Electronic Course Authorization System FAQ

If I want to change the Subject or Course Number for a fully-approved course in ECAS, how do I do it?
There are two different situations where this may apply.
If the course is permanently changing to the new subject or course number (the old and new course will not be taught at the same time), simply select the "Update" link under the course actions column and select the new subject and/or course number.
If the new course simply needs information from the old course, use the Add New Course button, select the required setup data, press Submit/Continue and open another window to access the course that you wish to copy information from. Use copying & pasting to add whatever information you need for the new proposal.
Also, if the old and new courses are equivalent to each other, please be sure to select the appropriate Course Equivalency set or add a new equivalency in the provided text box.
Why did we make this change? The old ECAS worked fine!
The Electronic Course Authorization System (ECAS) has been functioning as our institution-wide course database since semester conversion in 1999. What many people did not know is that this system required a human interface to transfer data to the PeopleSoft system. As we are moving forward with the Graduation Planner project and the new curriculum database, it was clear that we needed a course database that has more direct linkage to PeopleSoft, and that can also be linked to other components of the GradPlanner project. The new system enters data directly into PeopleSoft for most fields, thus saving the intervening step and adding the capacity for more powerful integration of course and program information.
What are the major changes I will see in the new ECAS?
In addition to the basic structural change (that is, the application links directly to PeopleSoft), there are two very significant changes for users. Both give users new options, but also create potential problems.
The first change is that you will be able to see the course data for ALL dates past and future--of a specific course. Course data is linked through the PeopleSoft course ID, which means that even when a course number or designator is changed, you will be able to see a linked history of what has happened to that course. But it also means that users need to be VERY careful about updating the correct dated row of a particular course. This will require some adjustment!
The second change is that users now have the option of entering "enforced prerequisites" prerequisites that WILL BE ENFORCED by the registration system when students register. We urge users to be very cautious about implementing this feature. Remember that any restrictions entered in these fields will actually prevent students from registering. For example, if you say the course can be taken only by freshmen, then only students who are true freshmen (i.e., fewer than 30 credits) will be able to take the course. If they have to have completed a specific course, only students who have completed THAT course (not one that is similar to it from another institution) will be allowed to register. Use this new feature with care.
I see that most courses have a note at the top that says "converted." What does this mean?
The "converted" flag indicates that the course you are looking at combines data from the old ECAS and from PeopleSoft. The flag will remain on the course until the course is updated for any reason. When you open a course page that has the "converted" flag, you should review all data to be sure it is accurate. While we have done extensive checking of converted courses against the old ECAS database, there is always the small possibility that some piece of data may have gotten lost in conversion. After the "update course proposal" is approved, the "converted" flag will disappear. As courses are updated over time, you will see fewer courses with that flag.
In the old ECAS, I had a new course proposal that had already been submitted by my department and was waiting for college/dean approval. Now I see that that course proposal is back at the department level. Why is this?
Because of the complexities of data conversion, we were unable to retain the "approval levels" for new or updated courses that were somewhere in the approval queue. The data in the proposal was retained, but we set all approval levels back to "unsubmitted." You will need to submit the proposal again at the department level and have it approved. You may also note that there were some instances where proposed topics (under topic courses) from past dates could not be converted. Since topics need to be attached to a specific dated course row in PeopleSoft, any topic that was never approved and that had a PAST date (not current or future) was not converted.
What about grad school courses are there any changes in proposing new courses that have to go through Graduate School approval?
The fields for Graduate School approval are still the same, but note that almost all the fields are now mandatory. This was done at the request of the Graduate School to ensure that all the information they need is completed on the form.
I see that there are new fields for "year most frequently offered" and "term most frequently offered." Why were these added? And where did the information come from?
These two fields will help us look at patterns of course offering. They will be especially important as we move into GradPlanner because they will give students more information about when a given course is USUALLY offered. We know that there is no guarantee that this will mean that a course will always be available in a specific year or term, but any information we can gather about the usual pattern of course offering will be helpful to students, and also helpful to departments and colleges for planning purposes.
One further important note about these fields: since they had no counterpart in the old ECAS, these fields have been partially filled in based on data gathered about course offering patterns from Fall 1999 through Spring 2004. Where a pattern was clear (e.g., the course was offered every fall for four years) we entered "every year" and "fall semester" as the data for these fields. If no pattern was apparent, the fields were left blank. Since this data was added from a computer-predicted model, you should check these fields each time you update a course for any reason, to be sure they accurately reflect the real pattern as planned by your department or college.