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Degree Audit Enhancements Request

Kerry Pretty

November 30, 2010 06:59

Not planned

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1. Enhance degree requirements management.

 Add the ability to change the year that the degree requirements are assigned to. For example, to change from 2009-2010 to 2006-2007.

Allow the requirements of one catalog year to be cloned for another catalog year so that the requirements only need to be changed and not completely redone. We could then clone the requirements for 2006-2007 in 2010-2011 and then make the necessary changes for 2010-2011.

2. Add basic logic functions such as AND, OR, NOT, IF THEN ELSE. This would allow for the following:

Take Either (Course A) OR (Course B AND Course C)

3. Add course group hierarchy such that one course group can be a component of another. This would allow for the following:

Example 1

Course Group X

Take Either (Course A: 3 credits)

        OR     (Course B: 2 credits AND 1 Course from a Course Group C: 1 credit)

 

Example 2

Course Group Z requiring 2 courses from the following list of course groups to be taken:

            Course Group A (Set = only 1 course of)

            Course Group B (Set = only 1 course of)

            Course Group C (Set = only 1 course of)

            Course Group D (Set = only 1 course of)

The result is that the student might take one course from Course Group B and one course from Course Group D to satisfy Course Group Z, but could not take 2 courses from Course Group B.

This capability is especially desirable in the instance when the school changes there programs, such as going from 2 credit to 3 credit courses or combining a number of courses together but still wants to give students who have taken courses in previous years credit in the program for the older version of the course.

 Example:  PS313 Leadership Development I (2 credits) AND

                  PS413 Leadership Development II (2 credits) are combined into

                  PMN 382 Leadership Development (3 credits)

But students taking both of the older version courses do not need to take the new version.

These three courses could be defined as Course Group A requiring 3 credits. It is assumed that the additional credit when the older version of the courses is taken would be counted as an open elective credit contributing to the overall credits for the student’s program. Similar sets of courses could be defined for course group B, and C and so on.

  

4. Prioritization of Course Groups

User selection of the course group that gets assessed 1^st, 2^nd, 3^rd, etc in the degree audit so that course area electives (e.g. General Studies Electives) can be evaluated last, thus allowing reuse of a “general” area electives list for a course area and allowing alternative courses in a required course list to be taken as electives.

For example, if a student had to take either Course A or Course B in a specific course area but also had to take 3 electives in that course area, they could take both course A and B with course A counting as the required course and course B counting as a course area elective.

Also, in this case, the course area electives list could be general and used for more than one program even if the required courses in that course area differed for different programs.

 

8. A folder hierarchy for course groups so that a user could put selected course groups into a specific folder.

9. Change the Course Group Requirement banner background to GREEN when the requirement has been met.

10. Highlight the courses listed in degree audit that are offered for Registration whenever the Registration page is open. We might want to also have a different colored highlight to make students aware of the courses that are being offered in the default academic term.

 

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11 comments

• 
  Adam Sentz February 08, 2012 01:42 Official comment

  I'm marking this as "Not Planned" because it is actually many separate requests about the degree audit all grouped together. If you'd like to see one of these items implemented please submit it as an separate request so we can accurately gauge its popularity.

   

  EDIT - Kerry reposted ideas as separate requests:

  Degree Audit Enhancement Request - Requirements Management

  Degree Audit Enhancement Request - Basic Logic Capability

  Degree Audit Enhancement Request - Course Group Hierarchy

  Degree Audit Enhancement Request - Completion Status Indicator

  Degree Audit Enhancement Request - Registration Coordination 

  Degree Audit Enhancement Request - Requirement Group Notes

  Edited by Adam Sentz September 12, 2023 20:31
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  Kerry Pretty December 01, 2010 19:45

  5. Could we add an area in course groups for notes for the purpose of helping students make decisions about completing the course group requirements, This might eliminate the need for additional logic functions. 

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  Kerry Pretty December 01, 2010 20:25

  6. Could a selectable option be added that would "grey out" any course groups in the specialization level that had already been designated as required at the degree (core) level. Currently, when I enter requirements at the degree level, I can only use them once but when I go to the specialization level, I can reuse course groups that were used at the degree level. The way I understand that Degree Audit mechanism, required course groups at the degree (core) level and at the specialization level should be mutually exclusive.

  Isaac suggested that I add this to the feature request.

