Amid this semester’s cancellation of classes, Communications Chair Laura Castañeda described what happened in her department as more than just cuts.
“We understand the district’s logic that they would cancel a class that only had two or three students enrolled in it, it’s just not feasible, you know, to have a class like that,” Castañeda said in an interview. “So we’re in total agreement with them on some of those types of situations come up sometimes.”
Where the agreement breaks off is when administration holds program classes to have the minimum 18 students enrolled without regard to the particular class, the classroom space and equipment constraints that may be a pre-existing condition.
Castañeda shared her department’s challenges with class cancellations: Before Aug. 24, two classes in Communications were cancelled and two classes were cancelled after Aug. 24. For the classes that were cancelled prior to the start of the semester, Castañeda had been informed by Dean Trudy Gerald that the possibility existed.
About the classes cancelled after the first day of the semester: RTVF 121 (Performance for Television) met the first week of classes with 12 enrolled students. The class instructor, adjunct Lisa Grossman-Lake, gave out three add codes. Sometime during the weekend of Aug. 28, students later reported that Reg-E was down, therefore they could not enter their add codes, which would have totaled 15 students-the magic minimum enrollment number to keep the class from being cancelled. The class roster disappeared from the instructor’s view Aug. 31. Students were notified via email, the morning of Sept. 2, minutes before the start of class that they were dropped, not that the class was cancelled.
As for the other class: it was another section of RTVF 107 (Audio Production) that is required for a degree. The second section of RTVF 107 would replace RTVF 125 and be offered online. That decision was made one week before the start of classes, but an administrative assistant who was the only assigned person to create and upload the online class was out the first week of classes, therefore students only had one week to get the class, but not enough students did, so RTVF 107 was cancelled, too.
One class was pulled out of the fire: RTVF 121. The original class was on Wednesdays 9:35 a.m. to 11:55 a.m. A new section of the class was created amidst the questionable circumstances in which the class was cancelled. The new section is still on Wednesdays 9:15 a.m. to 12:55 p.m. and has two seats still available as of Sept. 24.
