What's the difference between a Course Placeholder and a Course Section?

Modified on Mon, Jul 11, 2022 at 12:05 PM

(To view full-sized versions of these images, left-click on an image and it will display as a pop-up overlay.)

Course sections include meeting information (time, location, etc), but course placeholders do not. When you register for a course section you're reserving a spot in a specific course section that you added to your schedule. Alternatively, a course placeholder is like a bookmark; you can add it to your schedule, but you cannot use it to register.

Examples:

Placeholder:

A cropped screenshot from the Plan & Schedule screen of Student Planning on Self-Service. The screenshot displays a placeholder for CPSYC-3888. No meeting information is displayed.

Planned, Unregistered Section:

A cropped screenshot from the Plan & Schedule screen of Student Planning on Self-Service. The example shows information for a section of CPSYC-2453-01, with the label Planned below the course title. Below that the section and meeting information is displayed.

Registered Section:

A cropped screenshot from the Plan & Schedule screen of Student Planning on Self-Service. The screenshot depicts a registered section of CPSYC-4089-01. It displays the same information as an unregistered section, but with a blue Drop button prominently shown, and a blue label that reads, Registered.

Though you may add course placeholders to your course plan in either My Progress or Plan & Schedule at any time, that's just the first step in preparing your registration. When you're ready, you should return to Student Planning to add available sections of your planned courses to your schedule.

A useful way to tell the difference between a placeholder and a section is by checking the title. A placeholder will merely display the course code (e.g., CWRIT-1101). A section will display a course code and a section number (e.g., CMATH-1010-01).

Need more information? You might be interested in our article on adding, moving, or removing placeholders or our tutorial on using Student Planning to register for courses.