Minnesota not the norm:

Most states favor semester system

Starting in early 1994, I worked for my first-ever newspaper, The Northern Student, the student newspaper at Bemidji State University, where I attended and received my bachelor's degree in mass communication. Over three years, I would be a staff writer, news editor, managing editor and editor. I wrote everything from news stories to feature stories to sports stories to opinion pieces. It was the greatest training ground a journalist could ever have, and I am grateful to the many talented people I worked alongside in my years at The NS.

April 20, 1994

By Devlyn Brooks

For the Northern Student

The Minnesota State University Board recently approved Moorhead State University's plan to switch to a semester-based academic year. Moorhead's decision may have a rippling affect among the other MSUS campuses, including BSU.

In the fall of 1995, Moorhead State will be the only school using a semester system out of the seven universities that belong to the Minnesota State University System.

Moorhead's decision was due in part to their relationship with North Dakota State University and Concordia college in Moorhead, Minn. Both of these institutions are on a semester-based academic year, and this decision will reduce the difficulty for Moorhead State students to also attend classes at the other two schools. BSU Student Senator Grace Kung believes that Moorhead needed to switch to semesters to stay competitive among their market.

According to a report done by Jessica Shaten of Desnoyer Research, in January 1991, for the vice president for academic affairs at MSUS, 67 percent of the higher education institutions in Minnesota use a quarter-based academic year. This involves 81 percent of Minnesota students who are attending post-secondary schools. However, this is not the norm in most other states. Minnesota has one of the highest percentages of institutions using quarters in the nation. In fact, 77 to 80 percent of all institutions in the nation are using a semester-based system.

According to Student Senate President Marina Nadarajah, this has been an issue the Student Senate has been considering the past three years. Nadarajah and Kung said that in past Student Senate surveys, BSU students have favored a quarter-based system. Nadarajah believes this could be due to a "lack of information."

"I think a lot of people just don't know what semesters are," she said.

These surveys resemble ones that were given to Moorhead State students asking how they felt about their school's conversion. Both Kung and Nadarajah suggest there may be another survey conducted of BSU students soon to consider students' opinions.

The semester academic year is based on two cycles consisting of 15 weeks during a normal academic year, with an optional four-week session during the summer. A college using a quarter-based academic year has three cycles of 10 weeks that make up the academic year.

Considering the effects of a conversion Shaten states, "Converting from a quarter to a semester calendar is a major undertaking for an institution. However, despite the cost and time, it is an effort being undertaken by large and small institutions every year (78 institutions nationwide converted between 1988 and 1990)."

A special factor in BSU's case -- should they decide to convert to semesters -- would be the compatibility with area community colleges and technical schools. According to Kung, half of BSU's students are transfer students, and if BSU switched to a semester system, this would cause hassles for students wanting to transfer from other area schools who use quarters.

"We have a very good relationship with those schools (local community colleges and technical schools), and they are on quarter systems. So it would be a disadvantage if we switched to semesters and they don't," said Kung.

Nadarajah and Kung both agree that the decision of whether or not to convert BSU to semesters is not BSU's top priority. They believe it is something that needs to be looked into within the next few years. The biggest fear is that BSU students won't be prepared to make a choice on this issue. "The [Moorhead] students did not have a say in this (their conversion)," Kung said. "Now that's not something we want. It's not that we are opposing (a) change ... but we want to be involved."