This is part of our 2021 Unofficial Orientation Series. A quick reminder that you can check out the welcome post here and past years’ series here.

Disclaimer: While the tips introduced in this post can be applied universally, you should remember that your odds of getting into a class depend primarily not on your effort, but on the professor’s policies and how popular the class is (and, also, maybe how lucky you are). It’s pretty much impossible to convince a professor of an extremely popular class who simply won’t go over the limit to accept you into their class, even if you do absolutely everything right. But, trying can’t hurt, right?

Hello, and welcome to today’s episode of Unofficial Orientation. The focus of today’s episode will be mainly on the devil known as drop/add. If you don’t know what that is (seriously, how do you not know what that is yet?), the folks at the registrar’s office have provided this overview. During this period, students are able to add or drop pretty much any class to their schedule, regardless of the limits posed by pre-reg (however, your faculty advisor will have to approve an extension in your credit limit if you go above 4 credits). I also highly recommend you check out this FAQ, also kindly prepared by the registrar’s office, as a way to get the basics down before proceeding. This post will not be doing much explaining of Drop/Add itself. It will, however, try to warn you, innocent, unassuming frosh, about the reality of this brutal race and offer some insights (read: randomly gathered knowledge that may have been the results of embarrassing behaviors of the author (and past authors)).