University of Delaware

Student Information System

Glossary: A

Academic Calendar
Defines enrollment & grading actions based upon specific dates within the calendar, specific to career and institution. Transcript rules are also defined on the academic calendar.
Academic Career
The general level of study to which a student has been admitted (UD - Undergraduate, Graduate, Professional Development). Coursework taken by a student is grouped together on the transcript by career and is calculated together into the GPA.
Academic Course List
A listing of courses that is used to satisfy an academic requirement. (Course lists must be established before academic requirements are developed.)
Academic Entity Group
An entity consisting of similar items grouped together for more efficient use as a single condition. For example, an entity group might include all programs within a career or multiple plans within a program. This concept is used in the Academic Advisement application and can be used for prerequisite checking.
Academic Group
Each school, division or college within an institution is usually defined as an Academic Group. An academic group provides an additional way to categorize students and courses. Typically Academic Groups offer courses. Example: College of Engineering, Lerner College of Business and Economics.
Academic Institution
Highest level entity in academic structure. Generally, this is the concept of University or College. An Academic Institution generally has a one-to-one relationship with your financials business unit and its general ledger chart of accounts.

UD values: University of Delaware = UOD01 and non-credit Professional & Continuing = UOD02
Academic Level Rule
Academic level rules are associated with each academic program and define the rules to calculate a student’s level (Freshman, Sophomore, etc.). Academic Level rules can be defined by units, terms or established by a defined default value.
Academic Load Rule
Academic load rules define the number of credits required to be full-time, part-time, etc. at the University. Academic Load rules are with each Academic Program.
Academic Organization
Defines how an Institution is organized from an administrative perspective. Organizations are setup in a ‘tree structure’, so it is possible to have multiple ‘levels’ of Organizations. At the lowest level, an Organization is an academic department. Courses are attached to academic organizations. Example: Department of History, Department of Plant & Soil Science, School of Education.
Academic Plan
A course of study in a specific academic field. It defines academic objectives such as majors, minors, certificates, etc and when appropriate indicates degree. A student who is admitted to a specific program may change Plans many times (potentially) prior to graduating.

Academic Plans can be directly associated with a Program or associated with a specific Career. Career associated Plans are available for all students within that Career (Minors and Certificates are good examples.) Example: English BA, History BA, Hotel, Restaurant & Institutional Management BS, Applied Mathematics M.S., Business Administration Minor.
Academic Program
Typically the broad course of study that the student applies to, is admitted to and from which the student graduates. A student who is admitted into a particular career and program can easily be changed into a different career and program at the University (matriculation in SIS+).

Example: Arts & Sciences, Continuing Education
Academic Structure
Academic Structure is a reflection of how an academic institution is organized and how it fundamentally operates. Academic Structure is essentially the backbone of the student information system (UDSIS). It helps define how the University organizes its campuses, schools, and majors. It also defines what degrees are offered, how academic terms are established, what calendars are used, etc.
Academic Requirement Group
An academic requirement group consists of multiple academic requirements, which are satisfied by course lists. Requirement groups can be established before requirements or course lists are developed. A requirement group points to courses and conditions.
Academic Requirement
A requirement to be satisfied by the student in order to graduate. An academic requirement consists of course lists that must be established before the requirement is developed.
Academic Session
A class scheduling/enrollment control time period within an academic term. All classes are offered within a session and a session belongs to a term for billing and other administrative purposes.
Examples:
6W1 First Six Weeks of a Term
6W2 Second Six Weeks of a Term
8W1 First Eight Weeks of a Term
8W2 Second Eight Weeks of a Term
Academic Standing Rules
Rules that define the current academic standing of a student based upon credit hours and GPA. Labels such as probation, suspension, removed from probation, etc., can be placed on students using the Academic Standing rules.
Academic Statistics Period
To consolidate statistics, your Academic Institution needs to create a statistical period of time, called an Academic Statistics Period that tells the Consolidated Academic Statistics process how it should function. You can define an Academic Statistics Period for various types of statistical reports and have it use your institution's single term or contiguous term academic load rules during the Consolidate Academic Statistics process.
Academic Subject Area
A specific area of instruction within an academic group. For example, when a course is identified as Math 101, math is the subject area.
Academic Subplan
The ability to further specialize within an Academic Plan such as a concentration or track. Subplans must be directly associated with an Academic Program and Academic Plan.
Academic Term
An administrative time period within which sessions are defined, students are billed, and statistics are accumulated for individual students as well as for the entire school. The naming convention at UD is WXYZ where:
W = millennium (1 for 19xx and 2 for 20xx)
XY = last two digits of calendar year
Z = 1 for Winter, 3 for Spring, 5 for Summer and 8 for Fall
For example Fall 2006 = 2068
Academic Year
Each term is associated with an academic year for purposes of reporting and financial aid accumulation. However, a student may have any summer term work changed to point at either the preceding or subsequent academic year. Accounting is done at a term level and then summarized into a fiscal year which usually parallels an academic year.
Address Type
A type given to a physical address.
Address Usage
An address usage is a grouping of address types. The grouping has a specific or generic purpose. Address usages can be defined as permanent, mailing, billing, home, preferred, work, or dormitory addresses.
Addresses
A variety of address types exist may exist in the legacy system. PeopleSoft delivers multiple address types to provide flexibility and to accommodate various address needs. PS delivers 17 address types including billing, business, campus, cellular, dormitory, FAX, home, mailing, other, permanent, pager 1, pager 2, preferred, telex, veteran, work and joint communication.
Admission Evaluation Schemes
Evaluation schemes for Admissions incorporate several parameters that are assigned to pools of applicants for admission to University of Delaware. These evaluation codes are then used within an SQR to make automatic assignment of codes to group students into decision categories (Auto-Admit, Auto-Deny, Review Application, etc).
Administrative Function
Functional area that processes checklists, communication, and comments (3C’s). The administrative function identifies what variable data should be added to a person's checklist or communication record when a specific checklist code, communication category or comment is assigned to the student. This key data allows you to trace that checklist, communication or comment back to a specific processing event in a functional area. For example, when assigning a checklist related to a person's application for admission, it is important to know which specific application the checklist is related to—for processing, reporting, and analysis purposes. The admissions administrative function gives you the ability to link a checklist to a specific academic career, student career number, and application number.
Admit Term
The first term in which an applicant is expected to enroll in an academic program.
Admit Type
Admit type helps distinguish first-year from transfer applications.
Analysis Database
Analysis database tables store large amounts of student information that may not appear in standard printed report formats. The data tables contain keys for each object in the report that an application program can use to reference other objects in the student's record that are not contained in the printed report. The analysis database contains data on courses which were considered for satisfying a requirement, but rejected. It also contains information on courses captured by global limits. This concept is used in the Academic Advisement application.
Application Center
A place where admission applications are processed. Typically, the application center codes mirror the academic career codes. An application center provides the capability for academic careers with decentralized application processing to track what office is handling a specific application.
Application Fee
A charge incurred by potential students when they apply for admission to the institution.
Attempts/Completions
Limits on repeatability may be set in terms of how many times a student may attempt a course or how many times she may complete it.
Attendance Type
The Attendance Type indicates the type of attendance roster such as Class Meeting, Conference, Field Trip, Instructor Consultation, or Study Group. You use the Class Attendance Type to define the types of attendance rosters you will generate for individual classes through the Class Attendance panel and for multiple classes through the Class Attendance Generator process panel.
Award Letter
An official document issued by the Financial Aid Office listing all of the financial aid awarded to the student. This letter provides details on the amount, source, type of aid, and terms and conditions for the financial aid.
Award Year
The academic year for which financial aid is requested or received.