Administration working to fix problems
by Connie Yu, Managing Editor

   It has become a common scene in front of the registrar—students, and sometimes parents, comforting each other with their similar tales of troubles with online registering as well as repeated attempts to brace the long lines.
   Nick Garcia had problems getting his new password set up at home, but using a campus computer by the registrar’s office did not help him any further.
   “I tried at home, but that was not working,” the EMS program student said.
   “So I just came here and tried to do it here like last semester, but it’s not working either.”
   Instead, he was confounded by a screen message that denied his access to registration because of “some restrictions.”
   “What does that mean?” he asked.
   While Garcia said he understands he must be patient with the new system network, others found remaining calm a bit harder.
   “It never would load,” Richard Long said, describing his try at logging on to the registration Web site from a home computer.    “When I came here, the computer here didn’t work either. It’s just frustrating.”
   Long, who was trying to register for her daughter, ended up confronting the long line in front of the registrar like many others before him.
   One of Long’s line-mates, Tai Vo, was taking his second shot at registering.
   “I was here yesterday,” the first-time applicant said. “But the line was kind of long, so I left.”
   Not all of the students stuck in the lines wanted to register.
   It was Melba Smiley’s third try in front of the registrar, and she was there to petition for graduation.
   “The lines are very long,” she said, “and I have to do it over my lunch breaks.”
   Justin Sanders tried to drop a class before Saturday, the official last day to drop, but he had a hard time going near the registrar amid the rest of the registering crowd.
   “I checked the lines several times today,” the business student said, “because it’s been so insane.”
   In the future, Smiley and Sanders may be able to complete their tasks online with the new system, but right now, they are told to be patient in front of the registrar’s office.
   “I know it’s very distressing,” Dr. Cathie Jackson, director of registration and admissions, said, “and it’s not the way we’d like to do things.”
   Jackson said the college is trying to improve the conditions.
   “I don’t know if we could have done anything differently,” she said. “It’s an enormous project, and we are lucky to have gotten the system together in time for registration.”
   TCC has extended the deadline to drop a class to Saturday, Nov. 22, for students who were delayed by the registration rush, but for the students trying to register, Jackson advised preplanning.
  “The registration itself has gone really well,” she said. “It’s a really easy system to work with, but you have to plan ahead.”
   An unusually large early registration crowd and ignorance of the new online procedures from many students caused most of the problems last week, Jackson said.
   However, with some refining of the procedures and more notices to students, the director of admissions said she expects the situation to improve in coming weeks.
   “I know that we are going to get better at it,” she said. “I am just hoping for it to happen sooner.”
   Richard Vela, an advisor of five years on NE Campus, said he has expected some problems and delays with the administration’s first run of the new system.
  However, Vela said he did not expect the flux of students pouring in since the start of early registration.
   “I have never seen so many students trying to get in on the first day of registration,” he said. “It was a real surprise for me.”
   More than 8,200 students have enrolled in TCC in the first four days of early registration, and 2,900 of them registered on the first day.
   With the system slowed down by the overwhelming workloads and advisors trying to help students as they learn about the changes in registration and the new success initiatives, some delays may be inevitable, Vela said.
   “You just learn how to use patience,” he said. “It was challenging for us to tell the students to be patient and stick with us.”
   With a record number of students registering so early, available course sections are going fast, Jackson said.
   “A lot of Internet classes are closed already,” she said, “and that’s very frustrating, especially for those who have been trying [to register] and couldn’t.”