By NATALIE K. CLARK
Daily Universe Staff Reporter
The beginning of the semester means new classes, and while some students are just starting at BYU, others are trying to get into the major they have invested their time, effort and money into.
“The big challenge is our accrediting body requires that we have an admission process,” said Winston Egan, BYU department chair of teacher education. “By virtue of having an admissions process, we need to make applications for limited enrollment. If it is open access, there is no application – you just enroll.”
BYU offers Bachelor’s degrees in 190 academic programs, in 11 different colleges: Biology and Agriculture; David O. McKay School of Education; Ira A. Fulton College of Engineering and Technology; Family, Home and Social Sciences; Fine Arts and Communications; Health and Human Performance; Humanities; J. Reuben Clark Law School; Marriott School of Management; Nursing; and Physical and Mathematical Sciences.
Limited enrollment programs are important for university accreditation, but it is also critical to students and graduates and the type of education they receive while at BYU.
“If you are going to become a German, French or Spanish teacher, it is absolutely essential that you have the language competence, both speaking and writing, to actually model the behavior for your students,” Egan said. “The same would be true in music. One of the challenges we face is not excluding people who would otherwise be good teachers, but particularly those who are in secondary, and to a greater extent, even those who are in elementary. They need to have what we call content competence, or we would be disserving the young people they teach.”
Limited enrollment programs are beneficial to teachers also.
“In order to be an effective teacher you have to have what I call superior content knowledge,” Egan said. “So if you’re teaching history, German or mathematics, it would be silly to admit people who have what we might call sub-average performance in their discipline.”
Students who are not accepted to their degree programs can apply again or change their major.
“Students visit the University Advisement Center frequently needing to find another major because they were not accepted to their major,” said Marinda Pope, the student secretary in University Advisement Center.
“In elementary education, we bend over backwards to make sure we are making a wise decision,” Egan said. “Maybe once we have collected the data, we schedule interviews or seek addition information on the borderline students.”
For students who do not have a problem getting into their chosen major, the application process is painless.
“I got in, I don’t care,” said Lesley Larson, a senior from Martinez, Calif. “I think it is good that there is a weeding-out process.”
Once Jami Coon had been accepted to the public relations major, she could see the value in the limited enrollment program.
“I think that people will work harder to be accepted to their major,” said Coon, a senior from Plymouth, Minn. “I think that it is exciting because it shows progression in the Communications Department as a competitive and coveted major.”
The limited enrollment programs across campus are continuously changing as BYU faculty try and perfect the system.
“It is a challenge deciding what that level ought to be,” Egan said. “It is not a straight forward formula; there are a lot of complicated factors. A lot of it is related to this whole notion of mentoring. You have to know if there are enough personnel or faculty members in a given department to handle the number of students who are coming through.”
Jill Newbold, a senior majoring in communication studies, said she understands if there isn’t enough faculty, classes or rooms, students can’t be admitted.
“If there are only three faculty members and say 300 students, they wouldn’t be able to place students in appropriate settings and give supervision,” Egan said.
Students who apply to their majors have a list of classes to complete, application deadlines, job experience and in some cases a portfolio to prepare. In addition, having too many credits can hinder whether students are accepted to the program.
“It is already hard to get into BYU, and then if you don’t get into your major and you have too many credits to continue going to school and to reapply, what are you supposed to do?” Newbold said. “Are you supposed to go from a math major that you wanted to get into, to an English major? You shouldn’t be forced to major in something you don’t want to major in. If you have been diligent and been trying to get into the major you want, you should be let in.”
