Academic Advising: How to Select Courses

Selecting classes each semester is one of the most important decisions you will make at college. You will make these choices in consultation with your faculty adviser. Prior to the meeting with your adviser, at the midpoint of each semester during the Advising Period, there are several things you should consider.

Degree Works report.    Login to MyPlattsburgh and navigate to DegreeWorks. The report shows completed requirements and those which are still outstanding. Review your report prior to meeting with your adviser.

Course balance.    Generally, a well-balanced course load includes both technical courses (computing, mathematics, science) and humanities gen ed courses with reading and writing.

Plan your load.    The average load students take is 15 credits per semester (for instance five 3-credit courses); with such a load you can complete the 120-credit college requirement and graduate in eight semesters (four years). 12 credits are required in order to maintain the full-time status. Any load bigger than 18 credits is considered heavy and requires a 3.0 or higher cumulative GPA, filling out an Authorization to Register for Credit Hour Overload form, permission from the department chair, and approval by the dean.

Requirements of state and federal financial aid    Notice that state and federal financial aid will pay for only 120 credits and require every semester 12 credits in courses strictly necessary for the degree. (Credits required for additional majors and minors only count towards financial aid up to the 120 total credits required for graduation.) Consult the Office of Financial Aid.

Summer and winter sessions.    If you wish to graduate sooner than four years, you can take courses during summer and winter sessions. CSC 121 Introduction to Computing and the Web and many Gen-Ed courses and math courses are available during these sessions. CSC 497/498 Internship may also be available. Notice however that other CSC courses are not offered during these sessions.

Fundamental CSC courses.    Take the following courses during the freshman year or as early as possible — they are prerequisites for all other CSC courses.

Plan ahead.    Since not all courses are taught each semester, it is a good idea to plan when you will take each required course so that you can complete prerequisite courses in time. Use Projections of CSC Course Offerings together with your DegreeWorks report to make a plan for the rest of your studies.

Placement and proficiency exams.    Placement exams are offered in English and Math — If you take these exams, you will be placed in a course at an appropriate level. If you have knowledge equivalent to MAT 102 Precalculus, take Calculus Readiness Test (MAT 102 or passign this test is a prerequisite for core CSC courses. There is a proficiency exam in Library Skills — you can take this exam to test out of LIB 200. There is also a foreign language exam that will place you at an appropriate level or out of the requirement.

Learning skills courses.    Complete the following required GenEd courses during the freshman year or as early as possible:

How many more semesters before graduating?    Work with your DegreeWorks report. Take the biggest of the numbers above; If you are taking 15 credits per semester, divide it by 15 — you need at least that many semesters.

BS or BA?    In the case of computing disciplines, Bachelor of Science degree (BS) is more respected by employers than Bachelor of Arts (BA). The same concerns graduate school admissions. Consider switching to the BS version of your major — this will require only 10-12 more credits in upper level elective CSC courses. A BA version of a computing major is recommended only in the student has two majors or is under time constraints which do not allow completing additional electives for the BS degree.

CS, IT or SEC minor.    Consider a minor to strengthen your degree. Some students declare multiple minors. In the case of CS, IT and SEC minors, about 6 credits will double-count towards the major and the minor. To declare a minor fill out Declaration or Change of Major/Minor/Advisor Form and give it to the Chair of the Department.

Interdisciplinary minors in Bioinformatics, Robotics and Web Design.    If you have interest in biology, you can enhance your Computer Science major with a Bioinformatics minor. Robotics ivolves physics courses. If you like art or writing you can declare Web Design and Programming Minor that involves courses from Art, Communication and Journalism departments, among others.

Math courses.    Math is useful in computer science, although substantially less math is needed in IT. If you like math, consider taking the math minor. Due to a big overlap in requirements between this minor and the Computer Science Major, you can complete Math Minor by taking just 7 additional credits. We recommend the following MAT courses.

Natural science courses.    We recommend that you take either physics or biology or chemistry to meet your General Education Natural Science requirement. Physics is recommended for students interested in low level computing, embedded systems or robotics; PHY 111 is a prerequisite for PHY 379 Introductory Robotics; If you complete PHY112 you will have the prerequisite for advanced courses such as PHY350 Circuits and Electronics and PHY365 Electronics for Scientists which relate to computer hardware engineering. Bioinformatics applies computer science to problems of genome mapping with information retrieval and protein and enzyme modeling; completing BIO 101 or CHE 112 you will give you one of the prerequisites for BIO 341 DNA and Bioinformatics.

Foreign languages.    Knowing a foreign language can help you get a better job and will be useful in your career. Even if the Gen-Ed program allows you to fulfill the requirement by taking a course on World Systems instead of a language course, consider what is most useful for your career. We recommend completing a foreign language course.

College electives.     The college requires 120 credits for an undergraduate degree. Fulfilling all the CS, IT or SEC major requirements and Gen-Ed requirements will give you only about 90 credits. To make up the difference consider taking CSC courses towards an additional minor. Minors offered by the Computer Science Deaprtment allow a 33 percent credit overlap with the majors, so you can get such a minor for, say, 12 credits, instead of 18.

Upper level credit requirement.    In your DegreeWorks report you will find information on how many upper level (300- or 400-level) credits you have accumulated out of the 45 required for graduation.

Apply for the diploma.    In your senior year, right  after registering for courses for your final semester, fill out the Diploma Application Form on-line. The Registrar will then check your academic records to determine if you satisfied all requirements for graduation, and will notify you about the conclusion. Do not delay the application for the diploma — if there is any requirement you missed and/or any error on the DegreeWorks report, you need to learn about it when there is still time to fulfill the requirement.

Plan your schedule to allow for extracurricular activities.    Every week CS, IT and SEC students, faculty and other interested persons meet for Video and Discussion.

Consider going to a graduate school. Additional career possibilities become available if you complete a graduate degree. The CS major with Mathematics Minor will prepare you for graduate studies in any computer-related area. Our alumni who have gone on to graduate studies in computing tell us that it is useful to complete an advanced probability and statistics course, such as MAT 361 (prereq: Calculus III). In most cases you can take such a course in graduate school, but you may prefer to take it in advance.