Despite budget cuts, “piggyback” courses are not becoming more prevalent at the University, according to officials.

 John Ambrose, interim dean of undergraduate admissions, explained the courses merge undergraduates and graduate students.

“A piggyback course combines a 400-senior-level course with a 500-level course,” Ambrose said.

The course relies on the fact that seniors and first year graduate students have almost equal level of expertise and can be successfully combined in one class, Ambrose said.

Though the course combines both graduate students and undergrads, according to Ambrose, the course load for graduate students is slightly more than course load for undergrads.

“The course load for graduate student is 20 percent higher, it could be in the form of an extra assignment or submission paper,” Ambrose said.

According to Ambrose, the courses are considered a possibility only when enrollment for an undergraduate course and a graduate course are both very low.

According to Ambrose, the prime reason for the existence of such courses is because of budget constraints.

“They exist due to budget constraints, but this is a good way to optimize resources as well, it could free up physical resources like classrooms but there has been no increase in the number of such courses,” Ambrose said.

Ambrose said he feels this is a great chance for both groups to interact outside their social circles.

“They all learn something from one another, graduate students can take up mentoring though it’s not compulsory requirement of such a course,” Ambrose said.

According to Ambrose, there are around dozen such courses at the university, most being offered by College of Agriculture and Life Sciences and College of Humanities and Social Sciences.

“Quality of the course depends on content and instructor, but all things being equal quality improves because of mixing of students,” Ambrose said.

According to Ambrose, such a course is encouraged if graduate if there are less than 10 undergraduate and less than five graduate students for a course offered.

“Some form of piggyback courses existed prior to my arrival here in 1975; it’s not a new concept. Faculty thinks it’s a good idea but only to a limited extent,” Ambrose said.

Ambrose said he feels mixing students with similar interests will be an asset to both the groups, but the idea still has limited value.

“In this time of diminishing resources, we try to optimize and this is just one small example of that,” Ambrose said.

Annie Land, a first year graduate student in English, said a piggyback course would be fun to attend.

“I have heard of such a course but didn’t know what it was called. It’s a great concept but graduate students should get priority for registration,” Land said.

Keron Cumberbatch, a first-year graduate student in environmental engineering, said he previously took a piggyback course.

“It was good. I attended while I was in my undergrad at N.C State; graduate students had to do more work,” Cumberbatch said.

There is segregation, according to Cumberbatch, and graduate students don’t easily mingle with undergraduate students.

Samara Elshenawy, a senior in language science, said the combined courses can be difficult for undergraduates.

“It will be difficult for a senior to do well among graduate students. I would have attended such a course if I were a graduate student but not if I was a senior,” Elshenawy said.