Is the class you need to take full? Here's a tip for that: Obtain a waitlist permission code.

So what happens when you have a schedule all planned out for the classes you need to take and you try to add but you get waitlisted.

Now I have a couple recommendations for this. If your early on in your journey towards your associates degree, or any degree for that matter, you can look at a couple of alternative classes that you may be planning to take the next semester and see if you can enroll in those instead. Then the following semester circle back and try to add the class that you weren’t able to get into.

Now if you have a class that you need to take that you do not have an option to swap out for something else, as in you are near the end of obtaining your degree, what I suggest would be to email the professor directly and explain to them your situation. It has been my experience that teachers are there to want to help you succeed. If they know they have a student that needs their class to obtain their degree and they are motivated to take that class, you are more likely to get a add code for that class then if you do not reach out at all.

So what is an add code?

When you enroll in a class and are waitlisted, which means the class is full then you were on a waiting list to secure a spot if others drop out, so an add code is what the teacher will give you to secure a spot in that class.

Now, you might be wondering how to reach out to the teacher as when you are choosing your classes, it doesn’t have your teachers email on the course information. It only has the course number the title and the description as well as days of the week, etc. In order to find a teachers email, you can go to the schools Faculty & Staff page and click at the top where it has an employee directory:

Then simply search that teacher’s name and their email will come up.

Make sure you are not in Office 365 Outlook email.

Make sure that you set a reminder in your phone to contact that teacher the day that the class starts in order to obtain an ad code. Spaces for that course are very unlikely to open prior to the first day of class. Say you are in position six on a waitlist , it is unlikely that six people will drop out of the class before the first day.

So once the first day of class begins and you remember, (thanks to that reminder in your phone) make sure you send a friendly email to that professor explaining your situation and how much you would like to take their course and ask them if you could please have permission for an add code.

Now of course the success of this will be determined by how far back you are on that waitlist as well as the professor, but I know from experience that we have been successful to obtain an ad code, even when there were six people ahead on the waitlist. I will say that if you are a concurrent enrollment student, unfortunately, your priority for class selection is after other already enrolled college students. Other students will get priority in their enrollment date, however, if you put a reminder in your phone for the assigned date that you have been given and you actually enroll on that date and do not procrastinate, you are usually able to have enough time to secure spots for the upcoming semester.

A key there is to not procrastinate as your enrollment date is already behind other enrolled students so you need to be on it when that date opens up. Already know in advance what classes you need to take. The day your registration opens is not the day to make a list of what you should take that semester. You need to know that ahead of time.

So the key Takeaway for this post is to plan ahead when enrolling into classes as they do fill up, but just know that if you see you have not secured a spot in a course right away that it is not the end of the world. An opportunity can come up if you put a little bit of work on your end so that you can add the course.

I might have been there, and I do know this.

Xo,

Mama