By jtmanley
Although UCA did not cancel classes for Pope Francis's inaugural mass last Tuesday, they decided to start classes at 9:30 a.m. instead of their usual 7:45 a.m. I really wanted to watch the event, but I needed all the extra hours of sleep possible. Even though this was the second week of class, I felt a little more pressure because of something called the add-drop period.
At UCA, international students can sign up for classes in any faculty of their choosing. After their initial registration during orientation week, they are given until March 22 to decide their final schedule. As a GW student who has to figure out credit amounts and transfers, I was glad that I had time to shop around. As an international student, I am required to take a Spanish class. Furthermore, there are excellent courses in the Program of Latin American Studies (PEL) that are available to international students. But as a requirement for my GW program, I have to take two regular courses if I take a PEL course. Spanish does not count towards that requirement. Now I like the regular courses at UCA. In fact, this was one of the reasons I chose this program: direct enrollment with UCA students in their classes. The problem I had was finding the second course!
As I was piecing together my schedule, I had trouble finding a second regular course that met in the morning and was open for inscription. The Ethics & Fundamentals course, although great, was a seminar course that carried over into the fall term. I had to drop that. I encountered the same problem with an interesting theology course that focused on the Catholic Church's social doctrine. Finally, I signed up for some 3rd and 4th year courses that wound up having their own issues. Government & Administration of Argentina was way too dense. Some other great courses either had professors that were way too demanding or met so late at night that I would've gotten out at 11:00 p.m.!
I will say that I'm glad to have a great GW Argentina Program Director who helped me make a great schedule during the add-drop period. Since I was sure of three to four of the five classes that I wanted to take, I didn't really have to do that much work. The hard part was finding the right fit. Eventually, I was able to determine what worked best for me. After a little bit of adding and much dropping, I finalized a schedule that I am happy with. These are the classes that I'll be taking until July (when everybody else will be vacationing):
History of Argentina I
Contemporary Political History
Peronism: Symbolic Space, Discursive Practices, and Political Practices (1943-2005)
Political and Social Processes in South America: Argentina, Chile, Brazil, and Venezuela
Intermediate Spanish II