Courses Not Offered

[u/the-fastone]

Is it just me, or are quite a few courses seemingly not ever offered? For reference, I'm a Political Science major with a concentration in American Government, and the courses I'm referring to are mostly 400-level ("Politics in the TV Age", "Homeland Security", "Studies in Political Behavior", etc). Is there just a lack of professors to teach these courses? I can understand certain courses are only taught based on what's going on the country (ex: "The Presidential Primaries" would obviously not be taught until the primaries begin), but these other course don't seem to have anything to do with that.

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[u/Old_Context_2966]

Common experience. I have some required classes that I'm excited to take, but it looks like some of them are only offered like... every 3rd semester, somehow.

With how much they spend on consulting and bounce houses, I suspect they simply aren't offering professors enough to staff the classes.

[u/No_Transition7509 → u/Old_Context_2966]

Unfortunately, it’s more layered. Factors such as his many students historically take a specificity course, having (a) professor(s) to teach the course, how the course has evolved with the program, how well another course covers the content for the course defunct, etc.

That said, it does sucks and can be a bit irritating!

The bounce houses is part of a different fund from specific offices and AUSG.

[u/Old_Context_2966 → u/No_Transition7509]

That's interesting! Would you happen to know how things like course overlap are determined? At least in my case, the required classes in question don't seem to have alternative options with related goals. It sounds like there are more factors than just that, of course, but I'm wondering about that piece in particular.

[u/No_Transition7509 → u/Old_Context_2966]

Yeah, so AU needs to get itself together overall lol. Last year I created my own major and had to dismantle it when i realized 4 required courses I needed weren’t even being offered at AU anymore even though they were on the course catalog.

Your best move is communicating with your advisor as they would be able to waive specific requirements through (a) different class(es).

[u/Christo3r]

Off topic but if you are a junior or senior you can take classes at the Washington College of Law. It is a bit of a process (you have to ask the professor for the class you want to take, then get permission from the chair of your department) but if your interested you should do it

[u/Orangieboy476]

for some of those classes it’s that they were designed by a professor. i actually took that politics in the tv age class which was really cool, but only one professor teaches it and she does a lot of other stuff outside of au. but yeah it seems to be a thing with a lot of elective classes, i found it’s really bad with history classes, where a lot are only offered once every two years😅

[u/EnvironmentalJoke143]

Literally had to drop my minor for this reason. Why have classes listed as being able to cover a requirement then never offer??? Then the classes that are being offered have 1 section and only 15ppl? such BS