제 13 호 What Classes Should I Attend?
- 작성일 2022-03-01
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What Classes Should I Attend?
Helpful Lecture-Related-Guidelines for Freshmen
Choi Yeong-Jin, Editor
What was your biggest hardship when you first entered Sangmyung University? If anyone asks me what mine was, I will answer that what bothered me the most was to find out and decide what classes should I take. Since it is hard to make any contact with senior students when we have freshly entered the school and try to make up our own schedule for the first semester, it is inevitable for freshmen to frantically* search for useful information at the website. However, because sometimes gaining information at the school official website is tricky even for enrolled students, many freshmen may feel sour and clueless of how to make a good timetable, and why.
The school offers many possibilities for students in order to graduate. For instance, students in Global Area Studies in Cheonan Campus get the chance to choose between obtaining good grades in official exams like TOEFL or TOEIC, or to write an essay to graduate. Of course, knowing this qualification for graduation might not be so necessary for students until they are in their junior or senior year, and specific details within those qualifications slightly differ every year. Nonetheless, after the Corona era, it has become even harder for everyone to interact with other students as they do not share any time together, making them even harder to fetch helpful information like what classes should they take to graduate, how much credits they must earn to graduate, or should they really take volunteer classes. Therefore, in this article, I would like to offer useful guidance for freshmen by sharing beneficial information with details.
*Frantically: Done in a hurried way and in a state of excitement or confusion.
A Picture of Students Setting Their Timetable
Brief Introduction of What Global Area Studies Is
Everybody yells out that being fluent in a foreign language is absolutely mandatory* nowadays after the globalization. Koreans, especially, are very interested in being educated and being intellectual. Mastering foreign languages can allow you to be qualified in many jobs, and you can always find a new way for your future if you are good at speaking many languages. Global Area Studies helps you to discover your interest in Anglosphere*, Sinosphere*, and some other countries in Europe like Germany and France. Global Area Studies not only helps you to gain the ability of language fluency, but also helps you to deeply understand the culture, the economy, and the society of each country. Freshmen of Global Area Studies get to learn about all six countries and to consider their personal preference for their sophomore* year.
*Mandatory: Something that is mandatory must be done or is demanded by law.
*Anglosphere: A group of English-speaking nations that share common ancestral, historical, or cultural ties to England or the United Kingdom broadly, and which today maintain close political, diplomatic, and military co-operation.
*Sinosphere: Refers to the East Asian cultural sphere, nations within Southeast and East Asia that have been influenced significantly be various dynasties and subsequent republics of China in terms of literary traditions, culture, religions and social norms.
*Sophomore: A student studying in the second year of a program of study in a college, university, or high school.
Graduation Qualification
I would like to talk about graduation qualifications this time. Before I start explaining basic graduation qualifications, I must alert you all that I am in my senior year in Global Area Studies at the Cheonan Campus, and my example may be somewhat pinpointed with my qualifications. However, the way how you can find out your own cases does not change, so I most strongly recommend you visit the school website:www.smu.ac.kr for further information.
There are two ways for Global Area Students to choose their major. They can either choose two different majors like English in Global Area Studies and Art and Culture Management. Or they can just focus on their first major and be considered as an Advanced Major student. If you choose to obtain two or more major certificates*, you should get 24 major credits* for your first major, and 21 credits for your second major. Plus, 33 credits are for the general education curriculum. Since you must accomplish earning 130 credits in order to graduate, you can freely choose what to attend for the leftover credits you must achieve. For the advanced major students, qualifications are quite similar with multi major, but instead of 21 credits of second major, you should get 15 credits for advanced major. It may sound very complicated at first, but when you log in to the website and search for your own qualification yourself, you will be able to understand your qualifications quite intuitively*.
English Foundation is a class that all freshmen must attend in order to graduate. Before fully attending the school, each student gets the chance to take a sham TOEIC examination for their class division. Though what students learn in each class may slightly differ by whom they are taught by, they all basically get to learn certain aspects* like grammar, vocabulary, and English expressions, like idioms* and proverbs*, to communicate fluently in English. In their first semester, they should attend English Foundations (Speaking and Listening), and in their second semester, they must attend English Foundations (Reading and Writing). If new scholars* in Sangmyung have their personal reasons and failed to attend both classes in their freshmen year, they must finish both classes before graduation so that they do not face any obstacles to graduate from the school.
So how do we check out how many credits we achieved so far, and what classes I have already taken? The answer is simple. After you log in to Sangmyung University’s website: www.smu.ac.kr, you can access Sangmyung’s Sammeul Portal System. Or you can just use: www.smsso.smu.ac.kr to access it briefly. After that, press the Combined Information tab at the top of the website, and enter www.smul.smu.ac.kr for your personal information. The “Score Information” tab informs you of your current semester’s grade, grade overall your attending semesters, and how many credits you have earned. I would say that the last option to see how many credits you earned is the most important thing. It tells you your grade average, how many credits you got in each crucial* area like your first major, required classes, and advanced majors. So, if you are completely lost about how to design your own schedule later on, I strongly recommend for you to first check out your current basis on how many credits you have already obtained.
*Certificate: An official document that states that the information on it is true.
*Credit: A unit of measurement of the value contributed by an educational course to a college degree.
*Intuitively: In a way that is based on feelings rather than facts or proof.
*Aspect: One part of a situation, problem, subject, etc.
*Idiom: A group of words in a fixed order that has a particular meaning that is different from the meanings of each word on its own.
*Proverb: A short sentence, etc., usually known by many people, stating something commonly experienced or giving advice.
*Scholar: A person who studies a subject in great detail, especially at a university.
*Crucial: Extremely important or necessary.
What are Mandatory Culture and Core Culture Classes?
To not only master one’s intellect* on their major, but students must also be given the opportunity to seek for other areas that are not directly related to their major. In short, for students who major in languages to get the chance to learn more about arts, computer science, and science. Students who major in computer science can achieve the chance to be educated in biology, economics, and language. That explanation is for Core Culture Classes. Mandatory Culture Classes are more like lectures that student must earn credits to graduate.
*Intellect: The ability to understand and to think in an intelligent way.
Should Students do Volunteer Works or Not?
There is a “Volunteer Work” class for students to sign up for. It offers one credit, and students can do volunteer work freely within one semester and submit the volunteer certificate to prove their work. However, before 2022, all students must have attended at least one class to graduate, but this was altered into “not mandatory” after the 2021 fall semester. If any of the students are searching for any class which is only one credit for your timetable, you can still enroll* for it.
*Enroll: To put yourself or someone else onto the official list of members of a course, college, or group.
Some might already be frightened of the fact that students must find all of the information on their own, which is one of the biggest differences with high schools where homeroom teachers announce important information every time. I too, had a hard time when I first entered the school, but after I got used to the system, it was more convenient than I thought it would be. Since it is hard to directly inform freshmen about crucial information under the circumstances, I hope that my article can offer some help for Sangmyung freshmen.
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