For
students, the end result of a course
title is its listing on the student’s
academic record/transcript. Therefore,
as a general rule, it is best practice
to make any course title as descriptive
as possible of the material being covered
by the course.
In
addition, it is good practice to make
sure a title does
not place excessive
burden on the reader of a transcript
to know what subject/department abbreviations
stand for. For example, if your course
title is “Practicum” and
the subject is NURS, you are probably
fine, since a transcript reader would
recognize NURS as Nursing; but the same
title with a subject of PEXS is not descriptive
enough and should probably read “Practicum
in PE/Exercise Science,” since “PEXS” will
not automatically bring “Physical
Ed & Exercise Science” to mind
for someone reading the student’s
transcript.
In
many cases, titling of courses requires
extra care because
of practical limitations
on title length in the system and on
the student’s printed transcript.
In our current system, the title length
limit is 28 characters, and in the PeopleSoft
system it will be 30 characters. In some
cases, this makes it very important to
craft clear and communicative abbreviations
when planning course titles.
Our
current system was designed to allow
the over-riding of
course titles each
term on individual class offerings. This
was particularly useful for those courses
designed as “topics courses,” where
specific subject matter would vary from
term to term. Thus, for example, a course
with a standard title of “Topics
in History” would appear in a semester
schedule as “Top: History of Jazz & Blues.” In
the PeopleSoft system, the standard course
title of “Topics in History” will
be retained on the student’s record
and an additional topic title line will
be available to attach to any section
of a topics course. Both the standard
title and the topic will print on the
student’s transcript. In our example,
the topic title of the section would
be “Jazz and Blues,” and
the student’s transcript would
read “Topics in History” on
one line, and “Jazz and Blues” on
the line directly below it.
Three Course Categories
There are really three categories of
courses when it comes to course offering,
description, and transcription.
Regular Course
The first is the regular course record that is designed with a fixed
title that will be used every term to describe the content of the course.
Topics Course
The second is the topics course record
where the content of the course, and
sections of the course, will vary from
term to term. The topics course
is also used to introduce a new content area on a temporary basis to “see
if it will fly,” and if it does, a regular course is then added
through the curricular process.
Student Topics Course
The third category is the readings (also
independent study, etc.) course record,
where each student will receive credit
for course content that is individual
to the student. For the purposes of record-keeping
and transcription, it is possible, at
the discretion of the academic department,
to treat a readings course in the same
fashion as a topics course by having
each student register for an individual
course section that would include a topic
title that would describe the content
that the student is individually covering.
Title specificity at the individual
student level is not a common practice
around the country or at UND. Most departments
elect not to offer sections with student-specific
topics, primarily because of the amount
of work that is required in formalizing
individual titles. In the case of readings
courses, the individual titles are often
not known until after classes begin,
as students meet with instructors to
agree on content, and obtaining such
information can be difficult if a department
is not organized to collect it promptly
and efficiently.
