HELP! I'm getting a registration error message!

Fri, 13 Nov 2015 15:18:39 -0500
registration, troubleshoot

So, you've seen your academic advisor and gotten registration advising clearance. You've picked your classes and put them in your SA "shopping cart." But when you hit that "enroll" button, you get an error message! What gives!

Before you send a panicked email to your advisor, tap into the troubleshooting skills that you, as a STEM major, are developing. Begin by:

Reading the error message carefully. SA will tell you what the problem is.

Remembering that SA is a program. It does exactly what it has been written to do, and cannot make assumptions. If you don't have your pre-requisites lined up exactly as they have been defined for a course, or you're in violation of some sort of rule (like a time conflict, or exceeding maximum number of credits), SA is not going to allow you to proceed.This is also true of the way instructors must issue permissions, and departments build courses in the schedule- details that are overlooked can make a big impact on registration.

Returning to the start. Did you remember to check the "Wait List if class is full" box? Did you need Departmental Consent? Are you sure that there weren't time conflicts with any components of your other classes? As course registration heats up and classes start to fill, sometimes the best way of making sure that you've addressed all of the possible things that could be contributing to your error message is to delete a course from your shopping cart and go back through the process of trying to add it to your schedule from the beginning. Don't think of this as a failure...even very experienced students (and advisors) have to do this during peak registration times.

Some common error messages, and ways to troubleshoot them:

"Ineligible to Register" error message

What to do: Make sure that you are actually eligible to register - your credit total may be lower than you think! If you have used Degree Audit in SA to determine your credit total for registration eligibility, you may be trying to register too early. Degree Audit counts both earned credits and in-progress credits toward your 120-credit-minimum requirement, but your registration time is based on earned credits only. The link below will take you to instructions on how to find the correct information in SA.

"Pre-Requisites not met" error message

What to do: Look at the published, electronically-enforced pre-requisites (listed in the "Enrollment Information" box in a course's description), and make sure that you have already completed the pre-requisites, or have them in-progress. Transfer students and those with AP/IB credit should check to make sure that course equivalencies are displaying correctly in their transfer credit report. If you believe that you are eligible to take a course, request an override of electronically-enforced pre-requisites from the instructor listed for the course (in the case of a "Staff" listing, contact the course's academic department for appropriate point of contact). DO NOT contact your academic advisor for a pre-requisite override unless he/she is listed as the course instructor!

"Course is closed" error message

What to do: Find another open section of the course, or add yourself to the Wait List. If you didn't check off the "Wait List if class is full" box when you put the course into your shopping cart, you may need to delete the course from your cart, and put it back in, making sure that the box is checked off this time. Remember that, for multiple-component courses (e.g., CHEM101, PHYS121, BIOL141, MATH151), all of the course components must be open in order for you to get a seat in the course. If even one course component is full, you will be wait listed for the entire class. There is also a cap on the number of credits that you can be wait listed for (10) - use them wisely!

For more course registration "How-To" videos, quick guides, and FAQs to assist you in your troubleshooting, follow the link below!

If you continue to have difficulty, contact your advisor.