BSO: Your Class Scheduling Guide

Overall guidelines on building your schedule

• You need approximately 15 hours each term — that's five classes, in which three are required VICO classes. All first-year Visual Communication (VisCom) students, regardless of major, must take VICO 1414, VICO 1421, and VICO 1000.

• Take ENG (first-year English course) when indicated on your DARS (Degree Audit Reporting System). For VisCom students, this is usually during the spring semester.

• LCOM 1000 will enroll you in UC 1900. You'll also sign up for the three required VICO courses, and two “BRICKS,” either from Foundations or Pillars or one of your college liberal arts requirements, which may be a BRICKS course.

The how-to handout: Reading Your Dars and Registering

How to register for your classes

BRICKS

The university has grouped general education required coursework into “BRICKS,” which stands for ...

1. Build articulates the importance of developing interpersonal connections and references to two common goals: teamwork and intercultural knowledge & competence.

2. Reason articulates the importance of developing independent thinking and references three common goals: critical thinking, quantitative reasoning, and ethical reasoning.

3. Integrate articulates the importance of transferring knowledge to experience and references one common goal: integrative learning.

4. Communicate articulates the importance of communication abilities and references two common goals: written communication and oral communication.

5. Know articulates the importance of breadth of knowledge gained from courses in the arts, humanities,

social or behavioral sciences, and natural sciences.

6. Synthesize articulates the importance of integrating knowledge and abilities learned throughout general education.

BRICKS includes a minimum of 38 credit hours across five categories.

Combined, BRICKS offers six high-impact educational practices: common intellectual experience, writing-intensive courses, collaborative assignments, diversity learning, experiential learning, and capstone courses.

• Foundations (11 hours): Written Communication (3), Advanced Writing (3), Quantitative Reasoning (3), Intercultural Relations (2)

• Pillars (12 hours): Humanities Texts and Contexts (3), Humanities Arts (3), Natural Sciences (3), Social or Behavioral Sciences (3)

• Arches (9 hours): Constructed World (3), Natural World (3), Connected World (3)

• Bridges (4 hours): Speaking & Listening (1), Diversity & Practice (1), Ethics & Reasoning (1), Learning & Doing (1)

• Capstone (2 hours): Culminating Experience (2)

Prerequisites

Prerequisites are courses you must have completed BEFORE you can register for a class. Pay attention to the prereqs for classes you will be required to take. Plan ahead on your own, and seek help from your advisor when needed.

Your first-year fall semester scheduling guide

Your goal is to build a schedule that satisﬁes both school and university requirements and provides balance in your life. Construct a schedule of about five classes, so that you average a total of 15 credit hours per term. Make sure that you meet the requisites (or can get instructor permission, if necessary) for each course you plan to take.

For the required classes where permission is necessary to register for the course, your BSO advisor will provide that permission for you.

You will need to register using your MyOHIO Student Center. Here is a link to a video explaining how to register: https://www.ohio.edu/registrar/how-register.

Final exams

Your Final Exam schedule will be listed on all your course syllabi. Be sure that you consult each course syllabi before scheduling departure plans at the end of the semester.