Administrative Policy
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Policy Statement
Departments, colleges, and campuses have the authority to establish, change, and discontinue academic plans and sub-plans that may appear on official University transcripts, subject to appropriate consultation with other units and subject to the final authority of the Board of Regents. (See Administrative Policy: Academic Unit Authority over the Curriculum and Major: Twin Cities, Crookston, Morris, Rochester.) This policy includes undergraduate, graduate, and professional credit-bearing degrees, majors, minors, free-standing minors, and certificates.
Creating, Changing or Discontinuing a Plan or Sub-Plan
Collegiate units and system campuses proposing to add, change, or discontinue an academic plan or sub-plan must submit a proposal for review and approval. (See Responsibilities section below and associated procedures.) Collegiate units and system campuses must have a set of publicly available standards and internal processes for developing, reviewing, and approving new, changed, or discontinued plans and sub-plans that are consistent with these procedures.
The Executive Vice President and Provost is responsible for reviewing and recommending action on approving, as appropriate, academic proposals that require Board of Regents consideration and final action.
Every academic plan must have a home college(s) or system campus.
Collegiate units and campuses may not advertise or initiate new and/or changed plans or recruit or admit students to them prior to formal approval by the Board of Regents.
Changing Requirements of an Existing Plan or Sub-Plan
Any approved change in plan (e.g., major) or sub-plan (e.g., track, emphasis, concentration) requirements takes effect no earlier than the following term and will not normally be imposed on currently enrolled students who have been admitted to the plan or sub-plan, but the new requirements may be offered to them as an option. If the faculty of a collegiate unit or system campus concludes that a new requirement is essential even for currently enrolled students, approval of the dean of the collegiate unit or the chief academic officer of the system campus must be obtained before imposing the requirement on them.
Collegiate units and system campuses must communicate to prospective and current students their local policies and decisions regarding new or revised plan or sub-plan requirements.
The Executive Vice President and Provost is responsible for reviewing and approving academic proposals for changing plan and sub-plan requirements.
Reason for Policy
This policy:
- Enhances quality, productivity, and efficiency in academic plan development and implementation by faculty, departments, collegiate units, and campuses.
- Ensures that academic plan development is aligned with unit compact statements and institutional, campus, and collegiate unit mission and strategic directions.
- Makes explicit commonly held assumptions about criteria for academic plans and connections to related policies.
- Fosters shared consultation, and where appropriate, planning across academic units.
- Enhances availability, consistency, and coordination of information about the University’s academic plans for transcript records, internal analysis, accountability reporting, and accreditation.
- Ensures thorough and timely review of proposals.