Curriculum Management

What curriculum management looked like before CourseLeaf:

• Prior to CourseLeaf, the old system was a purely paper process. For program and course changes, faculty would have to fill out a sheet addressing the new/existing changes that they would like made, attach all supporting documentation, and submit through the proper channels.
• This process was tedious because it was difficult to make changes as the proposals went through the approval process, and sometimes steps in the approval process could be missed. In addition, the tracking and sharing of the paper documents made the process lengthy.
• Once all of the approvals were made, the changes had to be input into the system manually.
• There was a lot of room for human error to be made in the processes overall.
• The needs that were unmet were the ability to have this process be inclusive to all faculty; even within the same departments. Since the process was paper, there had to be a lot of internal communication within departments to ensure that work was not being duplicated. Also, new faculty that did not completely know the proper process and documents required through the process felt excluded from the ability to suggest curriculum changes themselves, and therefore the burden lay with senior faculty members.

How the new system addresses these needs (and enhancements):

• The new system is an online interface that houses all of CSU-Pueblo’s current programs/courses and gives access to all faculty members to view these courses. As approved by department chairs, these faculty members then have the ability to submit new programs/courses or propose changes.
• Rather than this being a paper process, everything is now done electronically though the CourseLeaf system. This includes submitting into and completing the workflow. Since the workflow is electronic, committee steps being missed is greatly decreased, and allows for a more seamless “rollback” process to submitters for clarification as suggested by committee members.
• Furthermore, rather than the end process being completely manual by the Registrar’s Office with lengthy checks and balance processes for accuracy, the system is able to upload the data into AIS (and in the future, Banner) removing the chance of human data input error.
• In addition, as the catalog is now also in an electronic interface, the changes suggested can be seen “live;” meaning faculty and staff can see exactly how changes will look in the catalog rather than waiting for a published document to see the finished/formatted product.

Who is impacted, what to expect?

• The largest impact on campus in regards to CourseLeaf is faculty, the Registrar’s Office, and parts of IT as these are the major points that input/process catalog changes.
• The second point of impact are some non-academic individuals responsible for non-academic pages of the catalog.