Enrollment at St. John’s has been increasing and some students are frustrated with the lack of classroom space available to them.

“I had this one class where there were about 60 or 70 students and there were only around 40 seats available,” senior journalism major Chris Cellucci said. “They need to have larger classrooms for larger classes.”

Admission numbers for undergraduate students have increased by 11 percent this year from 2,689 to 2,976.

The school is trying to find new ways to accommodate the large number of students. Areas like the Little Theater have been used to hold theater and communication arts classes, said Joanne Llerandi, senior associate Registrar.

“Are we really so fresh out of ideas that we have to resort to having the Little Theater to hold classes?” asked senior Candice Frederick, a journalism major.

The Registrar’s office is responsible for assigning classrooms to hold the various classes that take place.

“We do get involved with making the best use of the space that’s available to us,” said Joseph Capobianco, the University Registrar.

Some teachers are also upset because they are unable to have as much contact with their students as they would like.

“I have taught some large”I have taught some large courses with many students and it’s difficult because you can’t do much creatively,” Loretta Deboy, professor of theology said. “On the other hand, I understand that St. John’s is a tuition driven school and so the balance is hard to achieve.”

“We have a working relationship with the assistant and associate deans of the different colleges who are the individuals that get course offerings to us,” Capobianco explained.

“We give them an idea of how many classrooms are available at each time of the day. As we see that maybe they’re approaching the limit for classes that we can accommodate, we let them know and they make adjustments as necessary,” he continued.

To fit the maximum number of classes in each day, classes start as early as 7 a.m. on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays and end as late as 6:05 p.m. on Tuesdays and Thursdays.

“People were offering classes at 7 o’clock all along. We simply encouraged them to offer even more,” said Capobianco. “St. John’s faculty and students are more willing to take classes early in the day like eight in the morning, so we have almost every classroom in use at eight in the morning.

“By spreading out, then you make better use of the facility and that’s chiefly the way we work,” he said.

“It’s not the sizes of the classes that’s the problem, but the sizes of the classrooms,” said senior Kerri Rogers, an English major. “Most of the classrooms are so small. Other universities have much bigger individual classrooms.”

“We try to find the best rooms for the class,” Capobianco said. “There may be some instances at the beginning of the semester when things are a bit unsettled. For example, a room class with initially 25 students may go up to 30.”