11/09/2016

Parents,

Next week is the registration time for most of our students. They will register on-line beginning about 8:00 AM. I hope they get the schedule they wanted.

Students should have met with an advisor by this time. Their advisor will release their hold for registration. Students cannot register until they have met with an advisor. This helps assure that students are taking the courses they need.

All of us who work with freshmen have been working long hours to assure students get the advice they need for scheduling. I expect that freshmen advisors will be dealing with a number of panicked students who have waited until the last minute to register and have missed their priority date.

A number of students are facing a dilemma about what courses to register for since they are uncertain whether they will receive a D or F in a class. When I counsel these students, I ask them to tell me their specific grades in their classes. When I see fairly consistent low grades, I advise students to register for these classes again. If I see a low first test grade, with steady grade progress, I advise them to take the next course in the course sequence. I also recommend that students sign up for a class that meets at the same time as the class they may need to repeat. That way they don’t have to completely redo their schedules.

Should students find out they need to change the courses they are registered in when they get their grades, they can change their schedule from home. Since these changes occur over the semester break, students should discuss these changes with an advisor. I plan to be in the office most days that the University is open over the semester break. If I don’t answer the phone, just keep calling. I’m generally on the phone most of the day. Students should make a phone call appointment as they would an office appointment at jackbyrd.org.

You may be wondering whether students will be able to graduate on time should they have to repeat a course or if they needed to take additional preparatory classes in Math and Chemistry. In most cases, students should be able to get caught up. They may need to take one or more classes this summer. In many cases, they can take these courses at a local college.

It’s critical that students complete all of the course they need for a major by the end of the summer session. These courses include:

■ Math 155 (or 153/154)

■ Chem. 115

■ English 101

■ Engineering 199

■ Engineering 101

■ Engineering 102

Once your student gets his/her grades at the end of this semester, you should work through how these requirements will be met. Your student’s advisor or I can also help with this.

My experience has been that most students can get themselves back on track with more discipline and more work. Our students have grown up a lot since they started this semester, so I don’t expect to see a number of repeated mistakes.

Let me end with the story of Caprice. I first met Caprice when she was a high school student. She was a secretarial studies student who was doing a practical experience in my office. We had a number of discussions about her future.

Caprice’s plan in her words was that she was “going to get married and have babies.” Caprice was engaged to a student in our college. I tried to tell her that she would often be asked what college she graduated from when she and her husband were at social functions. I tried to encourage her to think about college, but her mind was made up.

Caprice and her husband Don moved to Seattle when Don graduated. I hadn’t heard from them for a couple of years so I was really surprised when Caprice walked into my office one morning in June. Don and Caprice had moved back to Morgantown so Don could work on a graduate degree.

Then Caprice said to me: “You were right. I’ve decided to go to college,” I was delighted. I asked her what she wanted to study, and she told me engineering. I was shocked. The highest math course that Caprice had in high school was business math (percentages were the toughest thing they studied.)

It was too late for Caprice to sign up for summer school. My advice to Caprice was to have Don tutor her in math and chemistry over the summer so she could get into the courses she needed.

That’s what she did. Don must have been a wonderful teacher because Caprice excelled in her courses in the fall. In fact, when Caprice graduated four years later, she had one of the highest GPA’s in her class.

I’m an eternal optimist and believer in young people. That’s why I can’t understand why students give up so quickly on themselves.