Academic Scheduling

1. Sign in to Coursedog
   1. Go to the following website in your favorite web browser: app.coursedog.com
   2. Enter your SIU email to login. (Must be your @siu.edu email address)
2. Open the Scheduling platform
   1. On the "Your Products" page, click the Academic Scheduling icon.  NOTE: Some users may open directly into the Academic Scheduling product and will not see the following screen. 

Home Screen & Section Dashboard

All assigned Departments will be listed showing the number of courses and sections for that term. Notice the current phase listed in the blue bubble is "2. Open Scheduling." The timeline is shown at the top of the page. This shows all phases and the dates when they change. You will receive an email notification of the schedule phase changes.

Open the Section Dashboard one of two ways: Click the department name under the "Department Status," OR Selection "Selection Dashboard" from the menu on the left of the screen.

Verify the term in the upper left corner.  If you need to change the term, click on the term name at the top left of the screen to open a drop-down menu, from which you select the desired term. 
The list of sections displayed is the rollover from past offerings of the same semester in the the previous year. Only on campus sections that had enrollment remain active and are included. Canceled Extended Campus sections are included. 

The top of the page will indicate the current phase of the scheduling process. The phase determines when you are able to add, edit and cancel sections with or without having to make requests. During the "Open Scheduling" phase you will be able to make permissible changes to a section without having to make requests.

ADDING A COURSE TO THE SCHEDULE

Click the +ADD COURSE button near the top of the screen if you need to add a course that has never been on the Schedule, such as a course that was just added to the catalog. This will open a pop-up box in which to search for the course.

You can search for a course by Subject+Course Number (e.g. ART250, STAT227), by title (e.g. Topics in Business, Ornithology), or by topic (e.g. authorship). 

NOTE: You will only see courses from your own department.

Once you have found the course you are looking for, select it and click the ADD COURSE button in the lower right corner.

To add a section to your newly-added course, click the +ADD COURSE button at the top of the page and search for the course.

Once you have found the course you are looking for, select it and click ADD SECTION button in the lower right corner.  This will automatically open the editor for your to add details.  

Working Within the Section Editor

Complete required fields within General Information in order to save a section. These fields have the word "required" next to them in a red box.  NOTE: You are able to start work on a section and save your progress by clicking the SAVE SECTION button in the Section Editor. It is recommended that you always save before leaving the Section Editor even if you are not finished.

Field Overview

CRN will auto generate once the section is saved.

Section Name will generate once the section is saved. This will be the course code, subject with course number. (MATH125 or ENGL101)

Section Number will carry over if the class is part of the rollover, or will auto generate to the next highest number if this is a new section. Section numbers match to what type of section you are adding: https:// siu.edu/_common/documents/registrar/pdf/section-number-guide.pdf.

Course Title is the short course title that is pulled from the catalog.

Department simply is the name of the Department to which the course belongs.

Campus is the campus where the section will be

• "CA: Carbondale Campus" should be selected for all on-campus sections.
• "WB: Web-Based Distance Learning" should be selected for all online and hybrid sections. The specific off campus locations should be selected for off campus sections.

Section Status should be set to "Active" if you want the section to appear on the schedule, or "Canceled" if you do not want it to appear on the schedule.

Schedule Type generally indicates format at the course level; there should only be one selection from drop down menu.

Instructional Method is the way the section will be instructed. See Information and Definitions for that list of defined methods.

Grade Mode is set up in the catalog and usually has only one selection possible from the drop down If there is more than one selection available, then select the correct grade mode for the section.

Special Approval can be added to sections to require that an override be entered for all registering This field is not required. See Information and Definitions for that list of Special Approvals used at the Section Level.

Attendance Method will need to be chosen for all Extended Campus sections. On-campus sections do not need an Attendance Method added.

