I thought about taking classes this summer to get ahead, but after looking into it further I found it was not going to be as easy as I thought.

My first issue was finding classes offered that would count towards my English writing major and that also seemed at least a little interesting. I found they do not offer very many options, especially web classes, for the English department.

I know many English classes are very hands-on and involve student-to-student communication as well as teacher-to-student communication, but I believe that there is a way to go about this so classes can still be offered online. EduCat is a great way for students to make comments on each other’s work and to also get the teacher’s feedback. I believe this site could be used more efficiently.

The second problem I had with summer classes was they are more expensive per credit than taking classes during the fall or winter semesters and less financial aid is given out. If you take five credits or less in the summer, for a resident undergraduate, the price is the same if you were to take one to 11 credits in the fall, which is $324.

However, if you wish to take more than five credits, it is $304 per credit. If you wish to take a normal load of classes in the summer, which for most people is 16 credits, then summer classes wind up costing about $700 more than during the school year.

This may not seem like a lot of money when you take into consideration how much total money you are spending on college, however when less financial aid is given out in the summer, it does make a difference. I know there are operation costs and faculty and staff need to be paid, but more people would take summer classes if they were less expensive.

Also web and any off-campus courses are $324 per credit, according to NMU’s website. Many students take web classes in the summer and I do not think they should be so expensive. If anything, web classes should cost less than on-campus courses.

There is no operating fee, since the course is not meeting in a class and it is made to be a lot more convenient for professors, since they can work around their own schedules.

Many community colleges offer summer classes for almost half the cost of universities; however, the process a student has to go through in order for their credits to transfer over is often time consuming. I think if summer classes are going to be so expensive at larger universities like NMU, then they should work more with the students to make sure all credits will transfer.

Sometimes students have to go through several different staff members to figure out whether the class they are going to take at a community college will completely transfer for NMU credits.

If summer courses were made to better suit students by offering more options, more students would take classes in the summer.

Also, making courses less expensive or changing the system so it is easier to transfer credits from a community college to NMU could help raise NMU’s graduation rate, which would benefit students and the university.