Course registration needs reform

Bookbagging season evokes a variety of emotions from students, ranging from excitement to anxiety. Prevalent among these is frustration with the antiquated ACES system due to problems with its interface and content.

These issues are not debilitating, but they nonetheless degrade the course registration process for students. Due to the scope of their implications, rather than the severity, the means of course registration still needs reform. An improved user experience would encourage excitement about courses and the registration process, thus fostering a more conducive environment for academic enthusiasm.

At present, the content of ACES often forces students to make uninformed or only partially informed decisions about classes. In the absence of in-depth information about a course, students rely on trivial aspects like course titles or meeting times. To help students make more informed decisions, each course on ACES should include a substantial synopsis so students know the intellectual questions the course attempts to tackle. Similarly, tentative course syllabuses should accompany every class.

In 2005, Duke Student Government launched the DSG online syllabus archive, which allowed students to upload and share course syllabuses with each other. However, the site has been neglected, either due to lack of student interest or a failure to update the site. Either way, the primary responsibility should lie with individual professors to upload their syllabuses to ACES. Such an initiative would benefit both parties—students could have more and better information about their course options, and professors would be more likely to initially attract genuinely interested students.

Aside from the content, the ACES interface is similarly problematic. Navigating the site is clumsy, as students lack standard conveniences like an intuitive “back” button from the browser. Links within the system are not intuitive, causing confusion in performing simple tasks. Furthermore, cross-listed courses pose additional challenges to bookbagging because they are labeled independently in each department, leading to confusion about multiple course numbering and wait lists.

These interface problems are just several of many. But all dampen a student’s course registration experience, burdening it with technological difficulties rather than illuminating it with academic excitement.

Kaveh Danesh, DSG vice president for academic affairs, has proposed an event called Bookbag Sunday to increase the excitement surrounding bookbagging. Bookbag Sunday would be a pre-registration social in the library where deans and professors could chat with students about courses. Such an event would take place the Sunday preceding bookbagging, It would allow students to better choose their next semester’s courses and get excited about them.

ACES certainly has its problems, but they are not so insurmountable to merit a new and likely expensive software suite. But when Duke does inevitably purchase new course registration software in the future, it should invest in new, top-of-the-line software rather than something already outdated at the time of purchase.