This article outlines new behavior that will take effect in Staging on 1/8/2025 for customers who convert over to the new New Term/Phases process.
You will be able to continue to modify merge settings until the New Term Phases process goes into Production.
Once also enabled in Production, merge settings will be locked, and you will no longer have access to them (which is great, because with this new setup, you no longer need them!).
Table of Contents
Overview
Roll Over Your Term in Your SIS
Define Your Term in Coursedog
Edit Phases
Assign the New Term to the Correct Phase
Set Up the Timeline for the New Term
Begin your Scheduling Cycle
Related Articles
Overview
If you’ve already scheduled at least one term in Coursedog and you’re preparing for a new/subsequent term, this is the article for you.
This article will outline key items you should review to ensure the platform is correctly configured for a new scheduling term but not your first-ever term.
If you’re preparing for your first-ever scheduling term in Coursedog, read our “Preparing for Your First-Ever Scheduling Term in Coursedog” article instead.
Roll Over Your Term in Your SIS
How It Works
The Term Roll Process is used in most SIS systems to move section data from one term to another.
This process will typically copy the schedule from one term to a new term that does not contain any scheduling information.
For specific instructions regarding rolling a term in your SIS, please refer to the documentation provided by your vendor.
Once you have established a new term in your SIS, you can pull it into Coursedog and prepare to plan your schedule.
Choosing Where to Roll
Some rollover capability for Sections, Relationships, and Instructor Preferences is available within the Coursedog user interface, but the ability to roll Sections and Relationships in Coursedog is only recommended for non-integrated schools.
Integrated schools should roll Sections and Relationships in their SIS.
See Rollover Basics to learn more.
Define Your Term in Coursedog
Coursedog syncs with your SIS nightly. In preparation for scheduling a new term, we suggest giving a 2 day buffer between the rollover event in your SIS and when you want to start scheduling.
Set your "Current Scheduling Term" by navigating to Academic Scheduling > Settings > Terms.
Click on the values displayed under "Current Active Term" and "Current Scheduling Term" to select your new term.
The current term setting is automatically recalculated every week, so this value can keep up with the current date.
See Defining Terms and Dates more information.
If you don't see your term listed, make sure Coursedog is connected to your SIS and configured correctly.
Edit Phases
Generally, you do not need to edit your Phases in any way to prepare for a new term.
If you do wish to make changes to your existing Phases, review our Phases article before making those changes and then proceed with the steps in this article.
NOTE: All schools do need to have at least one Phase in scheduling.
Assign the New Term to the Correct Phase
PATH: Scheduling > Settings > Terms > (Select Term) > Phase
Overview
Select the first Phase of your scheduling process from the “Phase” dropdown.
This will auto-save and begin the Phase you have selected, applying the Role Permissions, Field Permissions, Sections Rules, and Merge Settings Configuration associated with that Phase.
For schools using only one Phase (“Scheduling ON”), this is the only required step. You will not need to configure the Timeline for the term.
What Happens When You Assign a Phase to Terms
To make the new term setup process as seamless as possible and to ensure that your integration is running for Scheduling data in the correct terms, Coursedog uses your Phase and Term configuration to determine when your integration is ON.
When a Phase with a Saved State where the integration for Section, Courses, and Relationships data is ON is assigned to a Term, the integration will run for that Term.
If a Term has no Phase assigned or has a Phase where the integration for Section, Courses, and Relationships data is OFF is assigned to a Term, the integration will not run for that Term.
Think of it this way – a term with no Phase assigned does not need the integration to run.
A Term with a Phase where the integration is OFF (for example, a Pre-Scheduling or Historical Phase) does not need the integration to run.
Only Terms assigned to Phases where the integration is actively running for scheduling data will have the integration on.
Set Up the Timeline for the New Term
PATH: Scheduling > Settings > Timeline
Overview
The use of the Timeline feature is optional – if you have only one Phase or would like to trigger Phase changes manually, you can ignore this step.
To manually change Phases, navigate Scheduling > Settings > Term > Phase > choose the Phase you would like to move into.
Before your first-ever scheduling Term, you will have set up your Timeline. For subsequent terms, you will duplicate your Timeline and apply its steps to this new scheduling term.
How to Do It
Step 1: For each Timeline step, click “Duplicate”.
Step 2:
Rename the Timeline step to make it clear that it is a new Timeline step for the new term.
For example, rename “Post Scheduling to Historical (Fall 2024-2025)” to “Post Scheduling to Historical (Spring 2024-2025)”.
Step 3:
Select a new Start Date for this Timeline step (you do not need to select an End Date).
If your new scheduling cycle begins three months after your previous scheduling cycle, this new start date will likely be three months after the Start Date on the duplicated step.
Step 4:
Under "Display Timeline on Terms", check the "All terms" box to have this timeline appear on all terms.
To have it only appear for some terms, uncheck the "all terms" box, and select the applicable terms from the dropdown.
Step 5 (Optional):
If you’d like to send an email for this action, make sure “Send Email” is set to “Yes”.
If needed, update the Email Subject, Email Body, and Email Recipients (Roles) so that all term-specific details reflect this new Timeline, Term, and any key dates mentioned in the email.
Step 6: Under the "Phases" header, select the applicable term (left dropdown) and phase (right dropdown).
Step 7: Click “Add Action” to save this new Timeline step.
Begin your Scheduling Cycle
Once you have completed the steps above in preparation for the new term, your Phases will automatically update and email notifications will be automatically sent as your scheduling cycle moves along the Timeline you have created.