Course Offering Guidelines

Course Cancellation

The university will notify students of course cancellations as early as possible to permit students to enroll in substitute courses.  The Registrar's Office will notify student's via their ACE email of any course cancellations made my the academic colleges.

Courses in Shortened Format

The university considers any organized class that is shorter in length than the regular semester or summer-session term a shortened-format course, and college faculty and the VPAA must approve said courses. 

All courses offered in shortened format shall consist of the same number of contact hours as courses offered in the regular semester. The minimum number of class contact hours shall be 15 hours for each semester hour of credit. Thus, a one-semester, credit-hour course will meet at least 15 hours; a two-semester, credit-hour course for 30 hours; and a three-semester, credit-hour course for 45 hours. The university defines an academic hour as 50 minutes.

Independent Study Courses

The purpose of independent study courses is to permit advanced in-depth study in an area where instructors offer no regularly scheduled courses. To use an independent study, the student must first confer with the appropriate faculty member in order to develop a proposal. If the faculty member concurs that such work is appropriate, the faculty member should complete an application form, “Student Contract for Independent Study,” located on the Web and secure the appropriate approval signatures.

The university expects students to take required courses as they become available. Two-year schedules are available on the respective colleges' website.

No student may apply more than 6 SCH of independent-study courses toward meeting requirements for a master’s degree or more than 12 SCH of independent-study courses toward meeting requirements for a baccalaureate degree.

Special Topics

Instructors design these courses to cover subjects of specific interest which existing courses do not address. Consult the graduate section of this catalog for special instructions for graduate students. Instructors must convert special-topics courses to a designated course with a unique prefix, number, and name when the college schedules them to  teach the class for the fourth time.