Part of Term will need to chosen as this is a required field. On-campus sections must use parts of term that begin with "Campus" (or "Full Term") and Extended Campus sections must use parts of term that begin with "Ext Campus. NOTE: 601 Continuing Enrollment course must use the part of term that begins with "601." (UNIV 101U and LAW must use special parts of term as well.)

Credit Hours

The Credit Hours field will default to the value already defined at the course level. Credit hours only need to be adjusted if the course is designated as variable credit at the course level but the section is not variable and should be set at a specific number at the section level. There are 3 scenarios:

1. Fixed Credit --  Nothing needs to be done.
2. Variable Credit with set credit hours at Section Level -- Indicate the specific number of credit hours for the section. Enter the specific number in all 4 editable fields: Credit Hours, Lecture Hours, Billing Hours, and Contact Hours.
3. Variable Credit -- Nothing needs to be done.  However, you will be alerted after adding a meeting pattern that the "Session Credit Hours cannot be empty." You must click on "Set Details" below the meeting pattern and enter the number that is the minimum value of the variable credit course for the Session Credit Hours.

Enrollment Settings

Maximum Enrollment (required) -- Enter number for class capacity.

Waitlist Capacity (optional) -- Enter "99" for the capacity.

Meeting Patterns (Days/Times)

Click on Select Meeting Pattern to choose the meeting days and times for the class section from the options provided.  

+MEETING PATTERN will open a pop-up box where you can search for the timeblock within a pre-established menu of meeting patterns that fit the University Scheduling Guidelines. TIP: Filter by day and time at the top of the screen to narrow your options.

Custom Meeting Patterns 

Click +MEETING PATTERN and choose "Use Custom Times" found in the lower left corner of the pop-up box. 

Click on the requested day(s) and enter the requested start and end times using AM and PM to designate specific times.

CAUTION: Deviation from the available pre-established meeting patterns will require the Department assigns their own rooms to the section.  General Classrooms are only available for pre-established meeting patterns.

No Set Meeting Times or Meeting Times Not Yet Decided

Click on +MEETING PATTERNS and search for "TBA" in the Filter by Attributes field, then select the timeblock labeled "No Days and No Times."  

NOTE: This will display to students in the same way that Independently Scheduled sections currently appear--with no meeting time or dates. (There will be no "Meeting Time TBA" indicated on the schedule.)

Meeting Patterns and Rooms

Assigning Rooms --To assign a room to the section after adding a meeting pattern, click on "Not set" under ROOM in the meeting pattern. This will open the menu to select a room to assign.

All available rooms assigned to the Department are listed for selection. Use the search bar to quickly find a specific room. Navigate the pages of rooms by using < PREVIOUS and NEXT > To select no room, click on SELECT NO ROOM in the bottom left hand corner. If this section is meeting with another section, and you need to double book a room, use the toggle button next to "Show Only Available Rooms" in order to select unavailable rooms.

The Section Dashboard is where department schedulers can view the schedule, change terms, add sections and courses, and also perform other useful actions or view valuable information.  Terms can be selected from the drop down menu under “Select Term.”  Sections and courses can be added by clicking on “+ ADD SECTION”  or  “+ ADD COURSE”  at the top of the screen.  There are 4 views for the Section Dashboard:  Sections, Courses, Calendar and Departments.

