Overview
A course outline is a guide for all students and instructors to engage in for the whole duration of the course enrolment. Paradigm provides an avenue where you can outline the unit components and complexities involved in creating a Course Outline, including: setting up core and elective units for a course, adding prerequisite, co-requisite, and disallowed units to a Course Outline, and adding substitute rules to a Course Outline. A Course Outline can contain all possible units that are permitted for inclusion in the course. Once a Course Outline has been created, Unit Enrolments can be created by the students or the administration staff.
Key Terms and Concepts
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Course Outline User Interface
The Course Outline screen is intended to be completed by Administration Staff with elevated permission level access. All possible units that contribute to the course, are included in the Course Outline definition, including core, elective, prerequisite, co-requisite, and disallowed units, substitute rules and constraints. The details included in the Course Outline are used as the basis for defining the Course Plan for a student. The Course Plan can be defined for or by a student, or by administration staff, for a specific student’s course enrolment.
It is imperative that all core units and all elective units that can contribute toward completion of a course, are listed and saved in the course outline, before beginning to create any student’s course plan based upon that course outline. The core and elective units must have been saved in Paradigm before any prerequisites or corequisites or any other constraints can be defined for a course outline, because these constraints have a direct relationship with the existing core and elective units. A constraint cannot exist without referring to an existing core or elective unit.
Course Plan Grid
The Course Plan is a grid that is restricted to a maximum of 9 columns across the screen, denoted by the columns A through I (the first through to the ninth English letters), usually representing the passage of time by semester or trimester.
The grid is restricted to a maximum of 25 rows down the screen representing the type of unit to be studied. The rows are grouped based on a shared description, so for the units to appear nicely aligned and ordered along a row and in columns across the screen, then the description needs to be exactly the same for the units to be shown on that row.
These column and row length restrictions are in place to prevent the containing grid structure from becoming unwieldy on devices with smaller display screens. Examples are shown below.
Course Plan Rules
There are two types of course plan rules:
the first set (type core and elective) is solely focused on positioning units on the screen
the other types define the relationships between the units on the screen
For a prerequisite rule to appear as you intend on the course plan, the unit must already have an existing rule that defines it as either a core or elective i.e. the unit must already appear in the list for the course outline.
Essentially, the prerequisite rule for data entry is:
the first field defines what the student wants to study
the second field defines some kind of relationship that may impact whether the student can take the unit they wish to study
Loading the Course and then choosing the Outline option will show a screen such as this, detailing a list of all of the units and constraints that have been defined for a course:
Note that Unit Id BEM1002 is defined as a Core Unit and has a Display Code of B2. Clicking on the Edit icon reveals this information at the bottom of the screen:
Note that the Constraint Unit Id field is blank, which means that as no constraints apply to this unit, this unit will be available for students to enrol in, as soon as the enrolment period is current, and the unit has been scheduled.
Note that the above image contains different data than other images above it, unit BEM2002 is now listed to show in cell C2. To add a constraint for this unit, such that unit BEM1002 must have been completed before an enrolment will be allowed for BEM2002:
Click the Add Unit icon for the unit BEM2002 to add a constraint for this unit.
Scroll to the unit BEM1002 and click the Add As Constraint icon to make the completion of that unit compulsory before an enrolment into BEM2002 will be allowed.
Click the Save Outline Constraint button.
The Unit Id and Constraint Unit Id fields now indicate that there is a dependency on BEM1002 before an enrolment into BEM2002 is allowed.
Units Colour Legend on Student’s Course Enrolment (Course Plan)
Colour | Meaning |
|---|---|
Green | Student has previously completed this unit |
Blue | Student is currently enrolled in this unit |
Orange | Unit is not available because prerequisites have not been met |
White (with tick box) | Unit can be selected for enrolment |
White (without tick box) | Unit has been scheduled, student meets prerequisites, but the enrolment period has not yet opened, and students are prevented from enrolling in the unit. Note: Staff member needs to double check the configuration time period called ‘Unit_enrolment’ |
Grey | Unit is not scheduled for the next enrolment period. This rule overrides the Orange rule where a prerequisite has not been met, i.e. when a prerequisite has not been met and the unit has not yet been scheduled, the unit will be shown in a grey cell. |
The Course plan allows staff members to enrol students into units or it allows students to enrol themselves into units with ease.
