You’ve been accepted to UVA — congratulations! Now you get to choose what classes to take. But there are so many options, so how are you supposed to narrow down to the five or six that will make up your first semester at UVA? Read on for some tips on how to pick your classes and how to sign up for them once you’ve decided.
Picking Your Classes
Tip #1: Look at your college credit
First, check out any credits you’re bringing with you to UVA, either through AP scores or college credit at a different institution. UVA has a couple of helpful websites so you can analyze how those credits transfer to UVA and their equivalent classes. The Registrar will evaluate your credits and confirm them over the summer, and you can check your credits on your Student Information System (SIS) page. If you come in with credits, you might place out of introductory levels.
Tip #2: Review your program’s general requirements and your degree requirements
After looking at what classes you already have credit for, read through your program’s general requirements. Each of the five schools that students apply to as first years has its own set of general requirements, which you can review in this article or in greater detail on the individual schools’ websites.
If you already know the general fields you want to major in, check out their degree requirement pages. Even if you are not fully committed to a major, taking some of those required classes or classes in the field may help you decide if you want to study the topic in greater depth or even major in it. The upper divisional programs (including Commerce, Education and Batten schools) have prerequisites before you can start.
If you’re a transfer student, you’ve probably picked classes before at your old school and have already fulfilled some or all of the general requirements at UVA. Looking at the departmental websites or emailing your faculty advisor once you’re matched is a good way to get started. Depending on what year you’re transferring into, you may still have prerequisites for majors or programs to fulfill.
Tip #3: Check out the classes available to you
Want to get a head start on seeing what sort of classes are available to you? Check out Lou’s List, run by one of UVA’s very own physics professors. The list contains all courses offered for the next semester (once they are released by the University), all classes offered in the current semester, and classes offered in past semesters. On the website you can search by department, program or requirement.
Tip #4: Make a hypothetical schedule (or several!)
As you’re making note of interesting classes, it can be beneficial to map out a hypothetical schedule based on those classes. This allows you to see potential issues, such as conflicting class times or having five classes back-to-back in a day. Some classes have labs or discussion sections as part of the class, which you’ll want to be aware of as you build them into your schedule. You should also have a list of several additional classes just in case another class is full or there’s a conflict. Most students take five classes a semester, or about 15 credit hours. But if you want to take more than 15 credit hours, you need to request an override from your individual school.
Signing Up for Classes
So you’ve analyzed what credits you have, what classes you need to take to graduate, and made a list of classes that look interesting. How and when do you sign up for them? New students sign up for classes at orientation, while current students receive a time during a specific week in the semester. Some classes require instructor permission to sign up for, so make sure you reach out to those professors ahead of time.
If one of the classes you wanted to sign up for is full, you can always enter the waiting list. Students can add or drop classes until the second week of the new semester, so if you don’t like one of your classes, you can pick a new one instead. Keep in mind that by then most classes are pretty full, so make sure you thoroughly look into your options so you can start out with a great schedule!
Students use the Student Information System (SIS) to formally sign up for their classes, which means adding the classes to a shopping cart and selecting “confirm” once it is their turn to sign up. But before you can do anything on any UVA site — including SIS — you need to understand and use Netbadge and Duo.
NetBadge, the Student Information System, and Duo
UVA uses several layers of security to protect student information, and the ones you’ll be seeing the most are Netbadge and the Duo 2-Step Login system.
A NetBadge is an electronic identification that is issued to your web browser when you log into UVA’s NetBadge service. Once you have a NetBadge, you can access the Student Information System, which houses all of your personal information regarding financials, classes, and graduation requirements. We recommend you save the e-mail with your login information in a secure place so that, if you ever forget or misplace your password, you can retrieve it by following this same process.
Once you activate your UVA computing ID, you will set up your Duo 2-Step Login. Duo provides an additional layer of security by requiring two types of authentication to verify identity during login. Please see UVA’s ITS page for information about how to set up Duo.
You have the option to have the webpage and browser remember your Duo authentication for seven days after your initial authentication. This can be useful if you use a site multiple times a day or week so you do not have to authenticate yourself each time. However, once those seven days are up, you will have to authenticate yourself again.
It might seem like a lot of steps, but once you get the hang of it, signing up for classes is a breeze!