Are You Gonna Graduate On Time?

The end of the semester is looming. Due dates are coming thick and fast and honestly, we're all being crushed a little bit. But hey, what is uni for if not learning how to cope with exceptionally shit circumstances while continuously maximising outputs? If you were around on campus the past few weeks, which let's be real most people weren't, then you probably saw a metric fuck ton of people in graduation robes looking way too happy to be on a university campus. Maybe you were thinking about graduating one day and realised, you have know idea what the graduation process is like.

At UOA, when you finish the requirements of your degree, you get invited to graduate from your program. It's a little email sent you to that confirms the last however many years were worth it all along. What they advertise to high schoolers is that process is 3 years long. If you're a sucker for punishment like me, your program is probably longer, but you already knew that going in. What you probably might not have known is how to plan that degree the whole way through... and now you're stuck with two weeks left of uni and the realisation that you'll be coming back around for another semester (or worse, year!) to finish that degree you didn't understand anyway.

I know that over half of my friends are stuck in their degrees for longer than what is advertised. Honestly, that's a bit messed up Dawn - get it together. It's a reflection of the challenge every single student faces in planning and passing our papers. Our university is well known as one of the worst for degree planning, with basically no effective support or guides on how to enrol correctly, and that's so much worse if you take a niche subject in the Arts. With courses being cut or changed every semester, it's basically a clusterfuck of papers until you end up with something that almost resembles a major. Good luck to all you former language majors - I feel the struggle.

It's a little clearer if you're in a more structured program like a BCom, but trust and believe it's still a bit of a mess and people are constantly finding out at the last second that they've missed one random course and they're stuck at uni for a whole semester. It delays people's ability to get work opportunities, hurts the bank account with course and living costs, and is just a bit embarassing. What's worse is that it seems like nobody can help you - even Student Hubs is notorious for sending people on wild goose chases when they give course planning advice. I think there are some people who are proper course planners, but I have no idea how you'd get an appointment with someone.

So, here's the solution: check your course requirements now. Your best bet is through the SSO where you can see the exact paper requirements including electives, but it's not very easy to understand. Unfortunately, other sources are just less likely to be up to date or have the exact specifics for your courses in particular. While most degrees have some kind of planning page, like the Arts Degree Planners, they're not always up to data and they don't give you specific paper information, just overall points. If you're lost and scared, me too queen. We can get through this together! Figure out what you need using the SSO and blaze through the rest of your degree actually knowing that you'll finish on time.