Enrolment News (2025-26)

First posted on July 16th, 2025 at 12:14 pm. Last updated August 15th, 2025 at 3:17 pm

For information about changes from previous years, see the enrolment news archive.

NOTICE:

August 4-17 is the SOLUS Registration Hiatus. Students will not be able to add or drop courses during this time. Registration will reopen on August 18 and most enrolment blocks will be removed (you will be able to enroll in courses outside your program as space permits).

Please contact the corresponding department for assistance with any non-Computing courses.

General News

15-August-2025 - ARIN 100 is not required for Computing plans

Computing students interested in AI who did not get into the course should note that the course is not required for any of our Computing plans. I.e., they should not be concerned. ARIN 100 is open to all students in the faculty. It provides a general, high-level introduction to AI suitable for students from all disciplines. While this general perspective might also be of value to Computing students, upper year AI-related Computing courses offer more technical depth and detail.

5-August-2025 - Virtual Advising Session was well-attended

Thanks to everyone who attended the virtual advising session on July 31st. This was an experiment, so please feel free to send us your feedback to let us know how we did, and please share any suggestions on how we can improve our service.

5-August-2025 - Continuing to increase enrolment caps for full courses

We are continuing to monitor enrolment levels in our courses and expanding enrolments as appropriate and as best we can. Please be assured that we understand the need for space in our core courses, and this continues to be a priority. Please continue to try getting into courses as you can.

30-July-2025 - Virtual Advising Drop-In Session for quick questions! See Upcoming Events below

Sometimes all you need is a quick answer, so join Karen and Erin on July 31st from 6:30-9:30 PM on Teams if you have burning questions.

This is a very informal group advising session just for general Q&A (no personal info, not recorded). We'll also test drive the breakout room feature with one person covering general questions in the main meeting, and the other meeting with students privately. We can't promise to fix everything, but we may be able to resolve minor issues right away. See below to register.

30-July-2025 - Full courses - working on increasing enrolment caps

Please be assured that we are closely monitoring enrolment levels in all of our courses and taking steps to remedy the situation. Today is registration pause day, when the waitlists are being processed, but the system will reopen tomorrow. Please watch SOLUS for changes and either enroll or waitlist your courses as best you can. We have until September 15th for everyone to finalize their Fall term schedule, and until January 16th for your Winter term schedule. We'll do our best to get you into the appropriate courses for your plan.

Full or nearly full courses we are working on right now:

• CISC 124-001 (Fall) - *OUR CURRENT PRIORITY* - we are working with Timetabling on finding a solution for this one (we know how important it is).
• CISC 203-001 (Fall) - please take the winter term if possible
• CISC 204-001 and 002 (Fall) - increasing enrolment
• CISC 220-001 (Fall and Winter) - increasing enrolment
• CISC 457-001 (Fall) - increasing enrolment
• CISC 497-001 (Fall) - this course is now full, but there is room in the Winter term. We can't expand enrolment for this one due to the nature of the course.
• CISC 221-001 (Winter) - increasing enrolment
• CISC 223-002 (Winter) - increasing enrolment
• CISC 235-001 (Winter) - increasing enrolment
• CISC 437-001 (Winter) - in contact with ECE Dept. to see if they have any extra room (they run this course)
• CISC 468-001 (Winter) - waiting to hear back about room options

30-July-2025 - SOLUS ERROR: enrolled in CISC 101 and CISC 121 at the same time

We've discovered a few students were somehow able to get enrolled in both CISC 101 and 121 this Fall. This shouldn't have been possible, so we're looking into it, but once the system reopens (today is registration pause day), students who are in both of these courses must drop one or the other. CISC 121 is basically a more comprehensive version of 101, so you can get credit if you take 101 first, and then take 121, but you won't get credit if 101 is taken with or after 121. This is called a one-way exclusion.

You can switch from one to the other in the first three weeks of class if you find the one you chose is either too easy or difficult. CISC 101 is for students with little to no programming experience and 121 is for students who are already familiar with programming concepts and terminology. You can use the CISC 121 Readiness Self-Assessment to help you determine which course you should start with.

28-July-2025 - 100-level courses unavailable to 2nd year students

There is currently a block on 100-level courses restricting enrolment to 1st year students only. This block will be lifted in a few days. We will be monitoring enrolment activity and addressing courses if they fill up.

28-July-2025 - CISC 204 (Fall) and CISC 220 (Fall and Winter) are full

We are working on solutions to increase enrolments in these two courses in particular, and continuing to monitor other courses as they fill up. Please continue trying to add them, and work with the waitlists as best you can in the meantime.

