Summer Session and the Teaching and Learning Center (TLC) seek proposals from all interested faculty to develop asynchronous online courses that will be offered during Summer Session 2024, 2025, and beyond.* The call for proposals is open to all senate faculty and lecturers. The deadline is Monday, December 11, 2023 (10:00 AM).
This call for proposals is focused on developing asynchronous online courses that will help significant numbers of UC Santa Cruz students make progress toward their degree. This can include online versions of major requirements or bottleneck courses, pairs or sequences of courses, high enrollment or impacted courses, or courses that are key for degree progress for incoming first-year or transfer students (e.g., prerequisites, major and declaration requirements, or classes not articulated at CCCs). Summer courses can run in 5-, 8-, or 10-week sessions. Multiple proposals from faculty in the same department will be considered.
Courses will be developed in small cohorts of faculty led by facilitators from the TLC. The cohorts will work together in five weekly sessions (i.e., once a week for five weeks) in a meaningful learning community during spring 2024 or 2025. Each participant will also meet individually with an assigned instructional designer every week throughout the quarter and as needed during the first offering of the course. On-campus studios, loaner equipment, and editing services will be available for video production. Participating in the cohort sessions is a requirement of the program.
Faculty awardees will receive one course release (tenure-track faculty) or course equivalency (lecturers).The dollar amount of the course release/equivalency will be tied to the year in which the course is developed. All awardees will receive abundant staff support to develop and implement the course.
Awardees will be required to submit a request for online course approval to the Curriculum Approval and Tracking (CAT) system by January 5, 2024, per the course approval calendar. Requests in CAT must then be submitted by an awardee’s division to the Senate Committee on Courses of Instruction (CCI) by January 15, 2024. Courses may not be taught online without CCI approval. TLC staff will support awardees with the preparation of course approval requests.
The deadline for proposals is Monday, December 11, 2023 (10:00 AM).
Proposal Guidelines
Using this form, provide responses to the questions below. You will also be asked to append the current course syllabus to your proposal, to indicate when the course will first be offered and which faculty cohort you will participate in, and to confirm that you have discussed both the departmental need for your proposed course and the offering commitment with your department chair or college provost. Summer Session and the TLC will seek chair/provost confirmation prior to notifying awardees. Here, again, is the form.
Provide a brief overview of the course, including learning activities that students engage in.
Provide an estimate for enrollment in the course.
Indicate whether the course is any of the following:
- A major requirement
- Key for degree progress for incoming first-year or transfer students
- A bottleneck course
- High-enrollment or impacted
- Part of a pair or cluster of courses
Explain why this course would be superior in an online format during summer. Are there student learning outcomes that are better met online? Are there learning activities that are better facilitated online?
Contact the TLC at tlc@ucsc.edu with any questions.
* All awardees retain intellectual property rights to their developed course materials as defined in the UC policy addressing the Ownership of Course Materials. Faculty participation in this opportunity is voluntary and a condition of the program is that the awarded instructor agrees to make the course available for offering in five consecutive summers. The awarded instructor has the first right of refusal to teach the course. If they refuse, the department chair can select an alternative instructor. While uncommon, if this happens, the course materials will be made available to the alternative instructor for the offering term only. The original version of the course will be retained by the awarded instructor and left unaltered.