Thursday, July 22, 2010

"That's Not Our Department."

I go to a community college, and around here it's pretty notorious for adult women coming back to school to go to the nursing program. (We have a very good nursing program, and our X-Ray tech and sonography programs are similarly great.) That's a tale for another post though.

This semester we implemented a new idea; credit based registration. Previously, returning students had been able to register for classes before anyone else, and were able to do it online. Now it went by people with the most credits going first. I believe this so that people who have been here longer can get into the classes they need first.

I have logged about fifty three credits in the four semesters that I've been here (I had one particularly nutty venture where I took eighteen credits in one semester). The first day possible, I went ahead and registered for all my classes.

My financial aid was going to be able to cover everything, but it was going to take a few weeks to process my paper work, because that's just how they roll. I went to defer my payments, and skipped merrily away, glad all that was taken care of.

Sadly, today I went to go and check on my classes, and to my dismay--I HAD BEEN DROPPED FROM ALL OF THEM. No e-mail, no phone call, no nothing. I sure get handfuls of letters and phone calls if I owe them so much as a penny, or when they want me to donate to them, but not when it comes to anything important.

So I march myself down to Student Services and find out that my deferred payment had never gone through. I told the cashier I should have been notified. She gave me a deer in the headlights look and murmure; "That's not our department."

This is completely typical response here. Financial Aid down? Go to Student Services to Financial Aid, not their department. Records lost? Not Student Services department. They lose your paperwork (this happened to me twice)? Not their department. Need your ID? Not their department. Need your login fixed? Don't ask IT!

I hate it so much.

I did get registered for new classes, and I'm still only on campus two days a week, so I guess it's okay. :/

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