While Friday marked the release of the spring 2008 Course Offering Directory for University students, the date also marked the culmination of months of planning on departmental and University levels.
Since early August, efforts have been underway to revise the upcoming semester's course offerings and to organize all related logistics.
The planning process for the COD differs slightly for each of the schools, but in the case of the College of Arts & Sciences, the Office of the University Registrar sends out a draft, or galley, of course offerings in early August. Based on the revised course offerings, the office makes changes to ISIS and makes appropriate room assignments.
Associate University Registrar Jonathan Helm said the initial draft is based on course offerings from the "most recent like term." For instance, the galley for fall 2007 would have been based on course offerings from fall 2006.
Room assignments are made taking into account a number of factors, including the size of the class, the equipment needed and the room's proximity to the department's offices.
"The system tries to utilize space as efficiently as possible," Helm said. "It works through a number of variations in a matter of seconds. It doesn't take care of all the scheduling, but it does a significant portion of it." Meanwhile, on the departmental level, the planning starts at the beginning of the semester preceding the one in question, said Richard Handler, associate dean of academic programs in the College.
Each department first decides how many of each type of course it wants to offer, Handler said. Then the department determines what days and times the courses will be offered and submits the list of offerings to the registrar.
"Every department knows they have to spread courses across a variety of times," Handler said.
Within the department itself, the director of undergraduate programs plays a major role in the planning process. If the department does not "get the right mix" of courses, Handler said, the director will intervene and try to even out the offerings.
"The faculty ethos is that your teaching assignments are a combination of what you want to teach and what the department needs," he said.
Students said the COD helps them to evaluate their academic needs as well.
"[The COD] gave me the opportunity to look at what classes I can take next semester," First-year Engineering student Warren French said.
Second-year College student Jessica Mino noted that as academic careers progress, the COD's release is often less useful as students must focus more on requirements.
"I was more excited for it to come out last year," she said. "I guess because first year is more exploratory."
Although the COD is now officially available online, Helm has not ruled out the possibility of changes in the future.
"There's never really a final version of the COD," he said. "It's not a static sort of thing"
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