First, Let me show you what inspired us to create this, and then I’ll show you a real example schedule we created for an upcoming freshman!
This is MY (Sam’s) real degree guide from UO
You can click here to download a PDF of the full degree guide to follow along if you want
This is how many credits I still need
Starting senior year, I only need 26 credits to graduate (for reference, most people take 45 in an average year). The problem is, I’m going to be taking 48 credits senior year to hit all of the classes I need for my majors and minors because I took the wrong classes early on in college (like an idiot).
Here’s a list of some of the classes I took
If you go through the degree guide PDF, you’ll notice that ENG 200, PHIL 103, PSY 202, and WR 123 aren’t used ANYWHERE else that makes them useful. My advisors told me to take them to cover requirements like SSC, but my regular classes ended up hitting those requirements anyways, so those four classes did nothing for me besides act as general credits that I won’t end up needing. And it’s not like they were FUN electives, they ended up dragging my GPA DOWN.
Instead of just being general credits, those 4 classes could have gone to fulfilling my remaining Science or Literature requirements, or towards my Journalism major or Business minor. Because I’m is going to have to go over the 180 credit minimum to graduate, those classes are going to cost me an EXTRA $4,000 ($1,000 a class) I could have avoided spending if I had used those classes for something I actually needed. And the thing is, I feel like I scheduled myself PRETTY WELL compared to some of my friends and classmates. Out of the 43 classes I took in college, I only took 4 that didn’t apply to my degree. Credit waste is an easy trap to fall into, and we’re here to help you avoid the mistakes that we made.
So, what will the product look like for you? Here’s a real schedule we made for a real incoming freshman who wants to double major in Journalism and Public Relations and minor in Sports Business, along with a color key, degree checklist and an in-depth explanation
Click on the picture to open a PDF version
We provide in-depth guidance and advice for both the schedule and certain classes that need more explanation, as well as a color key to understand how you can adapt your schedule when classes aren’t available certain terms.
We also provide a checklist of the requirements needed to graduate depending on your majors and minors, so that you understand why we made the choices we made and so that you don’t miss anything.
The above is the basic version for what most double J/PR Majors with a Sports Minor would look like. HOWEVER, the students dad supplied us with more information later that helped us customize his schedule to their EXACT needs. By adding in college credits from high school, we were able to free up his schedule enough to have 6 electives (enough for a whole new minor) while already having a double major and a minor. In addition, he told us that their family was from California, but was moving to Oregon and would have In-State tuition his Sophomore year. In-State classes cost around $1,000 each, while out-of-state classes cost over $3,000. Before, we had the schedule planned out to only have 12 credits a term senior year; we flipped that with freshman year, where he’d be paying Out-of-State tuition, and saved them $6,000 (and in all honesty, I don’t think a University advisor would have paid close enough attention to think of or do that).
The Original (Click for full PDF)
The Updated and Personalize (Click for full PDF). Notice the difference? It’s subtle, but we moved classes from Freshman to Senior year, and added in more electives.