1. SECTIONS
   1. This view shows all sections for the Department(s), including canceled sections. Click on a section to select it for viewing or editing (depending on the phase.)  The view of the sections is broken up into pages with 25 sections on a page.  You can see which sections you are viewing out of the total number of sections. You can click on “< PREVIOUS”  and  “NEXT >”  to navigate through the sections.  You can also scroll up and down as well as left and right.
   2. The “STATUS” column on the left will show whether the section has any conflicts or not. A green checkmark means no conflicts, while a triangle alert means there is a conflict for the section.  The next column, “ACTIONS AND COURSE ANALYTICS,”  has 3 selections.  The first red trashcan can be ignored because we do not allow sections to be deleted in Coursedog. The blue box can be selected for the course information.  The line graph is for course analytics.
   3. The view of the rest of the columns is a Schoolwide Saved View. This is the default view for everyone at SIU.  It is similar to the view of the Schedule of Classes online.  The view can be changed in many different ways.  Select “FILTER” and this allows sections to be filtered by any of the information listed in any of the columns.  Select “COLUMNS” to bring up a drop down menu where you can select or unselect any columns.  A blue checkmark will make the column visible, while no checkmark hides the column.  Also, the black boxes to the left of the columns that do have a blue checkmark can be dragged up or down with the mouse to arrange the columns in any order.  The top of the list is the furthest column to the left.  These are some ways you can change the views of the Section Dashboard.
   4. Once a view has been created by using these tools, the view can be saved. This will be saved only for that specific department scheduler.  Multiple views can be saved.  To save a view, click on “SAVED VIEWS” in the top right of the screen.  Then, click on “SAVE CURRENT VIEW” in bottom left.  You are required to give the view a name, and also uncheck the boxes for Year and Semester under “Base Filters” needs to be unchecked.  Then click SAVE on the bottom right.  The saved view can now be selected in SAVED VIEWS on the Section Dashboard.  To run reports from these saved views, simply click on “EXPORT RESULTS” next to “SAVED VIEWS”  to export the view into a .csv file.
2. COURSES. This view lists all the courses from the department that have a section or multiple sections on the schedule for the selected term. The list includes the course code, course name and section count.
3. CALENDAR
   1. The Calendar shows all sections with meeting times on the schedule for the department. All sections with the meeting pattern No Days and No Times are not shown in the Calendar.  It only shows the information for a single department. If the department scheduler has access to more than one department, the department should be selected from the Home Screen before selecting the Calendar.  It has 3 different views:
      1. Calendar – The calendar view lists the sections in a calendar showing the days and times the sections meet.
      2. List – The list view lists the sections with their meeting times by each day of the week.
      3. Rooms – The rooms view shows all the rooms that are assigned to the department and all sections that are scheduled in the rooms for the selected term. This is a great place to confirm when sections meet together.
      4. 
4. DEPARTMENTS
   1. This is similar to the Home Screen. It lists all departments assigned to the department scheduler and shows the number of courses, sections and conflicts for the selected term.  This is where department schedulers go to validate the schedule for a department during the Schedule Validation phase by clicking on VALIDATE SCHEDULE under “ACTIONS.”

Once the phase changes from Open Scheduling to Schedule Validation, it is now time to validate the schedule for the department.  Hopefully, all the changes have been made during the Open Scheduling phase, but if further changes are required, requests can be created and submitted for changes.  See “FINAL SCHEDULE CHANGE REQUESTS” for more information on how to create and submit requests.  Requests can be made before or after validating the schedule during the Schedule Validation phase.

Validating the Schedule – The schedule can be validated by going to the Section Dashboard and selecting DEPARTMENTS. Click on VALIDATE SCHEDULE under ACTIONS on the right hand side to submit the schedule for validation. 

Review Schedule Conflicts – Once VALIDATE SCHEDULE is selected, the department schedulers must review schedule conflicts. These conflicts will be listed here and must be resolved before the schedule can be submitted for validation.  If there are no conflicts for the department, then the message, “Congratulations! There are no section conflicts in your current schedule,” will be shown.  Then, the schedule can be submitted for validation by clicking on SUBMIT FOR VALIDATION at the bottom right.

Workflow Approval – After the schedule is submitted for validation, a workflow will be created for approval of the validation. It will need to be approved by the Director of the School and Dean/Associate Dean.  Email notifications will be sent at each step of the workflow.

From the main menu on the left side of the Coursedog screen, there are some useful resources.  For information about HOME, SECTION DASHBOARD and REQUESTS, please see our other instructions on our website.  INSTRUCTORS and BUILDINGS can be ignored.  Here is information on ROOMS.

