Selecting Your Classes

Choosing the right classes and securing seats in them may feel overwhelming at times. To help, we created a step-by-step guide.

1. Figure out what you need to take - Work with the Program Officer and Faculty Advisor/Department Chair at your home institution to determine the courses you need to complete during your studies at Temple. 
2. Search for courses - Use the class schedule search, available in the 'Student Tools' tab of TUPortal to find courses.  You can search by subject, campus, instructor, and even by specific days of the week.  After you are accepted, we hold multiple online registration webinars to guide you through the course search and registration process.
3. Be aware of registration rules and restrictions​ - When searching for courses, make sure you take the following factors into consideration.
   • Credit Hours: International students must be enrolled full-time, which is 12 credit hours for undergraduate (bachelor's) students and at least 9 credit hours for graduate (master's) students.
   • Pre- and Co-requisites: A prerequisite is a course that you must take before you can enroll in a course.  A corequisite is a course you must take at the same time.  You can view pre- and co-requisites in the course descriptions. You can satisfy  prerequisites by either taking the course at Temple or taking an equivalent course at your home university.
   • Times: Make sure your courses don't have time conflicts with one another.
   • Location: You should only take classes at the Main Campus, Center City or Ambler Campus. Please keep in mind that the Ambler Campus is located 50 minutes by shuttle from the Main Campus. 
4. Register - After attending our online registration webinar, which you will be invited to after acceptance, you will receive a copy of the prerequisite worksheet, which you can use to request your courses. Once your completed prerequisite worksheet has been approved and submitted, your academic advisor will register you. 

Course Restrictions

Please note that the following subject areas are restricted for exchange students, which means registration is not possible or not guaranteed. If you study one of these subjects at your home university, we recommend that you remain flexible with your courses, as we likely cannot accommodate all course requests:

• Architecture (requires portfolio review)
• Computer and Information Science
• Performing Arts (Dance, Music, Theater)
• Business (unless majoring/minoring in business at your home university)
• Education
• Professional Schools (Dentistry, Law, Medicine, Pharmacy, Podiatry)
• Visual Arts (Film/Media Arts, Graphic Design, Fine Arts)

In addition to the above course areas, master's-level courses require individual approval from the academic department, and enrollment can not be guaranteed.