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It is recognized that enrollments in majors sometimes increase faster than the academic unit's ability to respond with course offerings. As a result, it may not be possible to accommodate all students wanting to register for a particular course. Consequently, it is sometimes necessary to place registration controls on courses. These controls serve a number of valuable purposes in the registration process:
- Controls guarantee course availability to students so they may maintain normal academic progress towards graduation.
- For courses in which enrollments must be limited because of field experiences, laboratory limitations, or reasons of liability, controls allow academic units to evaluate each student before permitting the individual to enroll.
- In some instances, certain groups of students may be ineligible for a particular course. Course registration controls effectively prevent their registration.
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The application of a course registration control is a serious matter and should only be requested as a last resort. An academic unit seeking authorization to use a Special Course Registration Control must prepare a request well in advance of the intended effective semester and provide:
- An identification of the course and semester for which the Special Course Registration Control is to be applied.
- A justification for the control indicating why the Special Course Registration Control is necessary. Reference should be made as to why alternative actions for increasing the course limits do not meet demands.
- An impact statement of how this control would likely affect other students and academic units.
- An indication of the type of control desired: schedule only, prevent scheduling, or prevent all.
- An outline of the criteria for the selection of students to be scheduled into the course, detailing the college or colleges of enrollment, the majors, and semester classifications of eligible students.
- The effective date of the registration control, and when it is to be removed. Controls should be removed as early as possible.
- In preparing this proposal, the academic unit should reference enrollment data from previous semesters and, if applicable, the current semester, and identify the impact the request would have on meeting student enrollment requests.
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To request a course registration control, academic units access the online form through the Registrar's Web page, https://registrar.psu.edu/faculty-staff/forms/.
At University Park, the department completes the form and sends it to the resident instruction dean. At other locations, the form is sent to the identified senior administrative officer.
- Special Course Registration Controls are initiated by the academic units, approved by the college dean, and implemented by the campus Registrar. Because of the significant nature of restricting registration, a right of reversal is provided to the Vice President and Dean for Undergraduate Education.
Senate Policies:
Revisions:
Revised: ACUE (3-4-99)
Revised: ACUE (4-7-05)
Revised: Editorial (1-20-10)
Reviewed: No Changes Needed (9-28-2017)