The registration problems experienced by some students on the first day of summer registration (the subject of your op-ed piece on June 12) came as much of a surprise to the College of Management (CM) and the Division of Corporate, Continuing and Distance Education (CCDE) as to the students who became caught up in the situation. More than 6,000 students generate over 10,000 course registrations during the summer and for most registration is a trouble-free experience. But naturally, the first day of registration is the busiest, and unfortunately, problems do arise. We took steps on that day to reduce the problems and have more plans in place to further reduce any problems next year. Nonetheless, we would like to take the opportunity to extend our apology for those students who did get caught up in the problems this year.

The requirement for an approval signature for MGT 490 when taken in the summer is not new. We did, and continue to, publicize this requirement. In fact, CM was available and did clear a number of students for this course the week before summer registration began. However there were some problems in publicizing this requirement this year, due to production snags with the catalog and CM newsletter. In earlier years the additional steps of obtaining a CM signature for MGT 490 was only a minor inconvenience, but for those students who ended up in line behind students who had arrived as early as three hours before CCDE’s publicized 8:00am opening, it became much more than that.

Upon learning of the problems CM immediately streamlined the procedures for granting permission for management courses and CCDE made sure that affected students did not have wait in line to complete their registration. Since that day our staffs have had several meetings about how to reduce these problems next year, including a meeting with two student senators who provided several recommendations that we intend to follow. Next year CM will (1) describe the signature requirements more clearly in CCDE’s summer bulletin and web site, (2) make sure the information about how to get advance approval is publicized early, and (3) will assign a CM staff member to be at CCDE to help with CM issues on the first day of summer registration.

We expect that these efforts will augment our ongoing efforts to ease registration hassles for CM students, both during the summer and the academic year. But we know that improvements can always be made and students should know that CM and CCDE remain committed to doing so.

Sincerely,Janet M. WagnerAssociate DeanCollege of Management

Burton H. HolmesAssistant DeanCorporate, Continuing and Distance Education