Enrollment Components & Troubleshooting Tips

First please try refreshing the page. If the issue persists, please log out of the system, clear your browser’s cache, and log back in. We’ve found Navigate Enrollment to be rather cache-sensitive, so clearing your browser’s cache oftentimes resolves this issue.

If a discussion or lab section is not required, you may enroll with or without a section selected. If you’ve already enrolled without a section, you will need to drop the lecture and re-enroll in the lecture with a section selected. Similarly, if you’ve enrolled with a section and need to drop just the section, you’ll need to completely drop the lecture and section and re-enroll in the lecture without a section.

Navigate Enrollment has several filters to help identify a specific section of a class. Please use the Instructor filter to limit results and help locate a specific class quickly.

Yes! Once in Navigate Enrollment, go to the My Classes tab. From here, select the View Details button for each specific class. Under the Final Exam field, you’ll find the date, time, and location for the class’s final exam.

If you’re already on the waitlist for a class, but now have a permission number to enroll, you will need to first drop the class before re-enrolling. Dropping this class will remove you from the waitlist, but once you go to re-enroll, you’ll be able to enter the permission number to fully enroll.

If you've logged into Navigate Enrollment and are not able to enroll, there's a handful of possible reasons.

1. Enrollment Hold: Near the top of the page in Navigate Enrollment, you might have a red banner that says you have a hold. Please navigate to your Axess home page and find the Holds, To Do's and Notifications section for additional details.
2. It's Not Time to Enroll: The Academic Calendar outlines the dates enrollment opens each quarter. All students are placed into assigned enrollment groups, based on their academic program and their completed quarters. Our When do I enroll? page further details this process and has more information on exact enrollment time slots.
3. The Class is Full: If a class is listed as Closed or the total capacity has already been met, you will not be enrolled. In some cases, there may be a waitlist, which you can select to be added to when you are selecting your enrollment preferences.
4. Incorrect Academic Term: When adding classes to your enrollment, please verify you've selected the appropriate quarter from the drop-down menu. Navigate Enrollment will show you your enrollment for any active quarters, so ensuring you've selected the correct term is crucial.

If you're still unable to enroll, please submit a help ticket with the Student Services Center, linked at the bottom of this page.

The Drop if Enrolled feature allows you to streamline your enrollment by reducing clicks and set yourself up for success if you're on a waitlist.

This feature allows you to specify a class to be dropped automatically if you are successfully enrolled in a different class. This can be especially useful if you're on a waitlist for another class. Since the waitlist checks for class time conflicts and total enrollment units, setting up a class to be dropped if you're enrolled from the waitlist can eliminate any enrollment errors and missing out on open seats!

Our waitlist process is typically run twice a day. If you're on a waitlist and not being enrolled, there are a few possible reasons:

1. No new available seats opened up in the class.
2. You have an enrollment hold on your account.
3. The waitlisted class has a time conflict with your current enrollment.
4. The waitlisted class would place you over the maximum number of units.

The first eligible student will be automatically added into the class if and when a spot becomes available. If the waitlist encounters any of the issues above, your position on the waitlist will be bypassed and the next eligible student will be added instead.

Some classes are set up to require a permission number to limit enrollment and allow the instructor to provide individual approval. In some cases, classes have specific requisites, but an instructor may make an exception and provide a student with a permission number to override this system requirement. When enrolling, there will be a place to enter a permission number, if required.

Permission numbers are only valid for one use. If you've enrolled by using a permission number, but drop the class and later decide to re-enroll, you will need to reach out the instructor or department to get a new permission number.

When enrolling in an independent study or research section, make sure to verify you're enrolled in the section with the appropriate instructor. If you've found out you're enrolled incorrectly, undergraduate students should reach out to their Undergraduate Advising Director. Graduate students should submit an Enrollment Change Petition via the eForms portal in Axess.

Do you see a red banner in Navigate Enrollment saying you can’t enroll due to a hold on your account? If so, you most likely have a temporary Enrollment Hold to ensure that important issues are resolved before you continue your studies. 

Please navigate to your Axess home page and find the Holds, To Do's and Notifications section. Click on the hold for additional details and complete the necessary action items to remove this enrollment hold.

Looking to enroll in a course that has limited enrollment and requires a permission number?

Departments may choose to limit course enrollment by requiring a permission number in order to enroll. These numbers are valid for only one use and pertain to a specific class in a particular quarter. For example, if you use a permission code to add a class and then later drop this class, you would need to get a new permission number if you wanted to re-enroll in this class. Additionally, if you’re looking to enroll in a “combined section” class, you’ll need to make sure the permission number is for the specific section you’re seeking enrollment.

If you’re running into issues with a permission number, please contact the instructor and/or department to request a new permission number or further support.

Some classes have requirements that must be met in order to enroll, also known as requisites. These requisites ensure that students are prepared for the course material and prevent them from duplicating class content. This information can usually be found within the course descriptions in Navigate Classes. Our classes have 3 types of requisites:

• Prerequisites are courses or conditions you must complete before enrolling in a specific class.
• Corequisites are courses you need to take at the same time as the one you’re enrolling in.
• Antirequisites prevent you from enrolling in a course if you've already completed another course with overlapping content. 

