Last updated Apr 18, 2024
Academic scheduling is a complicated challenge, and the more factors you add, the more complicated it becomes. However, being able to offer more options is usually an overall positive for students in the program. If you can include course offerings that are online, asynchronous, self-paced, and so on, it’s easier for students to balance coursework with the other demands of life. However, to keep this type of complex academic schedule organized, you need a smart system that’s flexible, scalable, and secure. Here’s how Teamup works for scheduling hybrid academic programs that include in-person classes, online classes, and other requirements such as clinical hours.
The complex challenges of hybrid programs
Hybrid academic programs offer a combination of in-person instruction and online coursework. Sometimes even a single course will include both types of course delivery. For example, a premed course might have online lectures which can be viewed asynchronously, as long as they are completed by the deadline. But the labs for this course might require in-person instruction. So, for a single class, academic schedulers might need to offer an online portion and schedule physical lab space for the in-person part of the work.
Multiple factors to consider
For in-person classes, schedulers need to assign an appropriate classroom, lab, or lecture hall. Even for online classes, there are usually a limited number of participants since there’s still work to be completed and graded. A qualified faculty or staff member has to be assigned to each course, as well.
Dependencies and conflicts
Those factors are still just the basics. Academic schedulers also have to make sure it’s possible for each student to get all the required credits they need. So if there’s only one offering of a required course, and it conflicts with required clinical hours or lab time, the schedule has to change. Sometimes there are also dependencies to consider: For example, students may need to complete X hours of lab work before they can take a certain advanced course. Schedulers also have to consider faculty and staff availability.
Departmental tracking
Schedulers are also considering departmental-level goals and requirements. There may be certain scheduling standards, such as ensuring there are adequate sections of each course and each teaching assistant gets a certain number of hours. Part of academic scheduling is being able to track these metrics, create reports, and ensure the schedule works, in practical terms, while also meeting departmental goals.
A scheduling solution for hybrid programs
You can see why finding an adequate tool for academic hybrid scheduling is a challenge. In fact, many schedulers often end up using tools that aren’t a great fit:
- Spreadsheets: No visual element, tricky to use, no drag-and-drop, error-prone, version control issues.
- Paper: Quickly outdated, difficult to collaborate, inefficient.
- Other calendar systems: Lacking flexibility to handle multiple scheduling dimensions, limited access control.
The Teamup solution
Teamup is a powerful academic scheduling tool because it’s flexible enough to handle many complex factors, easy to use, visual, and great for collaboration.
Flexible structure
With color-coded sub-calendars, you can create a calendar structure that handle multiple scheduling dimensions. For example, different sets of sub-calendars can be used to represent different course types, organized by graduating class. You can have another set of sub-calendars for individual faculty members or other event types, such as holidays or student activities. Any event can be assigned to multiple sub-calendars, enabling you to consider multiple factors for a single event.
Track and filter
With custom fields, you can track other dimensions too. You can have a custom field with prefilled options for session type, dependencies, or any other factor. A custom choice field automatically has a built-in filter, so you can filter calendar events and track different aspects of the schedule by field contents.
Visual scheduling
It’s easier to understand information when it’s visual. So, a scheduling tool that makes every aspect visual is going to be easier to use. Teamup’s unique calendar views provide options for viewing the schedule in the most helpful way. For example, use Scheduler view to see side-by-side availability when looking for a faculty member to teach a certain course. Switch to Multi-month view to plan course offerings over a quarter or semester. Use Month or Week view to schedule staff meetings.
Secure access
When a schedule is finalized, you need to share it with faculty, staff, and students. Provide secure, customized access that gives each person the ability to see what they need to see. For example, create a single read-only calendar link for each graduating class. The link would include read-only access to all the sub-calendars for that class. Students can open the calendar in a browser or the Teamup app for all the schedule information they need. You can also embed the calendar using a secure link.
Faculty members may need access to all the scheduled classes. If you use an individual sub-calendar for each faculty member, they can view their own teaching load quickly by toggling sub-calendars. But maybe that approach doesn’t work for you; instead of using sub-calendars to indicate which faculty member is teaching a class, you use an event field. Faculty members can still easily see their own schedule by using the built-in filters.
Export and import
You may want to set up a master calendar used for planning that’s separate from the calendar with the finalized schedule. Using separate master calendars gives you a “sandbox” for planning that’s safe and separate from the shared calendar. Use Teamup’s export and import functionality to move an entire semester’s schedule from one calendar to another, so you don’t ever have to start from zero.
Hybrid academic scheduling is a big challenge, that’s for sure. Let Teamup make it easier and more enjoyable. Try a live demo to explore more features and see how Teamup can make academic scheduling easier for your team.
