Chances are, if you’re a current or incoming student at Washington University, you like to get ahead. In high school, you probably kept a planner, tried to avoid procrastinating on assignments and stayed on top of your exam schedule. In college, the sentiment is probably unchanged or perhaps even more exaggerated—it becomes a necessity to succeed.

In order to start and remain ahead, many students turn to WebSTAC to choose and research professors and classes—but this process doesn’t stop with registration. Over the summer, many students click the seemingly helpful “view syllabus” button underneath each class, only to be met with an all too familiar phrase: “No syllabus was found for this specific section,” or even “Professor: TBA.”

In many cases, the professor of a given class changes or year-to-year or even semester-to-semester. With each change in leadership comes a change in the material, scope or even books used. This necessitates the timely upload of the most recent version of a syllabus for each semester, as the ones from past years might not even correctly reflect the current format of the class—and they are often completely unusable. Additionally, if the syllabus undergoes major changes, these should be noted within it, as many students go into a class expecting one thing—like a certain difficulty level based on a recommendation from a previous student—and end up with something completely different.

While we understand classes must evolve to meet changing technology and the possible discovery of new, pertinent information or even undergo structural adaptations to the benefit of the classes themselves, these changes need to be reflected in a way that is easily accessible to students and is not a surprise on the first day of class. Doing this can cut down on the amount of students who decide to add or drop classes, as they’ll know what they’re getting themselves into before the first day with more accuracy.

Sometimes, teachers even like to begin the semester before the start date on the academic calendar—often by sending an email or posting either videos or reading materials to Blackboard, to be completed before class on the first day. As a way of streamlining this process and to allowan opportunity for work to be done at a student’s leisure before the first day of class, this prerequisite information could be included in a syllabus and posted as soon as the professor completes it.

Additionally, the lack of readily available syllabi poses a challenge to students trying to access their book lists and get a jump on saving potentially hundreds of dollars on textbooks. We covered this last year, as the delayed release of needed books often does not allow enough time for shipments from less-expensive retailers, like Amazon or Chegg, to arrive.

The “book lists” button on WebSTAC redirects to a separate webpage, run through the campus bookstore. But it’s often unclear whether the listed options are required materials only available at the bookstore, recommended extra reading material or outdated information from a previous version of a class—not to mention that the books listed are often discovered to be unnecessary once the class actually begins.

By supplying a deadline for the listing of syllabi for all Washington University classes, the University would affords the luxury of time to college students operating on both budgeted schedules and bank accounts. While it may put pressure on professors to require turning syllabi in earlier, this has the potential to ultimately cut down on their stress levels, as fewer students will join or drop their classes as the add/drop deadline nears.