Scheduling Procedures

Monday to Friday, 8:30 to 17:30 (to 21:00 for the School of Continuing Studies) are normal teaching times.

The following patterns are designed to promote flexibility and avoid class conflicts within academic programs, are used without exception for courses based on a 3 x 1 or 2 x 1.5 pattern:

• 3 X 1 hour
• Monday, Tuesday and Thursday (MTR)
• Monday, Wednesday and Friday (MWF)
• Tuesday, Thursday and Friday (TRF)
• 2 X 1.5 hours
• Monday and Wednesday (MW)
• Tuesday and Thursday (TR)
• Wednesday and Friday (WF)

For the same reasons, classes are scheduled within three blocks during the day (8:30 to 11:30, 11:30 to 14:30, and 14:30 to 17:30) and must not span two blocks.

Whenever possible, instructors will not be required to teach courses continuously for more than three hours or to teach more than two different courses back to back.

Courses that have not received full governance approval will not be scheduled.

Credit-bearing courses and courses with CEUs, their exams, and required class events have scheduling priority over all other activities that require the use of teaching space.

Allocation of instructional space is based on the following:

• As much as possible, the pedagogical needs of courses will determine the type of rooms assigned, if requests have been submitted and approved by the chair/director/dean.
• Each year, the scheduling requests expressed by all academic units will drive the allocation of space, so courses will not necessarily be scheduled in the same room from year to year.
• The class schedule will make full use of days and times across the workweek, and classes will be scheduled as follows:

Classes are normally scheduled Monday to Friday

• Undergraduate and graduate degree courses will normally be scheduled from 8:30 to 17:30, but it may be necessary for Enrolment Services to schedule undergraduate and graduate classes in the evening, as, for example, in the following:
• Courses difficult to schedule otherwise.
• Courses requiring space for brief portions of the term (e.g., as part of a practicum in a professional program)
• Continuing Studies courses are normally scheduled from 18:00 to 21:00.
• Scheduling practices will accommodate programs that are designed specifically for weekend delivery.

The Class Schedule requires the coordinated efforts of individuals across the University: Provost, Deputy Provost (Student Life and Learning), students, deans, chairs/directors, instructors, and administrators in academic units and Enrolment Services responsible for scheduling. The roles and responsibilities of each of these individuals or groups of individuals are outlined in section: Roles.

The following requests are accommodated:

• Course and program requests;
• Course combinations – a list of courses that must not conflict or be offered on the same day for academic or pedagogical reasons;
• A series of special presentations given by non-University community members may require avoiding scheduling at certain times of the week to maximize students’ availability to attend and benefit from the special lectures;
• Enrolment Services accommodates no other special course and program requests such as conferences or optional tutorials during the initial scheduling cycle;
• Requests from instructors;
• Generally, classes are scheduled within a 45 minutes-hour span of each week (8:35 to 17:25, Monday to Friday). It is understood that professors conduct research for many hours each week and have to balance that academic duty with their teaching load and other responsibilities;
• Due to the complexity of balancing space limitations, student limitations and instructor limitations, classes are given scheduling priority over other University functions;
• Course and program restrictions and combinations requested by a department take priority over instructor restrictions.

Instructors may request limitations on teaching time availability for the following reasons only, and the Chairs or Unit Heads may authorize such limitations on teaching time availability:

• Human rights accommodation, which must be offered in certain circumstances, unless doing so will cause undue hardship to the University. Examples that may have implications for the time and/or place of teaching include disability, pregnancy, and religion. (Please refer any questions to Human Resources);
• Official academic or administrative responsibilities that require an instructor’s attendance (e.g., Senate meetings);
• Academic responsibilities (e.g., standing meetings for specialized research collaboration, involving parties inside and outside McGill; constrained access to specialized and shared laboratories for research);
• The University normally accommodates requests for a full, continuous day of research, if approved by the Chair, Director, or Dean except in rare situations such as team teaching scenarios, complicated course combinations, or a blend of the two. In such cases, Enrolment Services will contact the academic unit to consult on the development and use of an alternative option. Further, unless there is a requirement to assign a specific day of the week for research (e.g. coordination of work with another colleague), Enrolment Services based on other scheduling constraints will determine the day;
• Circumstances of a serious nature (health, family circumstances such as elder-, child-care for primary school-aged children or younger). The Chair/Director/Dean, with knowledge of local conditions, is expected to balance the competing demands of individual instructors and the Unit’s obligation and responsibility to participate in the development of a class schedule that meets academic program and University needs and that best benefits student. Given limited space and time resources and increasing enrolment, these requests may be approved by the Chair/Dean/Director. However, if the implementation of such approved requests is not possible without creating course conflicts, Enrolment Services will contact the unit to discuss alternate options;
• Appeal process: In exceptional cases, the Dean, or their designate, on the recommendation of the Chair, can grant an exemption.

• Chairs have the authority to assign work, to decide if requests from instructors that limit their availability for teaching are acceptable, and to determine if acceptable limitations should be assigned priority under the following guidelines. Enrolment Services determines whether the approved requests can be implemented without compromising the scheduling goals of the University. If not, the Chair is advised that the request cannot be met. Disputes between the instructor, Chair/Director and Enrolment Services regarding approval of special requests that limit the time available for teaching are to be addressed by the Associate Dean or Dean and may be referred to the Deputy Provost (Student Life and Learning).

• Pavilion: The first pavilion priority for each department is its pavilion.
• Room Characteristics: A comprehensive list of equipment and attributes is assigned to each room available for course scheduling (maximum of 3).
• Room type: Every available room is categorized by type to help match the appropriate size and types of courses with the appropriate type of room.
• Room Capacity: The size of every room is determined to match the appropriate class size of the scheduled course section.
• The software takes into account the course section constraints, course combinations, department and instructor unavailability, pavilion priority, room characteristics, room type, room capacity and maximum enrolment of the course section. The objective is to create a well-functioning schedule taking all of these factors into consideration for each course section.