Understanding Dynamic Academic Calendars

If you use the traditional way to design an academic structure in PeopleSoft Student Records, you define the terms, sessions, and academic calendars that control the various academic programs. You use these three elements to determine the significant dates and time periods within each session. For example, you use the academic calendar to set up drop and withdrawal deadlines for each session. However, this academic structure can be limiting.

A dynamic academic calendar provides more flexibility than static landmark dates based on term and session structure. This type of calendar enables you to dynamically control landmark dates for individual classes and even for student enrollments themselves. You might use dynamic academic calendars, for instance, if the academic institution has a rolling admission and enrollment business process that enables students to begin academic programs at any point in the calendar year. In this case, many classes that you offer might use their own academic calendars because the classes have their own deadlines and landmark dates. You can also use dynamic academic calendars if the academic institution offers students open entry enrollment into classes so that the students can enroll at any time during the calendar year and complete the classes at their own pace. Many classes taught over the internet use this type of enrollment, which is called open entry/exit (OEE) enrollment.

In a dynamic academic calendar, you establish flexible rules, called dynamic class date rules, which enable you to dynamically calculate cancel, withdrawal, and drop deadlines and other landmark dates. You then apply these rules to various parts of the academic structure so that you can calculate the landmark calendar dates for individual classes or student enrollments. You can override the calculations on a case-by-case basis. Consequently, the academic institution can create classes that begin and end at various times throughout a term and session, then dynamically calculate the landmark dates for individual classes based on the dynamic date rules that you assign to classes. In addition, the academic institution can set up OEE enrollment for these classes with dynamic dates so that the enrollment engine calculates landmark dates for each student who enrolls in one of the classes based on the student's enrollment begin date and the OEE dynamic date rule that you assign to the class.

Use the Dynamic Class Dates feature to create dynamic academic calendars for individual classes within a session and for individual OEE student enrollments.

To create dynamic academic calendars:

Create dynamic date rules.
Set up the academic structure.
Schedule the class sections for which you want to create dynamic academic calendars.
Calculate landmark date deadlines for the dynamic academic calendars using the Dynamic Class Dates COBOL/SQL process (SRPCDYNP).

You can calculate these deadlines in several ways. For multiple class sections within a term, use the Dynamic Class Dates process page. For individual class sections, use the Dynamic Class Data page. For OEE enrollments, the enrollment engine runs the Dynamic Class Dates process at enrollment time for each student who enrolls in an OEE class section, and the system calculates the deadlines.

Warning! Because the Dynamic Dates Process creates the Dynamic Class Dates table, which the system uses for enrollment transactions, you must run the process for classes scheduled in a dynamic date session before you perform enrollment transactions. If you do not run the process, the system has no indication that a rule exists and it might, for example, permit all class drops. This warning does not apply to classes scheduled in OEE sessions.

Dynamic Date Rules

The Dynamic Dates COBOL/SQL process (SRDYNADT and SRPCDYNP) uses a dynamic class date rule to calculate deadlines for landmark dates on the dynamic academic calendars that the process creates. There are two types of dynamic class date rules. The first type, a dynamic class date rule, is used to create dynamic academic calendars for individual class sections within a session. The second type, an OEE dynamic date rule, is a dynamic class date rule that is designated for open OEE enrollment. The enrollment engine uses the OEE dynamic date rule in conjunction with students' enrollment start dates to calculate dynamic academic calendars for the students whenever they enroll in OEE classes. Regardless of the type of rule that you define, for each rule you must specify the rule schemes, rounding schemes, and factors that the Dynamic Class Dates process uses to calculate the landmark dates on a dynamic academic calendar.

You define a rule scheme for the landmark date of a dynamic class date rule. A rule scheme indicates the method that the Dynamic Class Dates process uses as a basis for calculating the applicable landmark date. Your selection varies depending on the type of rule that you define. All rule schemes are valid for dynamic class date rules, but rule schemes that relate to class meetings are invalid for OEE dynamic date rules because of the nature of OEE classes.

You can define rule schemes based on these factors:

The number of class meetings.
A percentage of class meetings.
A percentage of total class hours.
A point between class start and end date (OEE).
The day before or after class start date (OEE).
The day before or after class end date (OEE).

