Whereas, Local curriculum development is guided by Title 5 regulations and the Program and Course Approval Handbook (PCAH), both of which are approved by the Board of Governors after consultation and agreement with the Academic Senate for California Community Colleges as appropriate;
Whereas, Colleges and districts have a variety of local curriculum processes, including timelines indicating when courses and programs are submitted to technical review committees, curriculum committees, academic senates, and governing boards;
Whereas, Timely curriculum processes are required for all disciplines and programs; and
Whereas, Colleges would benefit from a paper outlining effective practices for local processes on curriculum approval;
Whereas, Since 2007 the Academic Senate for California Community Colleges (ASCCC) has overseen and coordinated the Course Identification Numbering System (C-ID), providing staffing, resources, and structure through a grant to a single district from the California Community Colleges Chancellor’s Office;
Whereas, When Transfer Model Curricula (TMCs) were first created in response to Senate Bill 1440 (Padilla, 2010), no expectation existed that all colleges would be mandated to develop Associate Degrees for Transfer (ADTs) for all TMCs in which they possessed an existing local degree in the same TOP Code;
Whereas, In developing Transfer Model Curriculum (TMCs) in response to SB 1440 (Padilla, 2010), an additional benefit was identified when California Community College and California State University discipline faculty, although unable to conform to some aspect of the TMC requirements, were able to craft model curricula designed to best prepare students for careers or transfer within a specified discipline;
Whereas, The California Community Colleges Chancellor’s Office requires templates for submission of Associate Degrees for Transfer, and it is critical that the availability of the Chancellor’s Office Templates (COTs) be predictable and that any change in a COT be communicated in a timely manner;
Whereas, The Intersegmental Curriculum Workgroup has recommended that new COTs be posted twice a year, February 1 and September 1;
Whereas, Curriculum is the core of our work in community colleges and all California community colleges are required to meet the same Title 5 requirements and submit identical curriculum forms;
Whereas, There are no adequate responsible curriculum management systems widely available to community colleges; and
Whereas, Curriculum data will be an integral component of student education plans and student information in the educational portal;
Whereas, Title 5 regulations concerning repeatability of classes in physical education, visual arts, and performing arts require colleges to place active participatory classes into families of courses that are related in content;
Whereas, Under Title 5 §55040 students are allowed to take only four courses from any given group, with withdrawals and substandard grades counting toward the enrollment limit;
Whereas, Statewide efforts are currently underway to align and integrate instruction for college preparation, including credit basic skills, noncredit basic skills, adult education, regional occupational programs, and both public and private K-12 education;
Whereas, The various approaches to college preparation lead to inconsistent expectations and standards across these systems, often causing incoming college students to be placed in lower levels before embarking on transfer-level study;
Whereas, The Academic Senate for California Community Colleges adopted the paper The Course Outline of Record: A Curriculum Reference Guide[1] in Spring 2008 and has not updated it since; and
Whereas, Numerous changes to the California Community Colleges Chancellor’s Office curriculum requirements have occurred since Spring 2008;