Creating a New Academic Program

General Information

Creation of a new academic program is generally accomplished in two stages. First, the sponsoring unit must seek planning authorization from the Vice Provost for Academic Affairs. Once planning authority has been granted, the unit has three years to come forth with a request for implementation. ABOR must approve all new academic programs before the program may be announced or implemented.

Prior to implementation, proposals are subject to extensive campus review by college and university faculty and administration. Accordingly, proposals need to include information which satisfies many different viewpoints. The review process can take anywhere from four months to two years, as sometimes proposals need to be rewritten and resubmitted in response to questions raised by committee members.

Proposals should be sent electronically, which is preferred, as an email attachment or they may be sent via campus mail to:

Patti J. King
Senior Associate for Academic Affairs
Office of Academic Affairs
Dr Martin Luther King Jr Student Center, Room 320
P.O. Box 210128
Campus

Email: pattik@u.arizona.edu

Phone: 621-4107

Guidelines and forms for developing a request for implementation authorization are available for download from this site. What follows is a brief overview of how the proposal is processed.

Forms and guidelines for submitting program proposals

Implementation Authorization

When proposing a new program, the unit initiating the request must determine whether or not the proposed program duplicates another program at UA, ASU, or NAU. By ABOR policy, a duplicative program is defined as a program that shares a CIP code with an existing program. (CIP designations are based on the U.S. Department of Education's Classification of Instructional Programs, last updated in 2000.)

For the CIP code for a proposed program, contact Patti J. King in the Office of Academic Affairs, 621-4107. To determine whether or not the proposed program duplicates an existing program, contact J.J. Jenson, at 602-229-2531 or jewelyn.jenson@AZREGENTS.EDU.

Proposed degrees, majors, and minors are initiated by the department as a request to implement a new academic degree program.

Implementation proposals for new programs must be accompanied by a budget. A form for presenting budget information is available for download at the end of this section.

Before a request for implementation is fully approved it must be reviewed and approved by the following individuals or committees:

Implementation Authorization Form and Guidelines for a Unique Program*
Implementation Authorization Form and Guidelines for a Duplicative Program*
New Academic Program Budget Projections Form (MS Excel 5.0/95)

 Revised 05/05/2009

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