Then, you define a rounding scheme for the landmark date of the dynamic class date rule. A rounding scheme enables you to round the deadline up or down to various days. After the Dynamic Class Dates process determines the landmark date according to the rule scheme and factor (known as the basis day), it adjusts that date according to the rounding scheme. All rounding schemes are valid for dynamic class date rules, but rounding schemes that relate to class meetings are invalid for OEE dynamic date rules because of the nature of OEE classes.

You can define rounding schemes that use these days:

Basis day (OEE)
Beginning of next week (OEE)
Beginning of week (OEE)
End of next week (OEE)
End of week (OEE)
First meeting of week
Last meeting of week
Next day (OEE)
Next meeting day
Previous day (OEE)
Previous meeting day

You must also define a factor for the landmark date of the dynamic class date rule. A factor instructs the Dynamic Class Dates process how many units to move the deadline either forward or backward, based on the rule scheme. For example, if you use the percentage of class meetings for the rule scheme and you want the deadline to be at the halfway point of the class, you would enter .50 (fifty percent).

The Dynamic Class Dates process uses the rule scheme and factor to determine the basis day. If the rule scheme uses the number of class meetings, a percentage of class meetings, a percentage of total class hours, or a point between class start and end date (for non-OEE classes), then the basis day is the class meeting with the maximum value that does not exceed the specified factor. After the Dynamic Class Dates process determines the basis day, it applies the rounding scheme to the basis day to determine the deadline. If the rule scheme uses a point between class start and end date (OEE classes), the day before or after class start date, or the day before or after class end date, then the basis day is the actual calculated date.

Examples of Dynamic Class Date Rules

This section discusses examples of how the Dynamic Dates process calculates deadlines for a dynamic academic calendar.

Suppose that you schedule a class that meets every Wednesday for 7 weeks starting March 4. In the Last Wait List Date group box on the Dynamic Class Dates page, you enterPercentage of Class Meetings as the rule scheme and Beginning of Next Week as the rounding scheme. You also set the factor to .30 (thirty percent). The Dynamic Class dates process would calculate the last wait list date as shown in this table:

Meeting	1	2	3	4	5	6	7
Date	March 4	March 11	March 18	March 25	April 1	April 8	April 15
Percentage	14%	28%	43%	57%	71%	86%	100%

Based on the rule scheme and factor, the basis day would be the second meeting. By using the basis day as a starting point, the process then rounds the deadline up or down based on the rounding scheme that you specify. In this example, the last day to waitlist the class would be Monday, March 16, which is the beginning of the next week.

This table shows other possible deadlines in this example, depending on the rounding scheme that you enter:

Last Wait List Date Rounding Scheme	Last Wait List Date Deadline
Basis day.	March 11
Previous day.	March 10
Next day.	March 12
Next meeting day.	March 18
Beginning of week (Monday).	March 9
Previous meeting day.	March 4
Beginning of next week (next Monday).	March 16

Because the system dynamically calculates the landmark dates of the academic calendar, you can apply the same rule to any number of classes.

To further illustrate how the system uses the dynamic class date rule that you create, suppose that you have a 10-week class that meets once a week, starting January 1. In the Drop Dates group box on the Dynamic Class Dates page, you select a rule scheme of Number of Class Meetings and a rounding scheme of Basis Day. You have four drop deadlines—drop and delete record, drop but retain record, drop with penalty, and drop with greater penalty. The consequence of violating each deadline becomes more severe as time passes. Suppose that you want these deadlines to occur a week apart, starting the second week of class. You would enter 2 in the Drop Deadline (delete) Factor field, 3 in the Drop Deadline (retain) Factor field, 4 for the Drop Deadline (Penalty) Factor field, and 5 for the Drop Deadline (Penalty2) Factor field.

After you save the rule and assign it to the appropriate class, the Dynamic Class Dates process can dynamically calculate each of these drop deadlines for the class. According to the rule scheme and factors that you specified, the process calculates the basis day for each of the drop deadlines as January 8, January 15, January 22, and January 29. In this scenario, because you have used a basis day rounding scheme, the process determines that the drop deadlines are the same as the dates for the basis days.