Frequently Asked Questions

Unless otherwise specified by a course instructor, the only acceptable calculator for physics and astronomy courses is the SHARP EL-510RNB which is available for purchase at the UVic Bookstore.

This is a good question and you have to be careful to choose the right first year physics course for your program of study.  Please refer to our listing of First Year Physics courses for information.

If you have further questions about any of our first year physics courses, please contact our Undergraduate Advisors who will assist you.

Possible reasons as to why you cannot register for a course on the registration portal:

1) Time Conflict: You have registered for a course that occurs at the same time as the one you are trying to register for.

2) Pre-/Co-Requisite Error: You have not registered for or taken the prerequisite, or are not concurrently enrolled in the corequisite required take the course. To find out what pre- or co-requisites are required, please refer to the undergraduate calendar (in the term you plan to take the course).

If you believe you have the background that matches the listed prerequisites, you can submit apply for a prerequisite waiver. Please note, these are rarely approved.

3) Waitlisted in Related Course: If you are waitlisted in a prerequisite course, you will need to wait until you are fully registered in that course before you can register for the related course.
Ex. Waitlisted in PHYS 102A, therefore you cannot register in PHYS 102B.

4) Enrolment Restriction: You can check the enrolment restrictions tab when clicking on the course name in the registration portal to see what restrictions or limitations are placed on that course.

Some courses are restricted to students in a certain year of study or program of study. Your year standing is determined by the number of units of credit you have. Your program of study is considered to be whatever you have successfully declared.

5) Permission: If you are trying to register for an 'online' lab of a course (ex. an online lab in PHYS 110 or PHYS 111), you may require permission from the department to register. The only students who may receive permission are students who are repeating the course, and who have applied for exemption from the labs.

6) No Space Available: If there are no waitlist spots available in the lecture, and all lab spaces are full, you will either need to monitor the registration portal and wait for someone to drop a lecture or lab section, or take the course a different term.

As labs do not have waitlists, you will need to frequently check the registration portal to see if any spots open in a lab that works for you, or adjust your schedule to accommodate an open lab section that currently has a time conflict with one of your other courses.

If a lab section is available, despite its unattractive time slot, we recommend that you register for that lab regardless, while you continue to check for other open labs over the coming days / weeks.

*Please note that if you register for only a lab, and not a lecture, your registration in the lab may be cancelled without notice to make room for students who are currently registered in the lecture but have not found a spot in a lab. The same applies to students who are waitlisted in a lecture section.

If none of these options are feasible, you may need to consider taking the course during a different term.

You may have missed the additional pages of search results where you can find more lab sections (as shown in the image below).

In the UVic registration system:

• Lecture sections are identified by an "A" as in A01, A02, A03 etc.
• Lab sections are identified by a "B" as in B01, B02, B03 etc.
• Tutorial sections are identified by a "T" as in T01, T02, T03 etc.

Students are responsible for their own timetables. We work to ensure that there are as many lab spaces as lecture spaces available. You may need to change other registrations to fit in the available space.

We cannot add students to lectures or labs that are at capacity.

For all other registration inquiries, please contact our Administrative Officer, Monica Lee-Bonar by email: phastao@uvic.ca or by phone 250-721-7699.

Our department offers a Physics Aid Service throughout the academic year.

If you prefer to hire a private tutor, you can either visit our General Office (Elliott 101) or email physgen@uvic.ca to request a tutor list.