At most institutions, degree programs share some courses. For example, a Calc 1 course taught by the Math Department might be a requirement for both a Physics degree and an Economics degree. Both the Physics Department and the Economics Department want to include Calc 1 as part of their programs and map Calc 1 to their own degree objectives. However, the Math Department does not want anyone making changes to the curriculum in Calc 1 and they want their own mapping of Calculus as part of the math degree.
In Coursetune, we use a feature called Shared Courses to help you manage these curriculum complexities.
Shared courses create a relationship consisting of a source course and a collection of proxy courses. We use two icons to denote the source and the proxy courses
The proxy course is simply a representation of the source course. The proxy course is not a copy and cannot be edited separately. The ownership of the course is retained by the source course.
The source icon represents two hands holding the course. The proxy icon represents two hands holding the space where a course is represented but does not actually exist.
There are two typical strategies people choose to create shared courses. We’ll outline both these strategies below.
Strategy 1: The source course lives in a collection of similar subject courses. Every degree program that needs to include the course contains a proxy course.
Strategy 2: The source course lives in the degree program of the department that owns the curriculum. Other degree programs include proxy courses.
What makes the source/proxy relationship unique?
We are going to explain these relationships in standard CourseTune language to make the relationships easier to understand:
- Institution (Level 1)
- Division (Level 2)
- Program (Level 3)
- Course (Level 4)
1. Edits can only be made to the Source Course
If edits are made to the source course, then those edits cascade (in real time) down to the proxy courses. No edits can be made to the curriculum structure of the proxy courses.
2. Each Proxy Course can have different Program Mappings
The lovely thing about proxy courses is that they can be mapped to separate program outcomes. Every proxy has the exact same data as the source course, but keeps a separate set of data for its own program mappings. For example, each program below is mapped to a different Program Outcome Set.
If the source course is mapped to an Institution Outcome Set, then all the proxy courses will hold the same institution outcome set mappings as the source course.
If the source course is mapped to a Division Outcome Set, then a proxy course within the same division will hold the same mappings as the source course.
Note: If a proxy course is in a different division than the source course, then the proxy course will be able to map to the division outcome sets for the division it is held in.
3. Proxy Courses Show Up in Reports
Even though proxy courses are just a representation of the source course, they show up in searches, reports, and visualizations throughout CourseTune.
How to Create Shared Course Relationships
There is no way to “create” a source course by itself. A source course is automatically created when you share a course thus creating the source/proxy relationship.
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