At its core, the Online Syllabus System is an easy-to-use web application designed to simplify the syllabus creation, review, and approval process. To this end, it has been designed with the following factors in mind:
Intuitive
The Online Syllabus System is simple to use. Rather than imposing a rigid framework on the instructor, we've opted in favour of providing free-form categories for the instructor to use (or not), to suit the intended flow of their course. Fields that are not populated (or unnecessary) will simply not appear in the published syllabus. As well, the instructor no longer needs to worry about including University or Departmental policies in their syllabuses; they're managed separately, and attached automatically on approval.
Flexible
In addition to our interdisciplinary approach to learning, a large part of what defines Trent is the unique character and culture of each academic department. Each department has its own way of doing things and one of the goals we set while building the Online Syllabus System was to disrupt these as little as possible. With this in mind, departments can be configured to:
- Allow academic departments to maintain and control the list of syllabus administrators who can approve and/or edit their syllabuses
- Share syllabuses on the department's public website (or not)
- Define and manage their own departmental policies, which will be automatically attached to approved syllabuses.
Accessible
As legislation is enacted to ensure that people with disabilities are able to access and make use of the same services that able-bodied people can, our electronic infrastructure must adapt to reflect this. To this end, the Syllabus system's administrative console meets WCAG 2.0 AA accessibility guidelines, and published syllabuses are able to meet WCAG 2.0 AAA accessibility guidelines.
Universal
By building the Online Syllabus System as a web application that makes extensive use of HTML5 and CSS3 in its presentation and interface layers, it works on any device that you can connect to the internet and run a current browser on. This means that staff, faculty, students, and alumni can review syllabuses virtually anywhere on the planet, on virtually any device. The benefits of this are manifold:
- No need to print syllabuses any longer. We do still provide the option, however.
- If changes are required after approval, people working from obsolete versions won't be an issue; one copy online means that everyone will always be is up to date.
- Syllabuses can exist in perpetuity, and will be accessible to anybody with access to the MyTrent Portal: alumni, staff, faculty, and students.