1. ROOMS
   1. List of ALL rooms including Department, General and Extended Campus rooms. The view shows 50 rooms per page.  Navigate the pages by using <PREVIOUS and NEXT> and scroll down to view more rooms on the page.  There is the FILTER tool and search bar in the top right corner.  Any room can be selected whether it is assigned to the department or not.
   2. Select a room to view useful information about the room. This will bring up the Room Profile menu on the left.  (General information about the room including display name, building, capacity and department listed in Banner)
2. Settings
   1. General information about the room including display name, building, capacity and department listed in Banner.
3. Scroll down to see “Allowed Sections.” This is a list of all departments that are assigned to the room and are allowed to schedule sections in it.  The department is shown in the blue box inside the purple field.  In the example, the departments Management and Marketing, Business and Analytics, Analytics, Finance & Economics, and Interdisciplinary are all able to assign the room to sections on the schedule. 
   
   • Courses: Lists all sections scheduled in the room for a certain term with days, times and instructors for each section. There is a drop down menu to select different terms.  It shows what room is being viewed at the top.  There is also a tool to download the list into a .pdf file. 
   • Exams:  We do not use Coursedog for scheduling any Exams. This can be ignored.
   • Calendar:  Lists all sections that have meeting times in a daily calendar format. Scroll left and right to see different times throughout the days. This is an excellent place to confirm if multiple sections should be meeting together in the room at the same time.
   • Blocked Out Times:  We do not have any blocked out times for rooms in Coursedog. This can be ignored.

Coursedog provides a wide variety of out-of-the-box reports in the Reports Dashboard.

• Reports are accessed at Academic Scheduling > Reports.
• The Reports Dashboard contain is organized by topic (e.g. Sections, Courses, Times, etc.) for easy navigation.

Each tab on the left side of the Reports Dashboard provides insight into a different area of focus. 

Coursedog makes it easy to customize your view of the Reports Dashboard

• Use filters to tailor the dashboard and focus on the data most relevant to you.
• Create saved views to quickly access your preferred report configurations. 

To filter, click into the dropdown(s) and select the desired value.

Use Advanced Filters to narrow data by course, section, room, or instructor level data.

1. Click "Filter". 
2. Select the entity you want to filter by (course, section, room, or instructor). 
3. Click "Add Filter" then define your filter criteria by selecting a field, condition, and value
4. (Optional) Repeat, adding any additional filter conditions needed
5. Apply the filter.
   • Click "Save As" to view results and create a Saved View you can refer to later. 
   • Click "Apply Filter " to just view the results.

Create a Saved View from the Reports Dashboard

1. Adjust the dashboard to the desired view using filters.
2. Click "Saved Views" then select "Save Current View."
3. Input a Name and Description for the Saved View.
4. Click "Save."

To access a saved view, click "Saved Views" then select a view from the list. 

The Overview report provides a quick snapshot of the schedule for a given term. 

• Key insights in this section cover courses, instructors , preferences, schedule distribution, and overall scheduling trends.

Courses show total number of courses and sections scheduled for the selected term.Schedule Daily Distribution shows seat utilization across different times of the day.

Current Trends summarizes trends in seat utilization, room double-bookings, Prime Time meeting usage, and how well scheduling preferences are being met.

The Sections report highlights trends in section data. 

The Conflicts report helps identify section rule and preference conflicts 

• This report provides insight into how well the schedule satisfies instructor and section preferences and highlights any sections that violate section rules.

The Conflicts Area shows the total number of sections with conflicts, as well as what percentage of sections that total represents.

The Conflicts List displays conflicts by type based on the filters selected in the "Filter by Conflict Type" dropdown.

If no filters are applied, the list will show all conflicts, including preference violations.

You can resolve a conflict directly from this page. Click any section in the Conflicts list to open the Section Editing Modal and make updates.

