Non-Eight-Semester Program Completion Plans
Department Instruction Sheet for Completing Templates
Act 1014 of 2005 requires that UCA offer "most" undergraduate programs on an Eight-Semester Guaranteed Plan. If your program has been excluded from this requirement through the approval of your college dean and the Office of the Provost, you are still required to submit a Program Completion Plan that will guide students interested in your program in their course selection.
The following instructions will guide you through the creation of your Program Completion Plan (PCP), whether your program is intended to be completed in three, four, or five years. If you have questions about creation of your program’s PCP, please contact Terri Files.
Program Completion Plan templates are in MSWord and may be downloaded from the Program Completion Plan page: download and open the appropriate template, and fill in each section appropriately.
Note: Updated templates will be available by November 5 each year. New and updated PCPs are due in the Undergraduate Studies office no later than February 15 to be effective for students beginning at UCA in the following fall semester.
Be sure to complete all header information, including the Undergraduate Bulletin URL for your program information (e.g., English programs are described at http://www.uca.edu/ubulletin/03/30502.html). If an item of header information does not apply to your program (e.g., the program has no separate tracks or emphases), enter "N/A." Note that you will need to enter in the header the total number of hours required for graduation (usually 124, of course, and never less).
Your program completion plan should be as specific in the listing of courses as you are able to guarantee. Where possible, list specific courses students should enroll in to complete your program, including major and General Education requirements (see below for more on General Education).
Please list specific courses only by program abbreviation and course number (e.g., ENGL 2370, WRTG 1310, MATH 1360) or by using an appropriate and consistent notation such as "Core requirement," "Major elective," or "Minor elective." Credit hours should be listed in the appropriate column as a single digit number or, if courses might vary in credit hours, as follows: 4-5 (where the suggested courses might be for 4 or 5 credit hours).
Include WRTG 1310 and 1320 in the first two semesters of the PCP, since these are required by university policy. Your PCP should then include the appropriate number of additional General Education hours, listing specific Gen Ed courses or areas as required by your program. If your program allows students a choice of Gen Ed courses and the order of completion, you may simply include the appropriate number of Gen Ed courses, listing these as "Gen Ed." You may also include specific General Education courses that you recommend (rather than require), denoting these with an appropriate endnote. (See section on adding endnotes, below.)
If you do list an area requirement, rather than a specific course, please do so as "Gen Ed (area)," and use the following abbreviations for the General Education areas: Hist/Gov, Fine Arts, Health Sci, Hum, Math, Oral Com, Nat Sci, Soc Sci, WCT. In order to allow scheduling flexibility, suggested (rather than required) areas should be endnoted as such:
See appropriate choices, alternatives, or substitutions under "General Education Program" in the Undergraduate Bulletin.
Finally, every PCP should also include the appropriate number of "General electives" required to reach the total number of credit hours necessary for graduation. Programs requiring a minor will need to balance general and minor elective hours (see below). To allow students the option of enrolling in the First-Year Experience course, a three-hour "Gen Ed or General elective" may be included in the first semester with the following endnote:
The First-Year Experience course (FYFS 1320) or another appropriate course may be taken as a General Elective during the first semester.
You will then need to include another "Gen Ed or General elective" later in the program plan to account for all General Education requirements.
Programs that require completion of a minor should allow for approximately 24 minor credit hours (the most common number of credit hours for minor programs), and should include the following endnote:
This Program Completion Plan includes 24 credit hours in the Minor field of study. Minor requirements range from 18 to 27 credit hours; the student will need to adjust the number of general elective and minor elective credit hours in this PCP as needed depending upon the chosen minor field of study.
Include the three hours of foreign language at the 2000-level or higher in all BA programs as appropriate, listing this as "Foreign Language (2000-level)." An endnote should be added to this that says:
Students with no previous experience with a foreign language may need to enroll in up to six hours of lower-level instruction to prepare for this requirement. These courses are not included in this plan of study.
Additionally, the Academic Advising Center and the Department of World Languages, Literatures, and Cultures recommend that students complete this requirement as early as possible in their program in order not to lose fluency gained in high school.
For BS degrees, include two semesters of "BS Science/Math," listing the credit hours as "3-5."
If your program includes courses that are only offered every other year, please provide an alternative course suggestion in that slot, using an "or" between suggested courses. Please make sure that you also include these courses the following year, as well, again with an alternative course suggestion.
Place your cursor where you want the note number to appear. Under Insert select Reference and then Endnote. Ensure that the endnote location is End of document and that the number format is 1, 2, 3, . . . After making your selections, choose Insert again, and type your note. Once you have finished typing your note, move your cursor back to the body of your document and resume typing. (Note: Endnotes rather than footnotes are appropriate here in order to leave the body of the PCP more or less intact as the length of the notes increases.)
NOTE (added 1/23/2006): If you need to refer to the same endnote more than once, use Word's Cross-Reference function. This will allow all the references to any given note to be updated when the original endnote is renumbered, moved, etc. The following explanation is excerpted from the Word Help system.
Inserting cross-references to endnotes: "(1) Click where you want the reference located. (2) On the Insert menu, point to Reference, then click Cross-reference. (3) In the Reference type box, click . . . Endnote. (4) In the For which box, click the note to which you want to refer. (5) In the Insert reference to box, click Endnote number. (6) Click Insert, and then click Close." Note that the note reference mark (your cross-reference) is inserted as unformatted text, so you will need to apply the Endnote reference style to it. Again, the following explanation is excerpted from Word's Help system: "(1) Select the note reference mark [that you inserted using Cross-reference]. (2) If the Styles and Formatting task pane is not open, click Styles and Formatting on the Formatting toolbar [or Format menu]. (3) In the Styles and Formatting task pane, click Custom in the Show box. (4) In the Format Settings dialogue box, select the . . . Endnote Reference check box, and then click OK. (5) In the Styles and Formatting list, click . . . Endnote Reference. Superscript formatting is applied to the [endnote]." After going through this process the first time, this style will be available to you in the Style dropdown list on the Formatting toolbar.
Once your PCP is complete, please delete any unused rows in the tables (where possible) in order to minimize the length of the plan on the page.
Please save your PCP for your own records as a MS Word document, but transfer it to Undergraduate Studies in PDF format. (To do this, you will need to have a PDF compatible driver installed as one of your printer options. Contact Information Technology’s help desk at 450-3107 if you do not have this.)
Once "printed" to your PDF print driver and saved, your completed PCP can then be sent in PDF format as an email attachment or on a CD. Please name the file as indicated on the list of filenames and send it to Terri Files, Undergraduate Studies, or via email to terrif@uca.edu. Undergraduate Studies will then upload the file to the appropriate web folder.
Program Completion Plans may be reviewed each year to reflect changes in your program. In order to have them ready for freshman summer advising, updated PCPs are due each year no later than February 15.
Return to PANDA: Planning & Assessment