Enrolment News (2018-19)

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

Admission into Computing Plans

Program/Plan Selection for students with 24 or more units was May 14-25. We have accepted as many 2nd year students as we could; we will not be accepting more this year.

Enrollment Deadlines

Enrolment appointments begin July 16. We very strongly advise that you enrol immediately when your appointment starts. For July 16-25, enrolment in upper-year CISC/COGS courses is restricted to students registered in Computing degree plans; after that it is open to anyone who meets the prerequisites. Given the extraordinary increase in Computing enrolments, we cannot guarantee that there will be room in your courses if you try to enrol after July 25, especially in 2nd year courses.

Registration is July 16 - Aug 3. The detailed schedule is:

1. From July 9 Students can view their appointment time in SOLUS and can begin to load courses into their shopping carts.
2. From July 16 to 25 Computing students will have priority in CISC/COGS courses.
3. From July 26 - Aug 3 enrollment restrictions are removed so if any student has the prereqs/coreqs and there is room in the courses they can enroll.
4. From Aug 6 - August 20 is registration hiatus which means students cannot enroll.
5. Open enrollment begins again August 21.
6. Classes begin on September 6.
7. Sept 19 is the last day to add Fall term courses or drop them without penalty. Bear in mind that if you add late you may have difficulties catching up.

See also the Arts and Science page on class selection.

Shopping Cart Validation Confusion

The shopping cart "validate" function checks for prerequisites, timetable conflicts, etc. When checking prerequisites, the validate function looks for “completed” courses. Therefore, if a winter term class requires a fall term class as prerequisite, the prerequisite check will fail because the student isn’t yet “enrolled” in the class. However, once the student is enrolled in the fall term class, it will then satisfy the course prerequisite for the winter term class. During or after your appointment slot, commit your fall term courses and you will then be able to add winter term courses.

New Courses in Data Analytics

There are now four courses in Data Analytics: CISC 151 (an alternative to CISC 101 or 110), CISC 251 (replacing the first 2/3 of CISC 333), CISC 351 (including some material from CISC 333 plus new material), and CISC 451 (not offered in 2018-19). Also, CISC 432 now focuses specifically on "big data." See the courses list for descriptions.

Other Calendar Changes

• First-year courses CISC 121 and 124 that require mathematical co-requisites now recognize the corresponding Applied Science and Commerce courses as options.

Upper-year courses restricted to Computing Students

All CISC courses at the 300 level and above, except the Data Analytics courses 351 and 451, now require registration in a Computing plan, including minors and general degrees.

Grade Requirement in Prerequisite Courses

As of July 2017 enrollment in any Computing course requires a C- or better in all its prerequisite courses. We will waive the C- requirement on any direct prerequisite completed before July 1, 2017, when the new calendar came into effect. This waiver will be available only until the end of June 2019, when everyone completing first year in June 2017 will have had two years to fix deficiencies in their transcripts. If you will need to take an upper-year course after July 1, 2019 that depends on a course where you have a D+ or lower, you need to retake the prerequisite course.

If SOLUS rejects your enrollment attempt because of the grade requirement, contact the Undergraduate Assistant, Karen Knight, supplying your student number, the courses involved, and what prerequisite course is preventing enrollment. If the course has labs, specify all the slots that are compatible with your current schedule; we can't guarantee you your preferred lab time.

We will delay handling requests from non-Computing students until July 26, since prior to that enrollment is reserved for students already in Computing plans.

Summer CISC 121 and Enrollment

If you are enrolled in CISC 121 in July-August, SOLUS will assume you get the required C- or better grade, so you can enroll in courses for which it is a prerequisite as soon as open enrollment starts (July 26). You will be dropped from follow-on courses in September if you get a D+ or worse.

Fall CISC 121 and Math Co-Requisite

In previous years, if you try to take CISC 121 in the fall without CISC 102, or try to drop CISC 102, SOLUS does not recognize the full-year MATH courses (110, 111, 120, 121) as satisfying the co-requisite; we do not yet know if this will be a problem for 2018-19. If this happens to you, contact Karen Knight for an override.

Enrollment for COCA students

SOLUS can't tell when someone intends to take a COCA degree, since COCA students are officially in Arts degrees instead of Computing degrees, so can't qualify for enrollment in CISC courses during the period when enrollment is restricted to Computing students. Contact Karen Knight (karen@cs.queensu.ca) if you are in this position.

Internship Requirements

You must have a maximum of 90 units of courses completed by the end of the academic year just before the start of your internship. School of Computing policy requires you to return for a full academic year after an internship.

Term Changes

See the course list to find out what term your courses are in.

• Several 200-level courses are now available in both fall and winter terms: CISC 220, CISC 221, CISC 235, CISC 260. If your preferred term fills up, we will insist you take the other term if the scheduling conflict is with an elective or optional course.
• The intended section of CISC 365 for 3rd year students is now in Winter 2019. The fall section, which is cross-listed with CMPE 365 and thus may have slightly different content, is reserved for graduating students.

This list is not necessarily exhaustive; always check for yourself.

COGS 300

COGS 300 (Programming Cognitive Models) is no no longer offered. The COGS plan now allows any course in the COGS_Computing list to replace COGS 300. This list currently consists of COGS 300 (should it ever be taught again) and CISC 220, 223, 226, 271, 325, 332, 333, 340, 365, 425, 454, 457, 465, 481, 486, 496, 500, and SOFT 325 and SOFT 425.

400-level Option Courses

• There is a section of CISC 490 on computer security in the fall. It requires CISC 324 (operating systems) or ELEC 377, the equivalent ECE course. Contact Karen Knight to be added; she will first verify the prerequisites, then enroll you.
  The course conflicts with CISC 498.
• The major and the Computer Science specialization require a 400-level theory course. The available choices are CISC 422 and CISC 462, both in the fall, and CISC 467, in the winter.
• Software Design (Software Development) requires a 400-level course from a list called Soft_Design in the offical plan description. The available courses are CISC 425, 432, 435, 452, 453, 454, 458, 486 and SOFT 437. We have no information on whether the allowed Electrical Engineering courses are available or have room: ELEC 470/3.0; ELEC 471/3.0; ELEC 476/3.0; ELEC 478/3.0

CISC/SOFT 423 prerequisites

SOFT 423 does not recognize CISC 326 as a prerequisite. Please sign up for CISC 423 instead; they are the same course.

Conflicts with CISC 496, CISC 498, CISC/COGS 499, and CISC 500

Several courses (CISC 324, 332, 432, 467, 471, and 490) conflict with one or more of CISC 496, CISC 498, CISC/COGS 499, and CISC 500, the "capstone" courses. Follow this procedure to get a conflict waiver: First, enroll in the capstone. This may require you to un-enroll from the conflicting course. This allows SOLUS to enforce the hard-to-hand-check prerequisites of most of them. Second, email Karen Knight (karen@cs.queensu.ca) with your student number and stating all of the following:

1. You will attend the first lecture of the capstone course, and, if you're in CISC 498, all of its seminars, and if CISC 499, the final presentation.
2. You understand you are fully responsible for catching up on any missed work in the other course.
3. You understand that this waiver does not entitle you to any special consideration not available to other students, including exemption from any penalties for missing classes in the non-capstone course.

CISC 500

The deadline for submitting proposals for undergraduate theses was Monday May 14, 5 pm EST.