The debate on whether to take-up elective courses that are not linked to a major course has gained attention in the recent past among students, parents, educators, employers, and other stakeholders in the academic and employment world.

The debate on whether to take-up elective courses that are not linked to a major course has gained attention in the recent past among students, parents, educators, employers, and other stakeholders in the academic and employment world.

Almost all educational programs require that students take a combination of core and elective courses. Non-core elective courses are those units that students choose among several options outside their core units (Alleyne para 1). In spite of the fact that such elective courses are sometimes enjoyable and widen a student’s option or improve the skills that one already has, taking up such courses is also costly in various aspects. For instance, electives are costly in terms of time as well as unfair ranking. Moreover, non-core electives are usually not included in the final aggregate of a course. Elective courses might derail a student from an area of specialty hence reducing the number of the possible graduates in that field. With these observations and others in mind, students should not be allowed to take non-core elective courses that are not associated with their major.
To take-up non-core electives or optional courses that may supplement a major depends on a combination of critical factors: first, the extent to which the academic advisor is aware of the program; secondly, the adequacy of the supplementary services offered by the associated courses; and lastly, the perceived advantages or disadvantages of the linked courses to non-core elective courses. This paper is primarily concerned with the third factor. The paper observes the low level of awareness of the prerequisites of major courses among students, the influential and critical position of academic advisors in determining whether students seek the right academic counseling, and it raises the extent to which academic students should not be allowed to take non-core elective courses.
JUSTIFICATION
Minor (electives or optional) courses within a major should involve at least 30% of the course work credits required for a major. In fact, students should only be enrolled in options within their majors. Minors are academic programs that supplement majors. They characteristically consist of course work from several disciplines or in a single area. On the other hand, non-core elective courses are not linked to the majors. According to the California State University (East Bay para 5), a major is a plan of study in an area of concentration within a high level of educational attainment, primarily a degree. In other words, universities and other degree granting institutions may have common pre-requisites for all of their majors. Further, each major may have more requirements identified in additional, prescribed, related area categories and supporting courses. In this line, non-core elective units are not considered as part of the major. In all institutions of higher learning, educational programs are designed to give specific outcomes based on the core or optional units covered throughout a given curriculum. In the same context, some institutions offer non-elective core courses, usually for free (CSUEB para 2). These non-core elective courses have various impacts on the outcomes of a major.
Firstly, given that non-core electives do not cover any category or field associated with the desired major, they may significantly serve as a source of more knowledge or enjoyment for the students who take them (Rasmussen College Blog Administrators para 6). For example, a non-core elective music or linguistic course may serve as a platform for engineering or medical students to relieve their tension or boredom that emanates from the technicality of their majors. In this perspective, such non-core elective units would not only be acting as a source of enjoyment, but also serve as a platform for socializing and diversification of views pertaining to arts and culture. However, these benefits are superficial given that students choose to major in areas of their interest. In fact, a student majoring in any field should find most of the content in their area of choice to be motivating and captivating (Cornell University para 5). Therefore, it would be illogical to major in an area that is out of one’s interest. This observation counters the advantage noted because tension or boredom can be released through other activities such as sports. Moreover, majoring is an opening to study what a student loves most and is in a capacity to do well irrespective of what others think about it (Cornell University para 8).
Secondly, when students are allowed to take non-core elective units, they tend to lose focus from the main path; they tend to have divergent views from the core topics. In this line, non-core electives may derail students from the main course line leading to dropouts or poor performance. For example, a medical student majoring in organ or tissue transplant and genetic mutation may be corrupted by philosophical views about these topical issues if he or she attends a non-core elective course that entails the philosophical perceptive of the matter. A student may be convinced that it is unethical and illegal to carry out such medical procedures and as of consequence, drop from the major and become an activist in other fields.
In addition, students should not be allowed to take courses that are not associated to the major so as to improve satisfaction with results or manner in which a course is covered among students and employers. This approach would eliminate the notion that their time was wasted on irrelevant units. Similarly, non-core elective units also cost students the time that would be directed to more relevant tasks. For example, the time taken to cover a non-core elective unit would be used for practical work, volunteering, or college entrepreneurship. Moreover, this move increases the opportunity of covering the relevant units within the designated time in the course line. The time used to cover non-core electives can be used to supplement the time deficits in the core unit courses within the curriculum of a major.
Further, eliminating such courses in the path of majors or the act of simply excluding students from those courses also increases the compliance of a curriculum with the requirements of the regulatory bodies that facilitate employment outside the college. For example, for most professional courses such as nursing, medicine, and engineering, graduates are audited by independent bodies or associations based on what their course line entailed. This means that students who take non-core electives might be ranked unfairly by such regulatory bodies. However, this can be avoided through regular course audits. Therefore, courses that are not linked to majors should not be offered to reduce uncertainty around the possible outcomes of the courses in the field. It is also important to restrict such choices to ensure that students prioritize and take courses in the right order.
Lastly, in the event that students take courses that are not linked to their majors, they may not graduate or qualify for a particular advanced course level because they did not take the right general education units. Students may fail to graduate due to missing a core course. Core units are usually offered at specific times of an academic year and poor choice of units might delay graduations. This translates to the need of a careful or mentored process of selecting the core units while exploring majors (Alleyne para 4).

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