It’s agitating that a major university can’t do a better job managing class scheduling and show more respect to its students who enroll in them.

More than 350 spring semester classes were canceled by university officials, and many sections within departments have been combined.

Unfortunately, many of the students and professors in those course sections didn’t learn of their fate until the second week of classes.

It would seem that a Big Ten university such as MSU would show more respect to its students and employees by making these decisions sooner than the last day to add classes without an override.

The first two weeks of the semester are confusing enough without the addition of more headaches. Now, during the time students and professors should be settling into their new environment, they are faced with unnecessary confusion. The students must now jump through hoops to land themselves in classes to fulfill requirements.

It’s an ironic contrast to K-12 education, where educators aim to keep class sizes down in order to better serve students. MSU officials should promote smaller classes rather than push for larger sections, which are less beneficial to students’ education.

It doesn’t take rocket science to realize students learn more in classes of 20 or so than in large, impersonal lecture halls.

While it’s understandable courses with low enrollment may need to be dropped for financial reasons, it seems as though more and more classes are meeting the cancellation fate at the beginning of the semester.

And it seems as though MSU officials could offer students fair warning that the class they signed up for won’t be around to take.

Perhaps university officials could do more to pitch classes that are known to have low enrollment to students.

Sometimes, the most interesting classes are surprises - the one a student takes and has no idea what to expect. They don’t know what to expect because classes are too often not advertised. And course descriptions often offer little to no accurate information about what to expect.

We fear these cancellations may be economically based. Perhaps fears of budget cuts during a turbulent economy are promoting departments to cut costs by cutting courses. If that is the case, that is wrong.

MSU was founded to offer a first-class education to people who seek it.

Perhaps better management and advertisement is needed to make this a better situation for all involved.

But no matter what the problem, hindering education is not the answer.