Credit Hours

Policy 214

Introduction

1.1 The purpose of this policy is to support Appalachian State University’s compliance with the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools Commission on Colleges’ (SACSCOC or “Commission”) expectations regarding credits and federal regulations governing the award of financial aid.

1.2 As part of the Commission’s review of the University seeking initial or continuing accreditation, the SACSCOC conducts reviews of the University’s assignment of credit hours. Academic credit has provided the basis for measuring the amount of engaged learning time expected of a typical student enrolled not only in traditional classroom settings, but also laboratories, studios, internships and other experiential learning, and distance and correspondence education.

1.3 Students, institutions, employers, and others rely on the common currency of academic credit to support a wide range of activities, including the transfer of students from one institution to another.

1.4 For several decades, the federal government has relied on credits as a measure of student academic engagement for the purpose of awarding financial aid.

Scope

2.1 This applies to all faculty, staff and students of Appalachian State University.

Definitions

Credit Hour

the unit by which an institution measures its course work. The number of hours assigned to a course is a measure of the outcomes expected, the mode of instruction, the amount of time spent in class, and the amount of work that is expected outside of class in order to complete all course objectives.

Semester Credit Hour

the most commonly used unit for reporting the credit earned in a class and is based on a sixteen week calendar at Appalachian State University. Across the UNC system, a class must meet for a minimum of 750 minutes for every semester hour of credit (See Appendix A). Many institutions refer to this standard as the “Carnegie Credit Hour,” but a thorough review of the history of that term has revealed that the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching was not the source of that standard. Regardless of the actual origin of the term, the standard of two or more hours outside of class for every hour of in-class instruction is a common standard that is clearly reflected in the SACSCOC credit hour rule.