AP & IB Credit: In some cases, AP, IB, or other external test credit may meet a requisite to take a course. If you believe you’ve met a course requisite with an external test credit, but the system is not automatically recognizing this, please reach out to the department offering the course to request a permission number. 

Transfer Credit: Only course-to-course equivalency credit can be used for enrollment requisites. If you believe you’ve met a course requisite with transfer credit, please reach out to the department offering the course to request a permission number. Students with program elective credit or non-program elective credit will not be able to use these courses towards prerequisite requirements.

Once a class is full, you may be able to join a waitlist. The first eligible student will be automatically added into the class if and when a spot becomes available.

Your eligibility to be added to a class from the waitlist is based upon holds, maximum units, and time conflicts. If the waitlist encounters any of these three issues with your enrollment, your position on the waitlist will be bypassed and the next eligible student will be added instead.

• If you have an enrollment hold, please review your hold details in Axess. If needed, contact the Student Services Center for more information about this hold.
• If you have a time conflict (i.e., you are enrolled in another class that wholly or partially overlaps with the class for which you are on the waitlist), you will need to drop the conflicting class before you can be enrolled from the waitlist.
  • You can avoid this issue by designating an existing class as "Drop if Enrolled" at the time when you enroll on the waitlist. With the "Drop if Enrolled" designation, you will be dropped from your conflicting class when and if you are enrolled in your desired class from the waitlist.
• If this enrollment would place you above the maximum allowable units (i.e., 20 units for undergraduates), you must adjust your class list to remain within the maximum allowed units.

The waitlist process is typically run twice a day, and the system will send an email letting you know if you were enrolled. If there is no open spot, the system will alert you that you have not been enrolled.  

Please note: It can appear as if there are open seats in a class, but the waitlist process is waiting to run. If you are unable to add yourself to the class, please add yourself to any available space on the waitlist.

When a course is cross-listed, meaning it is offered by multiple departments under a different subject and catalog number, it is typically scheduled as combined sections. This means the classes are held simultaneously in the same room and share the same meeting time and space. As such, the combined sections have a combined enrollment limit to fit with the assigned room’s capacity.

When looking for open seats in a combined section class, please look for the Total Capacity indicator. This can be found in Navigate Classes within the details of an individual class under “Other Ways to Enroll in This Class”. The total capacity is the total number of students enrolled across all combined sections. As a result, there may be some classes that look to have open seats, but the total capacity is full based on all the enrollment from all of the combined sections. Once the total capacity is listed as full, no further enrollment will be allowed, regardless of remaining open seats in individual sections.

For an example of a Combined Sections class, check out CSRE 143. When scrolling through the class details, it shows four additional classes that are cross-listed with this course, as well as the total capacity and section capacities for each individual course.

Some courses are set up to set aside a portion of seats for a specific group of students, such as majors, first-year students, or seniors for a limited time period. This allows certain groups of students priority access to classes they may need to meet graduation or program requirements. Once the reserved seating period ends, any remaining seats become available to all students.

Within an individual class’s description in Navigate Classes, you can see which group of student seats are reserved, the number and active status of reserved seats, and the start and end date for these seat reservations. To see classes that have implemented Reserved Seating, check out Energy 201C and MS&E 176. Energy 201C reserves 30 seats for "ERE and ENERGY Maj and Min", indicating these seats are reserved for students with a declared major and minor in those subjects. MS&E 176 reserved 32 seats for "MGTSC UG and MS majors", meaning undergraduate and master students within this major, and 8 seats for "Seniors only". The seniors only designation reserves seats for seniors, regardless of a student’s declared major. 

Please note: When determining a student’s cohort, the reserved seating functionality checks your “academic level” – which is based on the number of units you have completed: 

• Completed less than 40 units = Frosh
• Completed 40 - 84 units = Sophomore
• Completed 85 - 129 units = Junior
• Completed more than 130 units = Senior

For some classes, namely independent studies and individual research courses, there are several sections allotted to a single subject and catalog number. When enrolling in one of these courses, make sure to locate the correct section with the appropriate instructor.

For example, If you're looking to add CS 199 to your study list, dozens of sections for this class will populate. You can narrow down the correct section by verifying the instructor listed, the  Class #, or the section.

Student enrollment does not allow dual-degree students to drop below the unit minimum in either career, even when enrollment across both careers would still be considered full-time. In order to drop a course, you will need to complete the Multiple Career Enrollment Change request, located in the Student eForms portal in Axess. This form will allow you to indicate which course you'd like to drop and the Registrar's Office will manually make the change(s).

Occasionally, a student may request permission to enroll in fewer units than the number associated with a course. This practice of “unit shaving” or unit adjustment is not permitted. Courses may be taken only for the number of units that are listed Navigate Classes. For example, a course offered for 5 units may only be taken for 5 units. Courses offered for variable units (e.g., 3-5 units) may be taken for the number of units chosen by the student with the stated range. Students should complete and be evaluated on the amount of work associated with the number of units they enrolled in. See the university policy, Amount of Work, in the Student Policies section concerning university expectations for the relationship between work and units of credit.