Author: Caroline Olsen-Van Stone
Last semester, I got my Reggie PIN, and got excited to register for spring term. What I didn’t know was that an evil surprise laid waiting for me in the prerequisite sector. I had no trouble getting into classes within my major, but the formal reasoning classes proved more of a challenge.
I have finished all of my requirements and have senior standing as a junior because of AP credits. I have wanted to take a psychology class since I got to Occidental, and I work for a clinical psychologist, so I figured I should take it before graduating. I searched for Psych101, and clicked “Add.” To my dismay, an error message appeared: “Open to freshman and sophomores only.”I am a junior.
Thus began my quest for a holy spot in Psych101. I wrote to the professors of both sections of the class, both of which have 50 freshmen and sophomores enrolled. None of the responses I received were reassuring. I decided I would try my luck at the method that has worked with every other class I have ever wanted to get into: show up anyway.
I showed up for the first day of class, in which we did two really interesting exercises: one about memory, the other about social psychology. Both made me even more interested.
At the end of class, I explained my predicament to the teachers, but they said since I am a junior, that the answer is probably no. My name was written down, and next to it, in capital letters, my stigma: JR.
I then went to talk to the other Psych 101 section teachers, and their responses were firm: no juniors, especially at this point.
I can understand the need for limiting a Psych intro class enrollment. They are always bursting at the seams, certainly upping the average class size of 21 on which Oxy prides itself so highly. The other reason is that any intro class is designed to help students decide if they want to major in the subject, so my junior status would preclude me on both counts.
But what about my interest in psychology? I spoke with more than five students in the first section of psychology that I sat in on who explained their disinterest in Psychology. “This is going to be a long semester. I am just taking it because it satisfies the science req,” one first-year student admitted to me. Let me clarify again that I am finished with all of my requirements.
I understand wanting to limit the class to possible majors and thus first and second-year students. But what teacher would rather teach a disinterested age-qualified student rather than a fully interested older student? (I can’t wait to experience real ageism, by the way.)
Psychology is among a few other intro level classes to deliver a “freshmen and sophomores only” punch this spring, including Sociology, Geology and Math as a Liberal Art.
Prior to this semester, these classes have been open to all students. I would have taken Psych earlier had I known that I would not be able to get in to the class as a junior or senior.
This policy, while it does achieve the desired effect of limiting the enrollment in intro-level classes, is unfair to students wishing to get a survey of a particular field (for which intro classes are designed).
Before implementing an enrollment limit policy, Occidental or the Psych department should offer yet another section of Psychology 101 or let juniors and seniors take the class (especially juniors and seniors who have already completed their science requirements).
Keeping interested students out of classes goes against the liberal arts college method of education. The point is to educate students in a variety of fields, and cultivate their stronger interests into majors or minors. If I wanted to get a field-specific education, I would have gone elsewhere, without a Harvard price tag.
Caroline Olsen-Van Stone is a junior CTSJ major. She can be reached at cstone@oxy.edu.
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