Many of the courses offered by the College of Pharmacy are taught by a team of faculty instructors, often from different departments. This document is intended to serve as a guide for the conduct of team-taught courses.

Departmental Responsibilities

Each team-taught course will be assigned to one department which will assume primary responsibility for the course. The Department Head will assign one faculty member to serve as course coordinator. Each additional department involved in teaching a course shall appoint a co-coordinator (unless that involvement is minimal and a co-coordinator is not needed). The course coordinator(s) and instructors will collaborate to determine how the course will be conducted.

The following are responsibilities of the Departments:

1. Course syllabi, handouts and examinations, submitted to the course coordinator by the designated due dates, will be the responsibility of the course coordinator's home department.
2. Scheduling classroom time (with the Associate Dean in collaboration with department heads and couse coordinator).
3. Lecturers are assigned by the department heads in consultation with the course coordinator and co-coordinator(s). Course coordinators may be asked to recommend potential instructors.
4. The Department Head will assure that students have the opportunity to provide written evaluation for all course instructors. Course coordinators may be asked to administer the student evaluations. Some method of quality assurance in addition to student evaluations should be applied by the department head and/or course coordinator. This may include the department head and/or coordinator observing selected lectures, small group conferences with selected students, or other materials.

Course Coordinator Responsibilities

Effective coordination of team-taught courses requires that course coordinators assume responsibilities that are different from single-instructor courses. Below are a list of responsibilities of course coordinators.

1. In courses which have coordinated lecture topics over two semesters, the course coordinator(s) from each semester should meet three months prior to each fall semester to determine, the order of topics, and the semester in which subjects will be covered.
2. Three months prior to the start of the course, the coordinator should conduct a meeting of all instructors teaching in the course to discuss the format, methods of instruction to be used, textbooks, readings, handouts, testing strategies, examination point distribution, and grading.
3. The coordinator should construct the course schedule, outlining course topics, instructors, dates, and times. The schedule should be sent to instructors for their approval at least four weeks before the start of the course. The finalized schedule should be sent to the instructors to allow adequate preparation time.
4. Instructors should be notified about procedures for handout materials (i.e. due dates, nature of material to be given to students).
5. The coordinator should assure that examination materials are properly prepared. Coordinators should review all test materials to assure that the variation in testing strategies does not pose an unnecessary hardship on students and should determine that the time required to complete the examination does not exceed the time provided. In consultation with the instructors course coordinators may delete or revise examination items.
6. The coordinator should determine letter grades based on examination scores and submit grades by the appropriate date.
7. At the conclusion of the course, the coordinator should perform an assessment of the course to determine components that should be altered for the next offering. These findings should be presented to the Department Head and/or Associate Dean for help in implementing changes.

Course Instructor Responsibilities

The following are responsibilities of instructors participating in a team-taught course:

1. Submit course materials to the course coordinator by the required deadline (including handouts, test materials, graded examinations). Materials submitted after these deadlines are the responsibility of the individual instructors.
2. Provide a complete outline of topics to be covered in the lecture.
3. Adhere to the teaching method and schedule selected for the course.
4. Adhere to lecture schedules so that lectures beging promptly at the scheduled time and conclude at the proper time.
5. Assist the coordinator in proctoring examinations.

Approved: January 5, 1998