Narrator Listen to part of a conversation between a student and an advi

Advisor  Hi, Quan, how are you doing?
Quan  I’m doing great. How about you, Dr. Smith?
Advisor  Great! Pretty busy with students’ papers.
Quan  It’s about the end of the semester. You must have a lot of papers to read.
Advisor  Yes. You are right. Thanks for coming in, Quan.
Quan  Dr. Smith. You wanted to see me? Is there some sort of problem? I’m a bit worried.
Advisor  Well, not exactly a problem. Don’t worry.
Quan  Is it about my paper?
Advisor  No, but there is something we need to discuss. I asked you to come here because I want to talk with you about your schedule.
Quart  My schedule? Is there anything wrong with my schedule?
Advisor  Eh...yes. About the courses you’ve already taken and the courses you’ve signed up to take next semester.
Quan  What about it?
Advisor  It’s not exactly wrong, but it’s something we need to deal with. Let me lay it out for you...here it is...you see...
Quan  Yeah.
Advisor  Well, in your plan of study you’ve declared that you want to finish your master’s degree in two and half years.
Quan  That’s right.
Advisor  It’s been a year since your enrollment. But, you haven’t taken any core courses yet. I’m just afraid that you may not be able to graduate in two and half years if you don’t take any core courses from this semester on.
Quan  Dr. Smith. Actually, I don’t know anything about core courses. How do they affect my graduation?
Advisor  You really don’t know anything about core courses? Didn’t anyone tell you anything about them? That’s weird.
Quan  No, I don’t know.
Advisor  You should have been told about them the very first day you were enrolled. Core courses are the required courses you must take so as to obtain your master’s degree and graduate. There are a total of five core courses you must take. Since they are not offered every semester, you have to make a plan about when to take them. Otherwise, I’m afraid, you may not be able to graduate on time.
Quan  It sounds very serious. Thank you very much for reminding me.
Advisor  My pleasure.
Quan  In my case, I have to take as many core courses as possible every semester from now on. Is that right?
Advisor  That’s right. By the way, another important thing is that the department cannot offer you an assistantship for the next year and half because of the tight budget. You know, there are more and more students applying right now, but there aren’t many assistantships to be offered. I’m sorry to tell you this.
Quan  That’s too bad. But thank you for telling me this. It’s really important to me.
Advisor  And, as you told me before, you cannot afford the tuition to study here by yourself.
Quan  No, if I have no assistantship, there is no way for me to study here. So, I have to graduate on time. Dr. Smith, can you give me some suggestions on which courses I should take this semester? I have no idea which ones are easy and which ones are difficult.
Advisor  Well, the core courses such as Grammar and Socio-psycho Linguistics are relatively easy, because they are the most basic courses. The courses like Testing and Descriptive Linguistics are comparatively difficult. But, if you can first finish Grammar and Socio-psycho Linguistics, Testing and Descriptive Linguistics will become easier because you will have some background knowledge about them.
Quan  Thank you very much. I really appreciate your help.
Advisor  You are welcome.