WHAT TO KNOW
There
will be several key pieces of your orientation experience that are
focused on
academic advising and the more you've reviewed these resources in
advance, the
better prepared you will be for those pieces of the orientation
itinerary. At the end of the first day, both students and parents
together will attend a College Information Meeting. During this
session, you will learn
about the structure of the Arts & Sciences degree, the degree audit
tool,
and the academic advising relationship in general.
On the morning of the
second day, students will meet in groups of 25-30 with 3 academic
advisors. The advisors in this group will teach students how to
develop a registration strategy and will delve into specifics about the
Arts & Sciences degree requirements. In the hours following
that small group session, each student will have a short individual
appointment
with one of the advisors to finalize a plan for the registration lab
and to ask and answer
individual questions. Students will then register in a
centralized registration lab, where there are advisors and Orientation
Leaders on hand to help guide them through their first experience with
the on-line
registration system.
Selecting
Courses
In order to know how to select courses
for your first semester on campus, it is important to understand the
overall
structure of your degree. The College of Arts and Sciences
degree
consists of 120 credit hours, made up of four parts.
- Minimum
Academic Preparation Standards (MAPS) - are
requirements we expect you to have completed in high school.
You will be able to complete any deficiencies in college.
- The
Core Curriculum - incorporates the general
education courses deemed necessary to ensure a well-rounded and broad
exposure to the disciplines that make up a liberal arts degree.
- Your
Major - will be your focused area of study
within the College of Arts and Sciences.
- Electives - are courses that do not fulfill MAPS,
core, or major requirements. Think of them as everything else you are
interested in exploring. The number of electives available to
you will depend on your major.
You will select
courses for your first semester that fall into some or all of these
broad
categories.
The Degree Audit
Your degree audit is
a tool that lists your remaining and completed degree requirements and
helps
you track your progress toward graduation. You can view the
degree audit
online through MyCUinfo. It evaluates how each of your
courses is fitting
into your degree, gives you links to course descriptions in areas you
still
need to complete, and lets you view “what if” audits to explore how
your course
works fits into majors
Degree audits are
available through MyCUinfo:
1.
Log in to
MyCUinfo.colorado.edu
2.
Click the “Student” tab
3.
Click the “Degree Audit” button
4.
Log in to the Degree Audit page
After orientation, you can view your degree audit to find out how your AP, IB, or transfer course work is fitting into your degree. You will also see how each course in your new schedule fits in. You should always run a new degree audit after making adjustments to your schedule to ensure the changes apply to your degree as you intended.