A university policy dictates that students only have five academic days, including the first day of classes, to add more classes to their schedule. Registrar Patrick Miller argues that this prevents the disruption of catching students up on a week’s worth of work.

When students come into classes late “It is unfair to everyone,” Miller said.

Unfortunately, the policy itself is unfair to all other students as well.

Freshmen are advised to pick classes that meet their core requirements when they come to orientation. The advisers are peers and faculty from the college of the freshman’s chosen major, but not necessarily the exact department.

What all this means is that freshmen, while satisfying core requirements, may spend more time and money trying to finish off the requirements within their majors.

For freshmen who realize there are classes within their major that satisfy both core and major requirements a week into the semester, it is too late to tweak their schedules.

This holds true, even for non-freshmen, that some classes are different from their description in the TCU catalogue. A student may decide to drop a class after the first day, but then has only four days to find an open class to replace the dropped one.

Breaking down the five academic days, this means students have attended three Monday/Wednesday/Friday classes and two Tuesday/Thursday classes. Those taking night classes had only one class, assuming the professor didn’t cancel the first class.

This is simply not enough time to decide whether a class is worth taking and then sign up for another class.

If a student cannot find a replacement class, he or she runs the risk of dropping below scholarship-hour requirements.

Students are also only able to sign up for 17 credit hours until the first day of class, but full-time students are charged for 18 no matter how many courses they are taking. This policy is intended to stop students from signing up for classes they do not need and shopping for what classes to keep.

While students needing a class are hindered by course shoppers, we should be getting what we pay for. Dropping courses and adding others is a fact of college life, even if the registrar doesn’t like it.

Students can drop classes until October, but cannot add classes to make up for lost hours.

Adding one more week to the add date would greatly benefit the students. By having 10 academic days instead of five, students would be given more time to get a feel for classes and professors. Professors could require permission codes to add classes after a week if their class has an abnormally heavy workload.

As adults, the education of college students should be in their hands. If they make the choice to come into a class late, they know that they have the responsibility to make up for missed assignments and to catch up on notes.

It is understandable, as Miller pointed out, that having students come into a class late is disruptive and that students entering late would need to work hard to catch up. However, it is not an impossible feat.

If a professor is fine with the student coming in late, and the student needs the class, why inhibit their education with an outdated policy?