Instructional Contact Minutes and Course Credit

The required contact time is 2250 minutes  for a three-credit lecture course.  A Monday-Wednesday-Friday class meets for 50 minutes a day (150 minutes a week), and meets for 15 weeks giving a total contact minutes of 2250 for the term.  A Tuesday-Thursday class meets for 75 minutes a day (150 minutes a week) and meets for 15 weeks, a total of 2250 minutes for the term.  As long as the 2250 minutes are attained, a class could meet a lesser number of days to get the total necessary contact time.

 

Minutes Per Class Session

(Assuming that the standard per semester hour is 750 minutes aggregate)

Number of Sessions	Number of Semester Hours: Aggregate Minutes Required:
	one (750)	two (1500)	three (2250)	four (3000)	five (3750)
5	150	300	450
10	75	150	225	300	375
15	50	100	150	200	250
22		68	102	136	170
30		50	75	100	125
32			70	94	117
44			51	68	85
45			50	67	83
60				50	63
75					50

Assignment of teaching load and academic advising are the responsibility of the department head or chair and may vary from one term to the next depending on the departmental requirements.  Although the normal load for those engaged only in teaching is 12 didactic hours, the loads vary widely and are usually adjusted to permit time for other scholarly activities, for outreach which is related to the missions of the university and the faculty member's disciplinary expertise, and for faculty development related to the quality of instruction.  A didactic hour is defined here as one contact hour in a lecture course or 0.60 hour for each contact hour in a course designated as a laboratory course.  Weighted Student Credit hours (WSH) are computed by multiples of credit hours by headcount (enrollment) at census. ( Faculty Handbook, 4.1)

The courses designated as Undergraduate Independent Study and Undergraduate Research are generally unique educational experiences between an instructor and a student.  Such studies require prior approval by the instructor's department head or chair and by the dean. (Faculty Handbook, 4.12)