Preparing Course/Program Proposals
I. Fill out the appropriate forms below before you consult your proposal with the members of the advisory board and your chair: New Course Proposal and New/Change Program request. Other UUPC resources can be found here.
II. Submit your documents early. To ensure that there is sufficient time for each proposal to move through the various committees, the curriculum committee (CC) strongly recommends that your proposal be submitted no later than two terms prior to the requested term.
III. If you are proposing a course as part of the core list you need to submit the following forms:
Core courses must be at the 1000 or 2000 level. 3000-level courses will be considered on a case by case basis assuming they have no prerequisites.
IV. If you are proposing a new course, submit a syllabus. The most updated guidelines for a new syllabus are below. It will save everyone time if all the info is accurate, edited appropriately, and updated. The co-chair of the CC, Dr. Carmen Cañete Quesada, will review your documents carefully and will send you a list of recommendations and questions. You will need to address those recommendations and resubmit your documents before your request is included in the agenda of the following CC meeting. Please, do this as soon as possible.
Guidelines for Course Syllabi and Course Syllabus Template.
V. To obtain an appropriate number for your new course, email your syllabus to Elissa Rudolph. with a request for a new course number. You can also consult this with Maria Jennings. If you are curious, you can click here to see the existing numbers located in the SCNS website.
VI. Every new Wilkes Honors College course syllabus needs a “Note of Honors Distinction" in the syllabus, outlining what specifically makes the course an honors course. This “Note” is an essential aspect of your course and the University Honors Council (UHC) will evaluate your proposal based primarily on this statement. Describe in detail the ways in which your course differs substantially from the non-honors version. Consult the syllabus of the non-honors version offered in Boca (if any) before you submit a new course. Below is a template that was included in the minutes of the UHC, on March 20, 2015. The italicized portion reflects the language of the Honors Curriculum Manual, and the UHC will look for it in your syllabus:
Note of Honors Distinction: This course differs substantially from the non-Honors version. First, and most importantly, the course is an agreement between the student and instructor that they will work together collaboratively to ensure a significantly enriched learning experience in a manner consistent with other Honors-designated courses at FAU. This means the course will produce substantive work that reflects interdisciplinarity and connections among academic fields, research and direct access to sources of knowledge pertinent to the field, leadership, creative and critical thinking, and engagement with the world outside the university. Secondly, the writing component of the course will be much more demanding, and will prepare students for upper-division college writing and for work on the Honors Thesis. Students will be exposed to vocabulary of a specifically theoretical nature, and will be expected to comprehend new concepts and to deploy these new terms in their own critical thinking and writing. In addition, we will begin professionalizing our own readings and analyses of these texts. Students will be expected to familiarize themselves with the history and the ongoing critical and scholarly conversation about these works, and will give in-class presentations about critical history and about the living scholars in the field as it now stands. Students will also engage with the theoretical tools used by today’s reading community to study literature. Finally, the course will develop critical attitudes and analytic skills that will teach the student to think for him-or-herself.
VII. When you are finished, email the form (pdf) and the syllabi/bibliography (Word document) as 2 separate files in an electronic attachment to the Curriculum Committee chair. Files must be named correctly: use LastName_BriefTitle_syllabus (for syllabus) and LastName_BriefTitle_form (for the form). Proposals that aren't approved by the committee will be sent back to faculty for revision. To expedite the approval process, the CC is willing to edit proposals that are approved subject to minor non-substantive changes without sending them back to faculty. If you would prefer to have proposals requiring such changes sent back to you first, indicate this when submitting your proposal.
VIII. If you want your course to satisfy the WAC requirement, see FAU's WAC guidelines. The UUPC website has other info and forms.
IX. The Curriculum Committee chair will contact you regarding the status of your proposal after the UUPC meeting. You can also check on whether the UUPC approved your proposal by consulting their minutes, posted online.