Course Conversion to Four Credit Hours
Presented to CEPP by Standards and Expectations Committee
Revised by CEPP, 3/29/99
Central Questions
As we increasingly direct students to take possession of their own education, we should ask two central questions:
Principles and Questions Central to Course Conversion
When faculty consider converting classes that currently count for three units to four-unit courses, we think it imperative that they do so with the following in mind:
Counting Time
The underlying defining measurement of these courses is the "Carnegie Unit," a State-defined fifty-minute class meeting three times per week over a fifteen-week semester. Notably, the State of New York expects that each credit hour includes two hours of assigned work for every hour of in-class contact. The State also regulates other kinds of contact so that different experiences (science labs, mathematics labs, rehearsals, private lessons, lectures, etc.) count for different amounts of credit.
Not only should we be counting the fifty-minute class hour, but also the two hours of assigned independent work. In other words, the State does not intend that faculty monitor all credit-bearing hours. We expect students to work on material independently and then report their work back to us, but we do not watch them do their "homework." Indeed, in order for them to be successful in their post-Skidmore life, they will need to develop the ability to work extensively in both independent and group contexts outside of their work environments.
Flexible Credit Hours
As some of us consider focusing student time more intensely in reconfigured four-credit classes, our committee suggests that faculty consider how they apply flexible credit hours. By "flexible credit hours," we mean the time that students spend on class work outside the usual classroom context, but that faculty still monitor. In essence, the difference between our typical three-credit course and a four-credit course with a flexible credit hour is three additional hours of accounted time on average per week.
Many of us engage our students in diverse activities. We meet students in our offices, we trade email with them, we hold extra review sessions, we ask them to supplement class work by attending lectures, conferences, and performances, and we instruct them to work among themselves. In this last instance, we aim to have them work without us, but expect that they will bring that work back to their classmates and us. Our expectation should be that this additional work should result in better performance in the classroom and on assignments.
In a flexible learning environment, we need to be certain that we are enhancing the quality and concentration of student involvement with their own education. We need to be certain that we have found a legitimate balance between faculty guidance and independent student activity. We need to know that commitment and integrity are inherent in the arrangement. Teachers still need to be in control of the decision making and academic guidance.
We already use flexible credit time, including (but not limited to) the following examples: