Plan Ahead for Your Quarter

Owned by Megan Hamshar
Sep 12, 2023

Repeating a course

Students may repeat a course taken at SPU once in order to earn a higher grade. To repeat a course for the third time, however, you must submit a Registration Petition (PDF) to the Office of Registration in Demaray Hall 151. If a course is designed to be repeated for additional credit, students may repeat up to the max number of credits (see the Time Schedule for details).

Taking over 18 credits (overload credits)

To be full-time, students must take 12-18 credits per quarter.

Some quarters you may find that you need to take more than 18 credits. To do so, you may submit a credit overload request through your Banner account. 

To access the credit overload request go to Student Menu > Registration and Class Schedules Menu > Credit Overload Request. 

If you meet the necessary criteria, the Registration Office will raise your credit limit, send you confirmation and then you will be able to register for the additional credits. 

Note: Overload credits are subject to additional tuition charges. Certain courses may be eligible for free overload. Please see Student Financial Services for information about those charges.

Create future schedule in Banner

The “Plan Ahead” feature in Banner allows you to create potential schedules for future terms. The feature is available each quarter for which the Time Schedule is published. To start a plan:

  • Click Plan Ahead in the Registration Menu.
  • Select one of the available terms.
  • Click Create a New Plan to begin.

You’ll be directed to a basic search page. There, you can use the basic search to find classes by one or more criteria. You can also utilize the “Advanced Search” feature by clicking that link just to the right of the “search” button.

  • Once you’ve entered criteria in one or more fields, click Search.
  • Not all courses are offered every term, so you will want to click View Section in the far right column of the course(s) you are interested in. You will be able to see each section that is offered for the term you are searching.
  • When you find a section to add to your plan, click Add. Repeat this process to find additional courses by clicking on the Catalog Search Results back arrow in the upper-left side of the search results block, and then the Search Again green button.
  • Once you’ve added all the sections to your plan that you wish, click Save Plan in the lower right-hand corner. You’ll be prompted to name the plan.
  • Created plans can then be used to register for classes.

When you return to the Plan Ahead page in the future, you will see your saved plan(s), and you can choose to edit those or create a new one. Plans can be viewed by you and by your advisors (faculty advisor, program advisor, and academic counselor).