CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Many University of North Carolina-Charlotte students are against a plan to add classes on Friday to ease overcrowded parking.
Student Wilson Pickelsimer said most days, he circles the parking lot for an hour trying to find a spot.
“I'm here for my 11 o’clock class at 10 o’clock just to get parking,” Pickelsimer said.
Most classes are held on either Mondays and Wednesdays, or Tuesdays and Thursdays, with 50 percent fewer students attending on Fridays.
University officials, starting in fall of 2018, will be adding Fridays to Monday and Wednesday classes while cutting the time from 75 minutes to 50 minutes per session.
Tara Johnson commutes to class and doesn't want to add an extra day.
“I don't want to drive an hour for a 50-minute class three days a week,” Johnson said.
She signed a petition against the plan that's gotten more than 5,000 signatures since Tuesday.
Pickelsimer signed the petition, too.
“I saw the petition,” Pickelsimer said. “Yeah, I've already filled out, like, 10 of them.”
He thinks the plan to ease congestion will only shift the problem.
“People are going to see that when they're scheduling, so they're going to be scheduling more Tuesday-Thursday classes,” he said.
University explanation:
In fall 2018, the university will return to a schedule where classes are offered in 50-minute blocks on Monday, Wednesday and Friday from 8 a.m. to 2:15 p.m. Seventy-five-minute and 150-minute classes will still be offered on those days at 2:30 p.m. or later.
Tuesday and Thursday classes will continue as normal, in 75-minute blocks beginning at 8:30 a.m.
The University previously offered a similar schedule until about 10 years ago. Returning to 50-minute classes on Monday, Wednesday and Friday was among the recommendations of a campus congestion task force.
More information on the background is available here: https://provost.uncc.edu/faculty-resources-government/class-schedule-changes.
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