TO:
Academic
Community, University of Rhode Island
FROM:
Keith
Killingbeck, Chair, Graduate Curriculum Committee
Norbert
Mundorf, Chair, Curricular Affairs Committee
DATE:
17
October 2008
SUBJECT:
Interactive
electronic course proposals
In keeping with
efforts to promote paperless
communication throughout the University, we are pleased to announce
that
proposals for new courses, and minor changes in existing courses, will
now be
submitted electronically. This
applies to all proposals for both undergraduate and graduate courses.
The new interactive
electronic
course proposal forms you will now be using were designed specifically
to
improve the accuracy and efficiency of the entire course proposal
process, and
to make the job of proposing a new course, or changes to an existing
course, an
easier one for both the initiators and the reviewers.
The documents needed
to submit
course proposals can be found near the bottom of the "Graduate Forms"
page of
the University of Rhode Island Graduate School web site (www.uri.edu/gsadmis/GradFormsPage.html)
under the heading "For Faculty/Staff."
If you go directly to the Graduate School home page (www.uri.edu/gsadmis/), simply click on
"Graduate
Forms" to get to the course proposal forms. Please
be aware that the link titled "Online Course
Proposal" is just for requests to give an online designation to a new
or
existing course.
The information
fields on the
course proposal forms can be written to and saved, and the signature
fields can
be signed electronically. Instructions for creating signature
capability on
your computer differ for Windows and Mac users, thus the two sets of
directions
for creating electronic signatures included as attachments to this
announcement. [See http://www.uri.edu/facsen/Digital_Signature_Win.pdf
or http://www.uri.edu/facsen/Digital_Signature_Mac.pdf
]
Hard-copy proposals,
and electronically submitted proposals using previous formats, will not
be
accepted for review.
To be able to
effectively use
the new electronic course proposal forms, they need to be opened in
Adobe
Reader Version 8.0 or higher. If
your computer is not equipped with this software, you may download it
free of
charge. This can be easily
accomplished by clicking the Adobe Reader hot link near the top of the
Graduate
School Forms page.
Workshops designed to
introduce
you to the entire course proposal submission process, including set-up
and use
of electronic signatures, will be offered on the afternoon of 5
November 2008
in Ballentine 240. Workshop
sessions will begin at 1:00, 2:00, and 3:00 p.m. and will be taught by
Eric
Benevides. Advanced registration
is not required for any of the three sessions.
Finally, we would
like to
acknowledge the hard work and clear thinking of Eric Benevides, Sheila
Grubman,
and Barbara Luebke. They were an
integral part of the team that developed this initiative.