Register for Courses - Johns Hopkins University Global Education Office (2024)

Visiting International and Exchange Students (J-1 Visas) must be enrolled as full-time students for the duration of their semester of academic year at Hopkins.

One credit reflects 15 contact hours per semester. Undergraduate courses generally carry 3 credits or 45 contact hours. To maintain full-time status, you must enroll in a minimum of 12 credits. Most students enroll in 15 credits per semester. You may not register for more than 18 credits per semester.

With some exceptions, here is the correspondence between credits and the number of courses you will need to maintain full-time status

12 credits = four courses
15 credits = five courses
18 credits – six courses

Some intensive courses carry a greater number of credits and many science courses have required laboratories, discussion sessions, and co-requisite courses. Please be sure to read the course description carefully when planning your academic schedule.

As a visiting international student, you are afforded the same rights and privileges as JHU degree-seeking undergraduates. You may register for any undergraduate course listed in the Undergraduate Schedule of Classes for which you meet prerequisites. You are not restricted to courses offered within a single department. You may select courses from undergraduate offerings in both the School of Arts and Sciences and the School of Engineering.

You may not register for courses in the graduate or professional divisions of Johns Hopkins (School of Medicine, School of Public Health, etc.) With the permission of individual professors, you may enroll in graduate courses offered in the School of Arts and Sciences or the School of Engineering.

Course numbers provide essential information on departments and levels of study.

AS/EN:
AS = Arts and Sciences EN = Engineering
Dept:
Department Number, e.g. 100 = History, 200 = Psychology
Level:
Courses at the 100-200 levels are first and second-year courses
Courses at the 300-400 levels are third and fourth-year courses
Courses at the 500-600 levels are research and graduate level courses
Section:
Many courses have multiple sections, many of which meet at different times.

As an exchange student, you cannot register yourself online. After admission, you will receive an email from the Global Education Office with instructions and timing to submit a registration form to the Office of the Registrar, and they will respond to you with updates. To register, you need to submit a SEAM registration request form. Once you log in, click on “Records and Registration” button, then click on “Add/drop inquiry or change grading system”, fill out the form and submit. Please read all the instructions carefully for KSAS/WSE Undergraduate Students first, then click “Sign in to request support” at the bottom of the page.

Course requests should include the following information:

• Course Number, Course Section, Course Title
• Any pre-requisites you have completed, if required.

Please be sure to include the pre-requisites you have completed. Without that information, we will not be able to enroll you in the course.

Once the Registrar has entered your registration requests, you will receive an email notice from the Registrar indicating whether you have been enrolled, waitlisted, or rejected.

Remember that you can submit more than one SEAM online form.

Waitlist
If you are waitlisted, please be patient because there will be many students who choose to drop courses prior to the start of the semester. If you are waitlisted and you receive an email from the Registrar that a space has opened for you, you should respond right away. You will only have a short window of 24 hours to be moved from the waitlist and enrolled in the course.

Reject
If your enrollment request is rejected, it may be due to a lack of prerequisites or you may need to get permission directly from the professor. You may email the professor or you will have an opportunity to get permissions during Orientation, once you have arrived on campus.

Special Exceptions
You may need permission from an Academic Advisor in order to enroll in a specific course or take more than 18 credits. Please email Jessica Mervis in the Global Education Office to request permission if you need an Academic Advisor’s approval.

Interdivisional Course Registrations
If you wish to take courses in another Hopkins division (such as the School of Business, School of Medicine or School of Public Health, for example), please remember that you will be subject to the school registration policy/the academic program policy. We cannot guarantee that you will be able to take courses with other Hopkins divisions which are located in other parts of Baltimore city or Washington DC. You will also need permission from your Academic Advisor in the Global Education Office to enroll in courses outside the Homewood Campus.

Independent Study/Research
If you are interested in doing an Independent Study/ Research with a Hopkins faculty, please first make sure that your faculty is located at Homewood campus. Please read carefully the instructions at https://advising.jhu.edu/research-internships-and-independent-study/. The last day to add Independent Academic Work is just over a month after the start of the semester,so you have time to contact professors once classes have started.

At the end of your semester or academic year, you may request an official transcript from the Office of the Registrar. Under the Federal Education Records Privacy Act (FERPA), you are the only person who may request transfer of your academic record to a third party. Please follow the instructions on the Registrar’s Website to have a transcript sent to your home institution.