Grad check process aided by computers

Just mentioning the term "grad-check" on many college campuses sends chills down many students backs. It seems you have to wait, and wait, and wait.

Cal State Long Beach's department of Enrollment Services now has a computer system that can process a grad-check in a fraction of the time it would take a human, using a manual, easing the heavy burden placed on the five individuals who handle over 6,300 gradchecks filed each year.

"It (the computer) takes 15 to 20 seconds, and a manual takes anywhere from 30 to 60 minutes and sometimes longer, dependent on transfer credits," Ernst Huff, associate vice-president of Enrollment Services, said.

The system was used for transfer-students entering CSULB in Spring 1995 and who attended the SOAR program. Those students who had already declared a major were given a degree audit, another term for grad-check, on the spot.

"That's evidence of where the degree-audit is going," Huff said.

Huff said enrollment services encourages students to file gradchecks one year in advance, but that doesn't mean it takes one year to deal with each individual request.

Huff said that the two most important tools used by enrollment services, which are the University Bulletin catalogue and the program planners from their specific departments, to evaluate whether or not a student is lacking a course or two, are available to students.

"In reality, the same tools that were used by one of these five clerks are available to the student," Huff said.

Huff said that 75 to 80 percent of students who graduate have some transfer credit, so most of these students are aware of which classes they need.

Huff said that part of the problem is that students throughout the California State University System are encouraged to think that a grad-check must be filed before they will know where they stand with respect to graduation.

Huff said that even though students have their catalogues and program planners in their possession at least one year before they file for graduation, they still don't graduate when they want to.

"Keep in mind, most students fail to graduate the term they make the original request," Huff said.