28-July-2025 - CISC 486 capacity increased

We have been receiving email from several students trying to get into CISC 486 but the course has been full. We have now moved rooms, allowing us to bump up the enrolment cap from 30 to 60. This should hopefully allow any students in that still need it. Contact us again if you run into any issues getting enrolled.

21-July-2025 - CISC 324 - Error has been corrected in SOLUS

The error in SOLUS that left CISC 324 without any timetable or instructor information has been corrected and should now appear normally in the system. Please let us know if you have any further trouble with this or any other course!

21-July-2025 - CISC 365 (Fall) - Reserved for ECE and 4th Year Students

To respond to a recurring message from our 3rd-year students, please note that the Fall term offering of CISC 365 is reserved every year for 4th year and Electrical Computer Engineering (CMPE) students who need to take this course in the Fall in preparation for their Winter term courses. 3rd year students must take the Winter term offering instead. If there is a reason that you can't take the Winter offering and need to take it in the Fall (for example, going on exchange in the Winter), contact us and let us know your circumstances.

18-July-2025 - CISC 324 - Error in SOLUS: Instructor and Timetabling Info Missing

We've been made aware of an error in SOLUS for CISC 324 in both the Fall and Winter term. The room, date/time, and instructor information have all disappeared, making it impossible to add to your schedule without conflicts. The problem is being investigated and we will update everyone once it is resolved. Thanks so much for your patience as we sort this out!

17-July-2025 - SOAR Webinar Recording now available

14-July-2025 - Upcoming SOAR Webinar on July 16th!

14-July-2025 - Course Enrolment FAQs and Advising

With course enrolments coming up, the volume in the Advising inbox is picking up accordingly. Please keep an eye on this page as we will update it with anything urgent or any trends that we're seeing.

PLEASE SEND ALL ADVISING REQUESTS TO advising@cs.queensu.ca and include your STUDENT NUMBER!

• Use your Queen's email account (for security purposes)
• Include your student number
• One email per issue - if you want to follow up, reply back to the last piece of correspondence with us (don't edit the subject line) to reopen your ticket (multiple emails = multiple tickets = two people working on the same problem without knowing it).

Why am I getting a prerequisite error for my Winter term courses?

This is a common problem! If you are getting an error message saying you don't have the prerequisite even though you have it in your cart for the Fall, try loading your Fall courses, running cart validation, and then adding your Winter term courses. Reach out to Advising if that doesn't work!

COMA Students: We've had a couple of COMA students reach out about a 100% conflict for CISC 371 and STAT 361. As 371 is only one of many courses on the COMA_Options list, students should choose an alternate course in lieu of CISC 371 or take it next year instead.

Can I take conflicting courses?

Possibly, but it requires permission from the department and your instructors. As a policy, any courses that are 100% overlapped are an automatic no; permission will not be given to take both courses, regardless of instructor support. For courses that have less than 100% overlap, you should reach out to both instructors to explain your situation and ask for their support. It helps if you can provide them a plan as to how you expect to be able to complete the course requirements for both courses equally. Your instructors may have additional conditions you must agree to, such as attending a certain percentage of the lectures, or not deferring any assessments if there's a conflict there.

Once you have gotten approval from your instructors, forward this correspondence to advising@cs.queensu.ca (for Computing courses only - other departments must manage their courses separately). We can then provide an override for this on SOLUS.

Should I be following the new plan requirements on the Academic Calendar?

Only if you've recently switched into or selected that plan during this Spring's plan change/selection. The recent plan changes that were made don't affect you if you were already in that plan. When you sign up for a plan - or change to another one - you are by default agreeing to that plan's terms at the time you signed up for it. Sort of like switching data plans for your phone; anytime you change, it updates the agreement terms.

You can find older versions of the Academic Calendar on the Archives page, but the most accurate way to know which courses you should take is to run an Academic Progress Report (APR) on SOLUS. This will clearly state which courses you still need. You can reach out to us anytime for help with this if anything is unclear.

14-July-2025 - Calculus Requirements for our Plans

We wanted to clarify that some of our plans still do have a Calculus requirement!

COGS - no
COCA - no
COMA - yes
SODE - no
Major (all subplans) - no
General (Science) - yes
General (Arts) - no
Minor (Science) - yes
Minor (Arts) - no

Upcoming Events

Past Events

Links and Resources

• Computing Plans - Tree Chart - Visually groups our plans and shows how they are/aren't related.
• Computing Plans - Pie Charts - A visual comparison of the differences between the Major, Major/Minor, and Specializations.
• 1st Year Guide (UPDATED - current as of 21-Jul-2025)
• CISC 121 Readiness Self-Assessment
• Enrolment FAQ
• 2025-26 Academic Calendar
• Academic Calendar Archives