Course Design

UNIVERSITY OF MAINE AT MACHIAS

Policy & Procedure Manual

SECTION: ACADEMIC POLICIES AND PROCEDURES SECTION IV

DATE: 05/98, 03/24, 03/99, /08, 08/10, 11/18


Proposals for courses are submitted to the Division for discussion and approval, using the New Course Proposal Outline.
Five-year file courses approved by Division will be forwarded to the Curriculum Committee. The Curriculum Committee will notify the faculty of deadlines for timely submission of course proposals.
If necessary, an oral hearing may be arranged by the Curriculum Committee with those persons directly involved in the course proposal.
Following approval of the proposed course by the Curriculum Committee, the approval will be announced to the faculty and sent to the VPAA for recommendation to the President except as follows:

  • If five faculty members (in five days) request action by the entire faculty;
  • If the Vice President for Academic Affairs of President requests action by the entire faculty;
  • If the Committee votes to bring the business forward to the Faculty Meeting;
  • If the Committee’s action runs counter to the requested action the proposal should not be sent back to the person/group who requested the action nor forwarded to the faculty or administration, instead, the Committee and the author of the request should decide together on an appropriate course of action;

One-time only courses (under temporary approval and which can be taught a maximum of twice without full five-year review) will proceed from Division level directly to the Vice President for Academic Affairs for FINAL decision.
Temporary (One-time only) Approval

  • Courses may be approved for either one or two offerings as specified on the request for approval.
  • This type of approval is designed for various special cases such as: experimental courses; courses from other University campuses; graduate courses; curricular enrichment courses, particularly as might be offered by visiting adjunct faculty; courses taught in joint programs with other institutions, etc. In general these might be described as courses which are not included in academic program requirements and are not a continuing responsibility of UMM faculty.
  • Such courses may be counted toward the meeting of UMM academic program requirements or core requirements only with the approval of the division or administrative unit responsible for that program, or that element of the core requirements. However, credits from such courses will be applicable toward the total degree requirements.

Five-Year Approval

  • This type of approval is designed for courses which will be offered on a regular basis as part of the curriculum, both “required” courses and “electives”. (i.e., Courses understood to be the continuing responsibility of UMM faculty.)
  • Any course not taught in any five-year period will be dropped automatically from the “file”. Thus, the “file life” of a course will be a period of five years from the time of its last being taught.
  • Each time a new catalog is to be produced each Division will select the courses from the file for inclusion in the catalog. The assumption is that courses included in the catalog have been taught at least once in the five years preceding printing of the catalog and will be taught at least once in the five years following the printing of the catalog.

Notes
Courses for the Five-Year File will follow this process:

  • Proposer to Division to Curriculum Committee to Vice President for Academic Affairs to the President.
  • The Vice President for Academic Affairs will notify the proposer, the division chairperson and Curriculum Committee of administrative action.
  • FISC may not approve courses for five-year file.

Administrative Action
Courses for temporary approval will follow this process:
A written request for approval will be submitted by the appropriate division chairperson or by the appropriate administrative officer to the Vice President for Academic Affairs, whose decision shall be final. The proposer and the division chairperson will be notified promptly by the Vice President for Academic Affairs of the decision.
In all cases, action taken by Divisions and Curriculum Committee are only recommendations to the Administration. All final decisions for course approval are made by the Administration (Vice President for Academic Affairs or President as outlined above). In the case of denial of temporary approval, a decision by the Vice President for Academic Affairs may be appealed in writing by the proposer to the President.
It shall be the responsibility of the Registrar to maintain a file for both the Five-Year File and a file of courses having temporary approval.

UMM course proposal and course change request forms are available on the Registrar website.