school. You might even have to meet with this person before you can register for classes. That's fine, but do your own advising work yourself so you can take the most out of your advising session. Don't walk into your adviser's office with a blank schedule and expect him or her to fill it out for you.

Your adviser is a good source for course registration information, for example, they will know if one class is only offered in the spring, or every other spring and might be able to tell you more about classes you are interested in taking. But keep in mind, it's you who has to stay in school an extra semester if you've somehow missed a required class along the way.

2. The first thing you need to do is find your school's catalog. Some schools sell these at their bookstore, some might send you one in the mail, but nowadays, most schools make their catalog available online and for some schools, it might be the only way you can get a hold of it (hint: go to your school's Web site, find the search box and type catalog). Whatever you have to do to find it, do it.

3. Once you've found the catalog, you will need to look in a few places in it. First, find out how many credits you need to graduate. Divide this number by eight, or however many semesters you plan to spend in college, but keep in mind tuition increases a great deal every year. If you go to Idaho, and I think BSU too, you will need 128 credits to graduate. That means you'll need to take an average of 16 credits each semester to graduate in four years.

4. The next place you need to look is at the graduation requirements for your major. Not sure what your major is? Seriously consider finding another way to waste your daddy's money until you can make up your mind. There's a good chance you'll change your major at some point during your college career, if not at multiple points. Keep in mind, the later you change your major, the longer you should plan on staying in college.

5. Next find out what your university or college requirements are for graduation. These are going to be general elective credits and include things such as science and math, humanities, English 101 and 102, Communications 101, and other classes that won't have a lot to do with your major but someone decided they will contribute to your overall education.

6. Once you have these requirements in one place, you are almost ready to begin making your schedule. But before you do this, there are some things you need to know first:

a. Classes are going to be numbered as 100, 200, 300 or 400 level courses. 100 level classes are freshman level classes and 400 level classes are designed for seniors. Expect to take a lot of 100 and maybe 200 level classes your first year. They offer 090 level classes for people who can't test into 100 level classes. These classes are most often math and English classes and you do not receive credit for them. Try to avoid them if you can and if you must take them, plan accordingly and you might have to stay an extra semester if you have to take a lot of them.

b. One credit hour is equaled to one hour spent in the classroom spent a week. Most college courses are three credits. This means you should expect to spend three hours a week in the classroom. There are three ways most schools offer classes. The most common is three 50-minute classes on Monday, Wednesday and Friday. Tuesday and Thursday classes are 90 minutes and some classes are once a week for three hours. Science classes with labs are normally four credit classes and include an extra class period to attend lab sessions and you will have to register for the lab portion of the class separately from the class itself.

c. Professors like to assign three to five hours of out of class work for each credit hour. They also like to think their class is the only thing in the entire world you have to do that semester.

d. 300 level classes are often the hardest in your sequence. This is because they act as filter classes to weed out everyone who really shouldn't be in the major or work in that career field. 400 level classes are often capstone classes where you demonstrate your ability to put together everything you've learned the last three years. 300 and 400 level classes are harder than 100 and 200 classes and take more time to complete the work generally, so be smart and plan it so your last two semesters you don't have to take 20 credits of 300 and 400 level classes.

7. Using the information above, it would be wise to make a rough draft of when you intend to take every class you need to graduate. Some people call this an education plan. It won't be perfect because some classes might only be offered once a year or you might have to retake a class, but it will give you a rough idea of what you'll need to do to graduate. As you write down the higher level classes, check in the catalog and ensure you have planned to take all required prerequisites for that course. You do not want to try to enroll in a class you need to graduate as a senior and find out you didn't take a 100 level prereque class.

To make a plan, simply draw a line down the middle of your paper to split it in half than draw three more lines going across the paper the other way. This will give you eight sections. The first two sections are for your freshman year, the second two sections are for your sophomore year and so forth.

8. Now that you've figured out when you're going to take all your classes, it shouldn't be too hard to figure out what you're going to take your freshman year since you've already done the work to determine it. With few exceptions, it won't matter much what freshman classes you take your first semester, as long as you take whatever you don't take your first semester the next semester.

Go on your school's Web site and find their course schedule. You won't be able to actually register for your classes until a certain date, but you don't want to wait until that day to make your schedule. Once registration opens up, which are at different times for each class with seniors registering first, everyone rushes to the Web site and register for classes. It's best to already been logged in a few minutes before registration opens up and keep clicking refresh until they let you register. Have your desired schedule already selected by then.

To select your schedule, look on the schedule and find out every time they offer the class you want to take. Write down the days and time of each time the school offers the class at the time you want to take it. When you're done, look at your list of times and circle the ones that are offered at times you want to take that don't contradict each other. Write all the circled times down in one place and you are done. You have just completed your first semester's schedule. Wait for the selected time and day to register for classes and register. Have a few back up times for popular classes in case you don't get the time slot you want.

9. When you are filling out your schedule, think about what you want to do during the day and be practical and honest. For example, do you want to wake up every day for an English class that starts at 7 a.m.? If not, don't register for that class. You won't go, you'll fail the class, have to retake and maybe fall behind on graduating on time when all you had to do was sign up for the 10 a.m. class. Do you want to get a night job? Set up your schedule so you're done with class by 3 p.m.

Be sure to leave a break during your classes for lunch, don't take classes back-to-back for a four hour period. You'll get hungry in one of your classes, run to get something to eat and be late to your next class. If you take a P.E. class, be sure to leave enough time between classes so you can shower and not have to go to class all smelly.

10. Look through your school's catalog and look for classes that sound fun that you think you would like to take. I took ice skating, rock climbing, piano, poetry and for some reason accounting classes just because I thought the classes sounded cool and I wanted to have some fun. There are all sorts of work out classes you can take, if you want to get in shape, there's no excuse not to do so. Don't worry about paying for these classes either, though some school's might charge a P.E. fee, because once you reach fulltime student status, you can take additional classes at no cost to a limit.

For example, at Idaho, once you enroll in eight credits, you will pay fulltime tuition. You can take up to 18 credits without having to pay additional fees. Suppose you want to take 16 credits your first semester and you enroll in them, you can now enroll in two extra credits at no cost to you, other than the P.E. fees. Be sure to register for at least 12 credits every semester though because you'll need at least 12 credits to be a fulltime student for FAFSA and most scholarships.