Course Load
Any undergraduate student who is carrying 12 or more credit hours is classified as a full-time student. A student may not register for more than 18 credit hours in any one semester without the permission of the Dean of the School of Graduate and Professional Studies.
A full-time load for graduate students is 6 credits per semester.
Stevenson University adheres to the following federal credit-hour definition for all courses regardless of credit, duration, or modality:
A credit hour is an amount of work represented in intended learning outcomes and verified by evidence of student achievement that is an institutionally-established equivalency that reasonably approximates not less than:
(1) one hour of classroom or direct faculty instruction and a minimum of two hours of out-of-class student work each week for approximately fifteen weeks for one semester or trimester hour of credit, or ten to twelve weeks for one quarter hour of credit, or the equivalent amount of work over a different amount of time; or
(2) at least an equivalent amount of work as required in paragraph (1) of this definition for other activities as established by an institution, including laboratory work, internships, practica, studio work, and other academic work leading toward to the award of credit hours. 34CFR 600.2
Following accepted practices in higher education, Stevenson defines a credit hour as equivalent to 50 minutes of direct faculty instruction and two hours of out-of-class student work or approximately 37.5 hours per a 15 week semester.
When assigning credit for asynchronous online courses, the School of Graduate and Professional Studies requires courses to meet the credit hour definition outlined above by requiring of students an equivalent amount of academic engagement in order to meet course objectives. Academic engagement includes, but is not limited to, submitting an academic assignment; taking an exam, an interactive tutorial, or computer-assisted instruction; attending a webinar study group that was assigned or moderated by the instructor; contributing to an academic online discussion; and initiating contact with a faculty member to ask a question about the academic subject studied in the course. Merely logging into the electronic classroom does not constitute academic engagement.
All undergraduate and graduate courses demonstrate a minimum of 37.5 hours of online engagement as defined above.