Defocused Temporal Perception

Bureaucracy.  Not that it is out of place during the first week of school at UBC – or any university for that matter – but the happenings this week have been particularly kurt to say the least.  So returning from 16 months of Co-op positions with two rather large software projects under my belt I was pretty excited to return to classes, with plans to graduate in the spring.

The Computer Science Department has politely deregistered me from my courses and applied its “stickler” policy due to the fact that I was missing a prerequisite that I am currently taking in concurrence with my other courses.  Upon seeing an adviser, with an attitude that was similar to another article that I was reading on dredging,  suggested I take “other biology courses” to forward my combined degree.  However, these are rather limited because of the Biology Department’s own policy on taking the required third year physiology stream of courses when you are physically a “third year” student lest you be deregistered from your specific specialization.  This leaves with a pretty empty time table containing only two courses, pushes my graduation back not one but possibly two years (that is if I wait around for some of the forth year bioinformatics courses to happen again) and the prospects of a graduate school application into limbo.

Officer "Short Shrift"

Normally, I would side with the department on this one.  It is important to take the prerequisite courses prior to taking more advanced courses.  I have even tried my best to take this course in the past; however past attempts to take this prerequisite course were limited by the University’s maximum credit policy.  Further attempts to extend my credit limit during this time were denied by the administration at Brock Hall.

Now administration details notwithstanding, the courses that am being deregistered from – particularly Introduction to Databases (CPSC 304), Introduction to Software Engineering (CPSC 310) – have a rather direct relevance to my previous Co-op experience.  While working at UBC IT I help develop the UBCevents public events calendar and my main project at the REW Hancock Lab was creating a Pseudomonas Protein-Protein interaction database and web service for Microbiologists.  So irregardless of rules and regulations there is precedence that should justify my registering for these courses.  I’d say that the whole process has given me a pretty classic “short shrift.”

Thus the appeal.  But should it even succeed I’d have to try register again for some pretty packed classes.  Leaving me no choice but to disrespectfully wedge myself in with other students in already full classes.  My apologies in advance if any of my fellow students get hurt.

This whole ordeal highlights how undergraduate students really just gunk up the “cookie-cutter” cogs of the university.