New student advising

What is FAS Touchstone?

FAS Touchstone is a virtual general advising session offered in collaboration with your departments: 

• For newly admitted fall term students: sessions will begin at the beginning of April 2024 and run until early September.
• For newly admitted winter term students: the sessions run from early June until early January.

As noted in the Welcome Guide for Undergraduate Students, new students must have an advising session. This session is to:

• Introduce you to the Faculty of Arts and Science and your department!
• Teach you about your degree/program requirements. 
• Highlight courses, course sequencing, and more, that make up your degree and program requirements.
• Review some of the information that you need to know/understand as you move forward in your studies with us!

What to do next?

• Accept your offer of admission and pay the confirmation fee. The sooner you do this, the sooner you can register after attending a Touchstone session.
• Review the Touchstone presentation dates and find your department's scheduled presentation
• Register for a session! Some departments will have their advising session separate from the Touchstone session. 
• Make sure to confirm your Zoom invite and save it to your online calendar or write it in your agenda.
• Touchstone registration closes the day before each presentation (or if the session capacity is met)!

What happens after Touchstone?

• After you attend a FAS Touchstone presentation with SAS and your department advisor, the registration restriction will be removed within 48-hours
  • If your department is not presenting at the FAS Touchstone session, the hold will be removed after your department advising session.
• If you have not accepted your offer of admission and paid your confirmation fee, your department will not be able to remove the registration hold and this will delay registration
• Review your required courses and course sequencing, if available
• Review the Class Schedule, if not already done, to place courses in your course cart. Use the Virtual Class Builder to see what your class schedule may look like!
• Make sure that you register as soon as possible after the restriction is removed (the longer you wait, the harder it will be to get the courses you need/want)