Tool Search: Academic Programs
The Course Plan Template allows counselors/administrators to mass add courses to a student's Course Plan. For example, a graduation program for incoming eighth graders contains all of the core courses high school students must take and pass over the next four years. Instead of adding those courses individually for each student, administrators can create course plans for that specific program. When students are assigned to the program, the Academic Planner automatically adds the courses from the Course Plan Template into each student's Course Plan.
Course Plan Template Editor for Academic ProgramsAdditional courses the student plans for outside of this template can be added by the student on the Portal using the Academic Planner tool. Counselors can use the Course Plan tool in Academic Planning to add any additional courses to a student's plan.
Students who need to alter the plan defined in the course template can make the necessary changes. Students may also enroll in courses at grade levels different from the plan suggestions. If the template indicates that Algebra I be taken in 9th grade, but the student successfully completed that course in 8th grade, the 9th grade math course might instead be Geometry, which is planned for 10th grade.
When planning for the current year, course plan templates apply any course on the template for a student who meets the current year planning requirements (no scheduled courses for the current year, no transcript courses for the current year). If planned courses already exist for students in the current year grade level, the Course Plan Template does not apply course plans to the current year grade level. See the Course Plan article for more information on planning for the current year.
Best Practices
This tool is best used for incoming 9th-grade students who do not have any existing scores posted to a transcript from a previous high school enrollment. When a program is assigned to a student, students are assigned this template, along with the other program requirements (course requirements, test requirements, etc.). Course Plan Template courses are automatically added to the student's Course Plan tab. If the student is assigned both a graduation program and an academic program, the academic program courses also display on the Course Plan tab.
Course Plan Templates only add a planned course into a cell if nothing is previously planned or added to the student's transcript. The Course Plan Template only adds courses to the Course Plan if the box in the Credit Type and Year is blank. It does not append/overwrite if there is a planned course or a course on the transcript in that credit type/year.
This tool can also be used for students who already have scores posted to their transcript. The course plan template does not add courses to an already completed grade level (ended enrollment). If a student transfers from another high school in their junior year, and has transcript records for their freshman and sophomore year, courses on the template for the junior and senior year are added to the transfer student's course plan for Grades 11 and 12. The columns for Grades 09 and 10 contain the transcript information (from the transfer courses).
Things to Know
For courses like Band or Choir, or other courses that can be taken multiple times throughout a student's high school career, make sure these sorts of courses are marked as Repeatable. Another option is to set these courses up as individual courses for each grade level. 9th graders would have a Band: Grade 09 course, 10th graders would have a Band: Grade 10 course, etc. The Course Plan Template will NOT add a course to a student's existing plan, which means a repeatable course would not be added.
If the student has already planned courses for future grade levels in a certain credit area, courses from the plan template are not added for that area. If a student already has transcript scores for a course in the plan, it is not added again.
Courses in which the student is already scheduled are not added to the course plan.
The plan template does not allow locked Courses. This action is only available to a counselor on the student's Course Plan tab.
Using Course Plan Templates is a plan for students' graduation or career tech program. This is not a tool to mass-assign actual courses to student schedules. That process is performed using the Scheduling Board and other Scheduling tools.
Course Plan Template: Warnings/Alerts/Errors
Just like alerts display on a student's Course Plan, alerts display on the Course Plan Template when a Planning Rule is violated during the template's creation. Each time a change is made to the Course Plan, all rules and requirements are reevaluated, and updated alerts and messages are displayed. The plan does not need to be saved to show these alerts. When the alerts have been satisfied, they are automatically removed.
Counselors can still save course plans when alerts and warnings exist.
Warnings display when:
- There is a failure in the template that prohibits the student from modifying and saving their course plan.
Alerts display when:
- A grade does not have enough credits planned.
- A credit type does not have enough credits planned.
Students with an Academic Plan containing an error are not able to save changes made to their course plan from the Portal.
Certain Portal Display Options apply here that can be turned on or off to show these rules.
- When the Enforce All Rules option is marked as part of the Academic Planner option, students can only save their academic plan if it meets ALL established requirements and planning rules.
- When the Enforce All Rules option is NOT marked, students can save their plan without meeting all requirements, but all planning rules must be met. Warning messages from failed requirements and failed planning rules display so users can see the issues while saving the entry.