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  Kerry Pretty December 04, 2010 22:21

  7. Allow a user to select an option in the degree audit that permits a course to be counted in multiple requirements in the same level (either at the Degree level or at the Specialization level) as selected by the user.

  For example, in our 4 year degrees, we have a course group requirement at the Degree level requiring a student to take English Composition, which is a course in the General Studies subject area. At the Specialization level, we have a requirement for the student to take another General Studies course in Public Speaking. Also at the Specialization level, there is a requirement for the student to take 30 credits in the General Studies subject area.

  When I examine a student's Degree Audit, I see that the course taken for English Composition is counted in both the course group requirement at the Degree level and in the General Studies subject area (named GEN - Electives) at the Specialization level. There is no selection box to specify where the English Composition course should count. This is brilliant because it allows us to both require the student to take English Composition, a specific course, and to require them to take a specific number of credits in a particular subject area (something the ABHE requires).

  Unfortunately, the Public Speaking course which is also at the Specialization level does not function in the same way. For this course, there is a selection box requiring the course to be counted only in one requirement, either the Public Speaking course requirement OR the General Studies subject area requirement.

  A multiple counting capability where the user can select to count or not count would allow the following:

  a. simultaneously requiring specific courses and requiring a specific number of credits in a particular subject area.

  b. handling situations where the number of credits for a required course changes or two courses with a different number of credits satisfy a specific course requirement without adversely impacting the requirement to have the student take a specific number of credits in a particular subject area.

  c. allow for the situation where the student needs to take a specific number of courses from a list of courses, say 3 of 7, and allowing those courses not selected from the list to be taken as subject area electives (where a specific number of credits are required). This ability to select where a course counts across the Degree and Specialization levels does not seem to be possible currently.

  d. the student will be able to clearly see which specific courses they are required to take and how many total credits they are required to take in a specific subject area.

  e. the Degree Audit function could behave consistently across the Degree and Specialization levels as well as within each of the levels.

  For additional details, please see Request #4427.

• 0
  
  Christal Fehr June 07, 2011 01:12

  I definitely agree with point #3 - we have many "course groups within course groups"... situations where students can choose one of 2 or 3 courses to meet just one of the course group requirements.

  I also like point #6... in fact, I believe I entered this as a separate request, not knowing it was here already. I also talked to Isaac about this one and he suggested submitting the request.

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  Patrick Friesen August 08, 2011 15:57

  Allow me to add a very strong yes to this thread.

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  Terry Hiebert August 09, 2011 18:36

  I would agree quite strongly with this thread. The degree audits need to look similar to our course catalogue formats. Students and advisors need a simple format to check course requirements and completions. The system as applied to our college is much too complicated for proper use. The base logic and course group hierarchy are good starting points but all of the suggestions are important for us.

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  Patrick Friesen August 09, 2011 19:29

  What is the likelihood of this being implemented in the near future? This is possibly the biggest issue that we are facing going into our first semester. We could do this with Gradpro and would love to be able to do this with Populi as well.

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  Brendan O'Donnell August 09, 2011 19:59

  Near future? Unlikely. This would involve a lot of programming—a complete rewrite of the Degree Audit—and would require most of our current customers to change the way they use it. 

  Concerning GradPro, we've seen a lot of GP databases, and few schools used those features well—it gave them the ability to make absolute hash out of a student's Degree Audit. One of the things we have to consider is whether a new feature simply introduces useful flexibility or, to use a stark phrase, hands people some rope to hang themselves with. Thus, our caution, especially when asked to make something considerably more complex than it currently is.

  This is by no means a closed door on improvements to the DA—we're constantly examining Populi looking for ways to improve it, and by no means does the Degree Audit escape our withering glare. But it's just not something we're considering for the near-term.

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  Patrick Friesen August 12, 2011 16:32

  Thanks Brendan for clarifying. Without the whole shopping list above, would it be possible to simply implement the same functionality that is there when transferring in courses from another institution within the degree audit. Basically what we would like to see is that the exceptions function be expanded so that we could say X course = Y course on the degree audit. That one change would make reading the degree audit much clearer to our students and advisers.

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  Brendan O'Donnell August 12, 2011 17:07

  Patrick,

  Something similar came up this morning with Exceptions, and I just submitted something to our developers mocking up how this sort of thing might look. At this point, it's really up to them how soon that could be implemented, but I think this is a good idea. Again, timelines are out of my jurisdiction, but the idea is in front of our programmers. Thanks for your thoughts on this.