APPLICABILITY: FACULTY AND ACADEMIC ADMINISTRATORS

Courses of an unusual type, especially those offered for professional development and certification, often lend themselves to acceleration. A course shall be considered accelerated if it meets over a total time period of less than 14 weeks during the fall or spring semester or over less than five weeks of a typical summer session. In instances where a course is accelerated, no three-hour course can be offered in less than nine (9) class days over not less than three weeks, requiring 2250-2400 minutes (45 to 48 contact hours) of instruction. One-, two-, and four-hour courses can be offered in proportionate time. Students may not carry more courses at a time in a shortened format than will give them total credit of one semester credit hour per week of instruction. A student may enroll for no more than one accelerated course not to exceed four semester hours of credit during the time between the fall and spring semester or the spring and summer sessions.

Approval of such courses rests with the regular approving bodies of the school or college, that is, the department curriculum or similar committee, the chair and the dean. The dean, in turn, shall forward the recommendation to the Graduate Dean, in the case of a graduate course, or the Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs, for an undergraduate course; the Graduate Dean or Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs may review the recommendation. Requests to offer accelerated courses shall be forwarded for approval on a form for that purpose. Once the course has been approved, annual updates of the dates when the course will be offered must be submitted for review. The course must be re-approved when the course syllabus changes.

Any course so innovative or experimental that it does not meet these criteria will be reviewed by an appropriate body. For undergraduate courses a subcommittee of the University Curriculum Committee will be appointed by the Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs. For graduate courses, a subcommittee of the Graduate Council will be appointed by the Graduate Dean. Special requests by agencies or schools for in-service courses with atypical content — for example, institutes and workshops — will normally be considered by the subcommittee. It is expected that the subcommittee will focus on the requirements, the Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs or the Graduate Dean will forward requests for exceptions to these rules to the Commissioner of Higher Education for review.

*This policy has been reviewed and no changes were made