8.2. Class Scheduling Policy

Download as PDF

Alfaisal University is devoted to providing the best teaching and learning environment for both students and faculty members.

8.2.1 Scheduling Committee

Scheduling Committee members shall be as follow:

  1. Dean of Admission and Registration.
  2. The registrar.
  3. A faculty-member representative from each college that has been nominated by their college’s Dean before the beginning of each semester scheduling process.

The primary mandate of the committee is to prepare a schedule that optimally allows all students to register for their required courses as well as to explore a variety of elective courses to meet their graduation requirements on a timely basis (within the prescribed number of semesters). Moreover, the schedule should permit faculty members the opportunity to pursue research in their respective disciplines.

8.2.2 Policy and procedure

  1. General Guiding Principles

Scheduling Committee members, faculty members and instructors are requested to keep the following guiding principles in mind when managing, supporting, scheduling, or using classrooms:

  1. Departments must strictly adhere to the approved standard set of time patterns.
  2. Time patterns are the configurations of days and hours to be used in setting up the schedule of classes.
  3. All 100’s and 200’s level courses to be scheduled as one-hour classes on STT exception is only allowed for the 2 credit hour courses
  4. At least 50% of the 300’s and 400’s level courses to be scheduled as one and half hours on MW
  5. The assignment of classrooms and labs to individual colleges or departments is not permanent; the assignment may change as the needs, priorities and demands of the colleges or university change.
  6. Final exams have scheduling priority over all other activities that require the use of classrooms.
  7. With appropriate notifications, the Office of the Registrar is authorized to reschedule classes and final exams in any available general-purpose classroom to accommodate the broader academic needs of the university.
  8. The probability of a student obtaining a conflict-free schedule can be greatly increased when classes are planned equitably across all days of the week and all hours of the day. This also maximizes classrooms and laboratory utilization.
  9. Large classrooms will be assigned to classes that efficiently utilize the available seats.
  10. Departments are responsible for accommodating the special needs of faculty, instructors and students while not impinging upon the overall class schedule.
  11. Each college is responsible for appointing a scheduling representative to interact with the Office of the Registrar. All scheduling requests must be made through the representative only.
  12. College Deans and Office of Registrar approval must be obtained to do scheduling changes’ requests.
  13. To provide conflict-free recourses environment (staff, space, and classes) for formal registration, potential conflicts should be outlined and corrected right after preregistration period ends.
  14. Schedule changes are not permitted once formal registration period starts.
  15. The scheduling process for fall semester will begin during the spring semester of the current academic year.
  16. The scheduling policy is not in effect for summer terms

Process Overview

The scheduling process for classes usually starts one week before the beginning of classes of the preceding semester as follows:

  1. The Office of the Registrar calls for a meeting that involves scheduling committee members to discuss related matters.
  2. All colleges communicate their needs to college of science for elective and general required courses.
  3. Colleges plan their overview schedules, and schedule classes in their assigned classrooms.
  4. Colleges’ representatives are to submit their colleges’ schedules to Office of the Registrar.
  5. Office of the Registrar verifies that the submission of colleges schedules adheres to the scheduling policy, and requests for the non-adhering classes to be changed.
  6. Office of the Registrar imports the schedules into the system. During this stage, no changes to be made to the schedules.
  7. Colleges review the imported schedules and may request for necessary changes before the final schedule is out for students.
  8. Colleges, scheduling committee, and Office of the Registrar work together to resolve any remaining issues.

All the above steps must be completed within the following specified times:

Scheduling Action

Day

Week No

Scheduling Committee Kick-off Meeting for each semester

Thursday

Before Classes Begin

Colleges to submit their requests to COS

Wednesday

1

All colleges to submit their schedules to SA

Tuesday

5

Final schedule check sent by SA to colleges

Monday

6

Schedule updates forwarded by colleges to SA

Sunday

7

Schedules posted to BlackBaud

Thursday

7

Copy sent to colleges for verification

Thursday

7

Colleges to submit final schedule changes

Wednesday

8

Final updates made to BlackBaud

Tuesday

9

Schedule sent to students

Tuesday

9

Agreements made during the scheduling committee’s meetings are documented and shared with the committee members, the Dean of Student Affairs, Admission, and Registration and all college Deans.

Class Meeting Time

Each college and the UPP must distribute their classes over all possible days and hours while taking the below listed rules into consideration.

All S T R classes are scheduled to start at the hour. M W classes are scheduled based on the following time slots [8:00-9:00, 9:00-10:30, 10:30-12:00, 13:00-14:30, 14:30-16:00, 16:00-17:30].

Classes must fall in one of the following patterns:

Course Credit Hours

Meeting Sequences

Required Length of Each Class Meeting

4 CH

Two days of S T R

100 min

M W (after 4 PM)

100 min

3 CH

S T R

50 min

M W

75 min

2 CH

One day of S T R

100 min

One day of M W (after 4 PM)

100 min

1 CH

One day of S T R

50 min

One day of M W (after 4 PM)

50 min

* S=Sunday, M=Monday, T=Tuesday, W=Wednesday, R=Thursday

  1. Classes should be scheduled as follow:
    1. 60% on Sun-Tue-Thu
    2. 40% Mon-Wed
    3. 10% from 08:00-09:00
    4. 10% after 15:00
  2. A class start and end times should be the same for all days.
  3. Each college is kindly requested to utilize all days in a pattern to eliminate gaps. However, the gaps can be utilized for labs and tutoring sessions.
  4. A class that meets once a week should be scheduled during peak hours. Peak hours are between 9:00 AM and 3:00 PM. If it’s a must, then the college is responsible for using the same block for other similar once a week classes.
  5. Because the standard meeting lengths are in 50- and 75-minute time blocks, non-standard sections should be offered in multiples of these times to avoid end times that preclude students from registering for courses that may follow the non-standard section.
  6. All Alfaisal University undergraduate classes must start between 8:00 am to 7:30 PM.

Good Scheduling Practices

  1. A course should be assigned a classroom which best meets the needs of the class to ensure the best teaching and learning experience for faculty and students.
  2. Review each classroom schedule to ensure that it is conflict free.
  3. Draft several student schedule scenarios to ensure that students can register for core courses and general required courses without any overlap.
  4. If a class is not needed or have low enrollment, kindly cancel it as soon as possible and inform the registrar so that concerned students can be notified in a timely manner.
  5. Available information regarding current semester enrolments, previous semesters' enrolments, and the number of current students in a course can all be utilized in projecting the upcoming total enrolment for a course.
  6. Each college is strongly encouraged to plan for a reasonable number of classes that run simultaneously to maximize classes selectivity for students and to better utilize the available resources.

​​​​​​​Laboratory and Tutorial

Lab and tutorial schedules must be designed and submitted with course schedules to eliminate unforeseen class overlaps. Lab assignments are prioritized as follows:

  1. COS approval must be obtained to use a COS lab.
  2. COE has priority utilization for computer labs (SG.064 and B3.065).
  3. COM has priority utilization for the computer lab (BG.079); followed by COB and subsequently COE and COS.

​​​​​​​Tips for Common Issues

Scheduling issues can be eliminated when detailed reviews are conducted. Below are some common issues and their suggested solutions:

Issue

Solution

Missing course, class, meeting, tutorial, or lab

Review schedule thoroughly before submission and after publication

A class have a lab

submit class and lab schedules

Low enrollment in a class

Merge available sections

Male only or female only class

Specify the course gender if it’s for one gender only