New Registration System of Communal Responsibility: It's Tricky, So Bone up Beforehand Brandon Ferguson, News Editor heads up to all you returning Douglas students: you had best prepare for registration now or you'll suffer the consequences later. Or to put it in P. Diddy terms: Prepare or Die. Registration for the Winter 2005 semester will have two radically different components to it, involving stricter time- lines and demanding more student diligence. The change is intended to ensure that all students get the courses they need, and is meant to create a com- munal responsibility among students. Basically, don’t be a putz and hold on to more courses than you need because it screws over a friend you haven’t made yet. Before I bugger this up, please go online to the Douglas website and click on the “Get ready to register for Winter 2005” link. Read about what’s new, and follow it through the registration and class- schedule __ tutorials. Seriously, you'll be way better off than if you follow my gib- berish instructions. Still reading? You tule! Thanks for the trust. Now here’s the haps. The two _ big changes involve the refund policy and wait lists. The refund policy is ridiculously punitive but, my fel- low anarchists, it is with good intentions. You what you are taking (and be registered in those courses) before school begins. As such, if you drop a should know course after January 3rd, you get only 70 percent of your tuition fees back. Drop in the second week and you get zilch. Harsh? Yes, but with purpose. The waiting lists have been modified so that you can wait in up to 10 sections. That can be one section in 10 courses, or 10 sections in one course, or any other conceivable combination you math majors can think of. Just don’t exceed 10 waiting lists. Let’s say you want to take a course. We'll call it Karma 100. You can get into Karma 100’s Tuesday class but you’d pre- fer the Thursday one, which is full and has a waiting list. You can be content with the right course but a screwy schedule and take ‘Tuesday, or you can be put on the wait list for Thursday. You cannot do both. The rigidity of the system is intend- ed to give every student a shot at the courses they need. If you choose to go on a wait list, you must confirm this every 72 hours from the time you join the wait list. Yes it’s a pain in the ass, but you were going to check out anyway, so just do it. You can monitor your climb up the wait list, and as you get closer to the top you'll want to start checking daily to see if you have been offered a spot. New spots are opened at 12:30pm every- day, Monday through Saturday. Don’t rush, just check, because if you are at the top of the wait list you will automatically be offered the chance to register in that class. You have 24 hours to do this. You can also go online and give the registrar’s office your email address, and they will send you an email notifying you of the offer. Confused? Hang on. There are some important dates you still have to remem- ber. December 13th is the absolute last day to pay your fees in full (by 4pm). If you don’t, you will be dropped from ALL your registered courses and all wait lists. This sucks. So pay. Unless you believe in this communal responsibility so much that you'd like to give all those unmade friends the courses you had. There’s a reason why they’re not your friends—you’re way too good for them. So screw ’em and pay. On December 15th at 8:00pm, all the spots held by those who haven’t paid will be opened up to students on the waiting lists. Again, don’t rush, just check, because if you’re around the top you'll be offered those spots. What then class? Accept the offer within 24 hours and you will be in that course. Your next big day comes January 3rd, 2005. If you are in the top 10 spots on the wait list, you can and are expected to attend the first class of that course. The instructor will take attendance, and if there are any students dropping that course, it will be offered to the highest spot from the wait list in attendance. If you are on the wait list and don’t attend, you will be skipped over for any available spots. If you go and are told by the instruc- tor that you'll be offered a spot, run home and sit by the computer. You'll be sent an electronic offer at either 6am or 1pm, depending on the time of your class. You have six-(6) (SIX) hours to accept. Please do. For my fellow slackers and boozers, beware: you’ve got to be there on day one, too. If you skip out on the first day and don’t confirm your absence beforehand with your instructor, you may lose your place in that class. So scrub the fuzz off your tongue, wipe the eggnog from your eyes, and carry your hungover ass to class. Pll bring Tums and extra pajama pants for all of you. Oh, and_ there’s add/drop sheets to fill out. Everything’s done electronically, but you'll have to pay also no more for any added courses by the next day online or in person. So: that’s that, chicken fat. It’s not meant to be hard, it only sounds that way. “Tt’s an increased effort for sure,” Associate Registrar, Ashifa Dhanani told me, “but the hope is to have all your reg- istration issues taken care of before you get back to school.” Any more problems, with either the new rules, the online tutorials, or regis- tration in general, please contact the registrat’s offices directly (NW: 604.527.5478 or David Lam: 604.777.6228), or email Ashifa at . Hey Prince George: Cheers to You UNBC Students Vote for Independent Newspaper Jonathan Woodward, CUP British Columbia Bureau Chief fter a student newspaper was A shut down and had its funding frozen by its student-union pub- lishers over an article that said men should become “novelties for the super rich,” students at the University of Northern British Columbia have voted to make that newspaper an independently funded publication. More than two-thirds of undergradu- H | OUREPPPeSs ate student voters at the Prince George campus decided in a referendum to sepa- rate Over the Edge from the Northern Undergraduate Student Society and fund the paper directly at $5 per student per term. “We know now that the student body supports Over the Edge,” said editor-in- chief Carolynne Burkholder. “The concept of freedom of the press, that governments should never control the press, is the main issue behind this refer- endum.” In September, Over the Edge published a satirical article called “Men in the Modern World,’ which blamed men for the development of destructive technolo- gy, saying only men would need “dangerous phallic symbols like guns, rockets, and submarines.” When genetic technology allows, “men should be forced into non-exis- tence for the safety of the entire earth. Maybe one or two could be kept alive as novelties for the super rich,” the article said. University harassment officer Cindy Hardy said the article violated the univer- sity’s harassment policy and could be offensive to men. The student union: Continued on page 5 hovember = al/adow