The Instructors report provides easy insight into faculty utilization

• This report includes a high-level overview of instructors including their assignments, roles, workload, availability, and scheduling patterns.

Instructors shows the total number fo instructors, how many have submitted preferences, and how many currently have scheduling conflicts.

Assignments displays how many instructors are assigned to at least one section and how many are still waiting for an assignment.

Instructor Type summarizes the number of instructors by full-time and part-time/adjunct status.

Average Credits shows the average number of credits assigned to instructors.

Instructors with Back-to-Back Sections flags instructors scheduled to teach back-to-back sections so potential adjustment needs can be identified

The Times report helps identify under and over-utilized meeting times.

• This includes insight into how meeting patterns and class times are distributed across days and times as well as how effectively spaces are used.

Meeting Pattern displays the total number of standard meeting patterns and the percentage of patterns that fall within prime time. 

Assignments shows how many meeting patterns are currently assigned to sections and how many are not in use.

Schedule Hourly Distribution illustrates which hours of the day have the most scheduled sections.

Seat Utilization by Hour provides insight into how efficient seats are filled at different times based on actual compared to maximum enrollment.

Schedule Daily Distribution highlights which days of the week are busiest and where scheduling might be imbalanced.

Most Popular Meeting Patterns identifies the meeting patterns most frequently used for scheduling sections.

Meeting Patterns includes a list of all meeting patterns with information on days, times, prime time status, usage, average seat utilization, and available rooms.

Departments reports provide a snapshot of each department's progress on building their schedule.

This report contains a summary of how many departments have already submitted a schedule as well as the status of each department (Not Started, Submitted, or In Progress).

The Rooms report provides insights into how classrooms are utilized.

This includes insight into seat utilization rates and room usage across days and times.

Room Assignments shows how rooms are assigned to sections and how many are currently unused.

Conflicts summarizes double-booked rooms and room assignments that violate section or instructor preferences.

Usage provides insight into how efficient seats re filled overall.

Seat Utilization by Hour summarizes seat utilization at different times of day.

Seat Utilization by Day summarizes seat utilization throughout the week.

Seat Utilization by Room Size summarizes seat utilization by room size category (Small, Medium, or Large).

Most Used Buildings highlights which buildings host the most classes.

Average Usage by Building compares average room usage by building.

Rooms List provides a detailed list of all rooms with key details such as room type, capacity, number of sections, seat utilization, and overall usage.

The Bottlenecks report identifies scheduling issues that prevent sections from being assigned a room.

The Enrollment report helps identify underfilled, balanced, or overfilled classes and optimize scheduling and resource usage.

The Enrollment report's Overview tab summarizes key enrollment metrics including:

• Overview of total enrollment and percent of balanced sections
• Underfilled sections
• Overfilled sections
• Zero enrollment sections
• Rooms that are being utilized above capacity
• Enrollment Trends visualized by day and hour

The All Sections tab provides a complete list of sections for the term.

The Sections by Utilization tab provides a list view of all sections by category.

• Balanced
• Underfilled
• Overfilled
• Zero Enrollment
• Zero Max Enrollment
• Above Capacity

Use the tabs near the top fo the page to navigate between different categories. Sections can be edited directly from this page by clicking a section to open the editing modal.

Enrollment Heatmap displays enrollment and utilization patterns across time blocks to help identify heavily used or underutilized schedule times.

Switch between a term view or see the heatmap for individual weeks by clicking "By Term" or "By Week"

Click the "Learn More" icon to see how Coursedog determines if sections are underfilled, balanced, or overfilled.

The Export tab of the Reports Dashboard is the hub for downloading more than 25 different .cvs reports.

1. Select the desired term for the report from the "Terms" dropdown.
2. (Optional) Select the department to include in the report.
3. Locate the report to export.
4. Click "Export" or "Generate."  Downloads will be available as soon as the file is complete; Generated reports are emailed when complete.