Brief

background

Cal Poly doesn’t have a university-wide course numbering scheme, so each department is left to number their courses how they like.

My department, Graphic Communication (GRC), doesn’t have its own scheme.

problem

Due to the difficulty in adopting new numbers, courses don’t typically change numbers, even when it makes sense to, like when courses are sequenced with each other or are related.

This leads to confusion and the need for students to (more or less) memorize each course number since there are no patterns to indicate what the course might be about based on the number alone.

challenge

How might we design a numbering scheme that can indicate a course’s level, topic, and place in a sequence of related or requisite courses?

Parameters

role

This was a self-initiated project.

tools

Pen & paper, Google Sheets

time

February 2019

Research

User empathy

Though no formal research was conducted for this project, being a Graphic Communication student means that I communicate using course numbers regularly.

My peers and I often have to pause to remember (or ask for clarification) which course they are describing when naming courses by their number.

This problem affects freshmen most, since having taken only a few courses, are unfamiliar with almost all of the course numbers.

defining problems

Sequenced courses
Courses that are related and appear in a sequence often have completely unrelated numbers.

For example, GRC 203 Digital File Preparation and Workflow and GRC 301 Digital Photography and Color Management are two keystone classes that appear in a sequence, have related course material, and yet have no relationship between course numbers.

Meaningless numbers
Other than the first digit, which roughly represents during which year a GRC student might take a course, each digit is relatively meaningless.

For example, there’s no way to know if GRC 337 is similar to (or might even be a prerequisite for) GRC 338. (It’s not, by the way; these courses are Consumer Packaging and Web Development and Content Management, respectively.)

Lack of expandability
It seems when classes are added, they are numbered either randomly (perhaps it’s the founding professor’s favorite number) or they are assigned numbers that are (inconsistently) related to similar courses.

defining need

Students and faculty want to be able to gauge a course’s level, topic, and place in a sequence of related or requisite courses based on the number.

Future faculty want to be able to expand on a course numbering system easily when adding or removing courses.

Design considerations

Course types

There are four concentrations offered by the GRC department. Abbreviated, they are Management, UX/UI, Printing, and Packaging.

In addition to choosing a concentration, all GRC students complete a set of core classes of which the non-introductory classes (GRC 101 and similar), which can be classified under a concentration.

This allows core courses to be classified by their type (the concentration that governs the course).

Non-GRC courses

There are some variants of GRC classes offered by the department that are for students outside the department.

Execution

Reconciling problems

To solve these problems, each digit is made meaningful.

The first digit (1-4) represents a course’s place in a sequence or the year a GRC student typically takes the course, if there are fewer than four courses in the sequence.

The second digit (0-9) represents the course’s type, as well as if it is a core to the GRC program or if it is part of a concentration.

x0y courses are general core classes.
x1y courses are general special classes.
x2y courses are printing core classes.
x3y courses are printing concentration classes.
x4y courses are web/UX/UI core classes.
x5y courses are web/UX/UI concentration classes.
x6y courses are management core classes.
x7y courses are management concentration classes.
x8y courses are packaging core classes.
x9y courses are packaging concentration classes.

The third digit (0-9) represents specific topics within each concentration/type. Courses that share the same second digit, like 120 and 220 (or even/odd pair, like 120 and 230) fall within a sequence.

For printing courses (x2y and x3y),
xz0 courses are printing basics and lithographic printing
xz2 courses are flexographic printing
xz4 courses are digital printing
xz6 courses are gravure printing
xz8 courses are binding and finishing

For web/UX/UI courses (x4y and x5y),
xz0 courses are web development and UX/UI
xz2 courses are digital to print workflow
xz4 courses are typography
xz6 courses are social media

For management courses (x6y and x7y),
xz0 courses are general management
xz2 courses are finance and optimization

Packaging courses (x8y and x9y) are xz0 since there are only two within the department.

Odd third digits also indicate a course is similar to their even-numbered counterpart, mostly for non-GRC courses. For example, GRC 120 has the non-GRC counterpart GRC 121.

full course list

Sorted by number, which roughly indicates the sequence that all of these courses might be taken.

Sorted by type and topic. Darker rows indicate concentration courses (odd second digit).

TATE YEUNG

Course Renumbering