Students consider picking courses from a different program as a time waster or just another university scheme to make scholars grieve. Well, I was part of that team until I took a clear look into it.
I’m sorry to say there is more to O.E than the desire to harm.
So what is an open elective?
The word elective means the ability to choose. So it’s an arrangement that allows university students to design their own syllabus by picking subjects, usually from another stream. A good example is how I picked Mutual funds and exchange trade from the school of business yet I’m studying in the school of computer application.
So what?
I will mostly give examples based on what I’m studying. Now listen, information technology doesn’t work by itself. It’s used as a solution in other fields such as business corporations to deal with data and blah blah blah. However for I.T professionals to be able to design something for another industry they should have a basic idea of that industry.
Now you can think of examples based on what you’re studying. Clear? I hope so.
Apart from that, it’s a chance for students to gain skills they feel they are lacking or need to improve. For example, if I know I cannot stand in front of people and present without peeing myself, I can pick soft skills as my open elective. Isn’t that helpful?
Let me finish with the point that will probably make you smile. You can utilise open electives to boost your grades. How? Well if you need a little boosting you can pick a course you know you are good at and will enjoy. That way you can make your semester less stressing.
Well, there many other advantages of open electives but those are my favourite three. I’m delighted LPU saw this and offered the O.E scheme. I hope that cleared the clouds on why we have open electives. From the points I’ve given you can come up with how to pick your O.E wisely or I’ll write another piece on that. Good luck Vertos!
-Wangisani Kumalakwaanthu
