As the end of the fall semester begins, students now have the task of setting up appointments and choosing their classes for the spring semester.

For lower classmen, greenlighting appointments must be scheduled to meet with their academic advisors and make sure they are taking the right classes and receiving the credits they need in order to continue with their degree program.

“Essentially, they’re just checking with an advisor to make sure they’re taking all the credit classes and any courses that they don’t need and it’s really just to give students the green light to register,” said Alyssa Perez, graduate assistant for Advising Services.

Due to the COVID-19 protocol for the university, there have been changes made to the way students go about their greenlighting meetings.

“We’ve done a lot more phone appointments, and some zoom appointments,” said Mandy Puryear, an academic advisor.

Puryear discussed how the changes to online and over-the-phone meetings have been strange. However, the transition has been quite smooth.

“A big obstacle is to get students aware of greenlighting, that they need to do it and that they will need to meet with somebody to get greenlighted,” Perez said.

Due to the cancellation of in-person new student orientation at West Texas A&M University, students weren’t able to gain experience and learn about advising appointments and student planning. However, advising services still do all they can to promote greenlighting and help students.

“I will go around campus, set up a table, let students know what greenlighting is, handout giveaways and just kind of make students more aware of what greenlighting is and how it works and how they can get in contact with an advisor,” Perez said.

If students need help with setting up appointments or need information regarding greenlighting, they can reach out in a number of different ways.

“They [students] can go on any of our social media platforms and they can see like the advertisements there and they go to WT’s website. If you type in advising services, our contact information will come up. I know in a lot of IDS (Interdisciplinary Studies) classes, word of mouth by the professors or if they just walk by we try having promotions all around the HUB,” said Ustina Guirguis, student worker for Advising Services.

For more information regarding greenlighting and setting up an appointment with Advising Services, students can visit this link or contact Advising Services at 806-651-5300. Students can also stop by The HUB at the Jack B. Kelley Student Center. The HUB’s hours are Monday thru Friday, 8:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m.