Constraint Rules
To set up the Course plan / Constraint rules the following information will be required:
The scope and structure of the course including the units required to complete the course
Units prerequisites, corequisites, core units, electives, substitute units, previous versions of units
Accreditation changes
Majors and Minors available within the Course structure
Planned unit schedules
Field Name | Brief Overview |
|---|---|
Program Constraints ID | Internal System ID given to the course rule. Each constraint will have its own unique code |
Course ID | Course ID associated with the base course and student’s course enrolment |
Unit ID | Internal System ID assigned to a unit code |
Constraint Unit Id | An unit code that is associated with the constraint type |
Unit Name | Mainly for readability so that the staff members can more easily identify the unit by its name |
Constraint Types | Core Unit, Elective Unit, Prerequisite Unit, Study Area (Minor), Major, Minor, Study Specialisation (Major), Program Prerequisites, Unit program prerequisites, Program Unit Not required, Application Unit, Co-requisite Unit, Disallowed Unit, Substitute Unit, Allow multiple schedule Units, Component Program, Competency Unit, Required Unit Count , Transfer Program *Please refer to the Standard Constraint Types table below for more information |
Display Code | Display code indicates where the unit will appear in the grid. The letters A-I (the first to ninth letters of the alphabet) are columns across the screen, whereas numbers 1-25 are the rows down the page. Combining the column and row identifiers then determines the exact grid position where the unit is displayed, such as cell A1, B2, C3 |
Description | Text that appears in the front of the row to describe this section of the grid, e.g. Core Unit, Electives |
Setting up the logic of your course plan is highly subjective and specific to each institution. Below is an example of how a course plan appears (including showing the display codes) under a student’s course plan (course enrolment):
Explanation:
There are two types of rules: one is to determine the visual display of a unit on the course outline screen using the display code. The other is to determine the units that a student is eligible to select or enrol into at any given point of time.
Referring to the above picture, both core and elective sections control the visual grouping. Some education providers might only have Core units throughout their course offering.
Standard Constraint Types
NOTE
It is highly recommended that you setup a list of Core and Elective Units prior to further defining their constraint relationships.
Constraint type options | Description |
|---|---|
Core Unit | Your institution defines the core units to study this course, often it is compulsory to study this unit within the major or program. |
Elective Unit | Your institution defines a list of Elective unit options as part of the major or program. |
Prerequisite Unit | Some units of study have a prerequisite. This is a requirement that must be completed before you are able to take this unit. |
Co-requisite Unit | Some units of study require you to undertake another specific unit of study at the same time. |
Major | Your institution defines which unit components make up the structure of that Major |
Minor | Your institution defines which unit components make up the structure of that Minor |
Disallowed Unit | Your institution defines that if a student has already completed a unit, they will not be allowed to enrol into this unit |
Substitute Unit | Your institution defines a substitute unit to replace a historical unit |
Required Unit | This is a compulsory that unit must be selected when enrolling via the course plan |
Specialised Constraint Types
Constraint type options | Description |
|---|---|
Optional Prerequisite Unit | There might be more than one Prerequisite unit to choose from |
Cross course Prerequisite Unit | Set up Prerequisite units, for students who enrolled in to two courses |
Transfer credit Unit | This is a function for bulk auto transfer course credits (If you want to select this option, please raise a ticket in Jira) |
Program Prerequisite | This is a function at the course level. One course is a prerequisite for the other |
Unit Program Prerequisite | The student will not be able to study this course until they finish the units outlined by the institution |
Application Unit | For Applicant portal, allow Applicant to enrol in to units for their auditions and interviews |
Block Mode | A special intensive enrolment status |
Component Program | A special child and parent relationships between some courses |
Transfer Program | An approach to bulk transfer courses (If you want to select this option, please raise a ticket in Jira) |
Required Unit Course Count | Students must complete a list of required units to take the next course |
Implications
We recommend that only staff who have higher permission levels can enrol students in this manner.
The Course Plan method will require initial setup of a course plan with restrictions, co-requisites, prerequisites, majors, minors, core units, electives, scope and structure of the course.
By setting up the enrolment in this manner students may, if required, enrol themselves to units.
Units may only be selected if the student meets the requirements previously setup in the system and if the unit is on offer for the time period specified
Alternatively staff, with the designated access level may enrol students either via the course plan or via the Student >Course Enrolment> Units page.
This method may be used to bypass course rules and will enrol students into any unit regardless of restrictions, co-requisites, prerequisites, majors, minors, and time period as any date ranges can be selected.
Example Course Plans
Introduction to the Course Outline | 1. What is a Course Outline | 2. Adding Core and Elective Units | 3. Arranging Content on the Course Plan | 4. Adding Constraints