However, this being at MIT, I was never sure whether this was because of humans or bots.
My undergrad university had the sense to let everyone pick their first preferences within 24 hours of enrollment starting. Then for over-selected courses, people were enrolled randomly [1]. This was repeated once more, iirc, and then in the third round enrollment was instantaneous.
This, thankfully, prevented virtual stampedes and allowed for people to select their courses in a non-panic manner.
[1] after required-for-graduation enrollments.
Still a fine university, but the days of 'hacker' culture are definitely dwindling. There are still pockets here and there, but like with old forms of communication (IRC, etc ) it becomes harder and harder to foster that culture when there are less and less spaces for it while simultaneously creating curated spaces that are so much easier to use.
My college just sorted people by GPA and if there were enough of them for an additional group and staff to lead it, an additional timeslot would appear.
This is why I often tell everyone, not just high school students, to consider other marketplaces for information like uDemy or Coursera or any of the dozens of upstarts. They're sooo much better than old school universities because they're not designed to enforce artificial scarcity. There's no bogus song and dance for the admissions department and after that there's no limit on how many people can take the course. This is what the digital world has to offer and we should celebrate the unlimited access to knowledge.
Not to mention, the highest demand courses are always the easiest ones. As someone who has worked as a professor, I refuse to accept that the universities have some administrative imperative to increase the number of sections of easy courses, so students can learn less.
Students should take online courses, but that is besides the point.
The correct answer is to this is to cut that administrative staff and reduce tuition. Not to redirect money towards easy classes.
But there is a larger issue here.
> The students are paying plenty of tuition. Why shouldn't they get the courses they want?
Universities are institutions for providing credentials [1]. Students cannot be the party who should decide what courses are offered, because there is a clear conflict of interest. If you work at a universities, you will see that students naturally and constantly advocate for easier passing requirements and courses. The same way you don't want your trainee electrician at the vocational school to have a say in whether they get to take the safety courses or not,
* you don't want your trainee software engineers at the university to have a say in which math courses they will need, and * you don't want your English majors at the university to decide they would rather take the course on Twilight rather than the one on Shakespeare.
What courses should be offered should be decided by professors in collaboration with industry professionals. Not students who often don't know what is good for them long term. What should be provided to students before enrolling at the university is complete information about what courses are part of the program and why, and the students can decide up front whether the program is for them.
The above is not a blanket defense of universities in any way. I left academia because I think it is broken, but not for the reasons your comments postulate.
[1] Besides the necessary education of society. I also strongly believe there is space in society for educational institutions that don't provide test based credentials, but those cannot replace universities.
As a trivial example, what happens to quadriplegics? Do they not get to go to MIT?
Also, you can fulfill the swim requirement by taking 1 beginner swim class regardless of whether you actually learn to swim during that class or not.
Rather a lot of the history of disabled and otherwise 'unusual' people seems to disprove how 'obvious' and 'commonsense' that idea is in practice.
Furthermore, where is the line between disability, principle and preference? Do religious reasons count? What about cultural ones? A friend of mine who was a Navy officer told me that the Nepalese he trained were absolutely terrified of water - the rivers were so cold in Nepal that they had a deep-rooted cultural association of water with danger. They needed to persevere because they had enlisted as frogmen, but why should a student of astrophysics do so?
The opportunity to justify one's reasons doesn't absolve the issue entirely either, as that effectively makes skills of persuasion, rather than swimming, the requirement. Finally, if you allow arbitrary requirements, which ones are reasonable? Swimming might be as unreasonable to someone brought up in a desert as mountain hiking might be to someone born and bred in Massachusetts.
I have zero issue with forcing prospective astrophysics students outside of their comfort zone.
ADDED: There are also phys ed requirements and humanities distribution requirements. If these are such issues, I have no doubt there are plenty of other schools that don't impose them.
Still technically a "requirement" though.