Course Enrollment

Course Enrollment Information for Faculty

The Kennedy School course enrollment process consists of four phases - an online enrollment period, a single-round of bidding for oversubscribed courses, an online add/drop period, and finally an off-line, or paper, add/drop period. The main points and phases of the enrollment process, including the bidding system, are highlighted on the Registrar’s web site. Faculty receive an email from the Registrar each semester outlining the relevant specific dates.

Online Enrollment

SMART (the self service web site for HKS students)
During the online enrollment period students logon to the SMART online enrollment system, and may request up to five credits (including cross-registered and reading and research courses) that they wish to take. They may change their selections at any time during the online enrollment period. Details on course enrollment for students can be found on the Registrar's web site.

The Bidding Process

Students who have selected an oversubscribed class during online enrollment will be informed by the Registrar via email that they have the option to bid on the course. Students are given an endowment of points per academic year to use during the bidding process. The endowment is determined by a student’s expected year of graduation and program. Details: See the section on point allocations for more information.

Online Add/Drop

After the bidding period a two-day online add/drop period on SMART opens for non-oversubscribed courses only, allowing students to revise their schedules. Please note that online add/drop is first come, first serve. Students should check the course capacities for these classes often to determine space availability.

Paper Add/Drop

Students who wish to add or drop courses after the online add/drop period need to complete and submit a paper petition form. The paper petition requires the signatures of the student, instructor(s) and program director. Students are admitted at the instructor’s discretion during the paper add/drop process.

Cross Registrants

Non-Kennedy School students must fill out a hard copy “cross registration petition”, signed by the faculty member to register in a Kennedy School course. Cross registration petitions should not be signed until after the on line Add/Drop period is over, and not until after the Kennedy School course roster has been reviewed. Signing cross registration petitions before knowing if all Kennedy School students who want to take the course have a place leads to more signed petitions than there are seats in the class.

Jointly Listed Courses

A jointly listed course is one that has both a Kennedy School course number and a course number in one or more of the other Harvard schools. The course may be co-taught by instructors from the participating schools or by an instructor from one school only. It is taught to all of the students who have registered for it, whichever number they have used, in the same classroom at the same time. It may meet at HKS or elsewhere. Almost all of the jointly listed courses are 1-credit courses.

An example. Microeconomic Theory II is offered by HKS as API-112, by the Economics Department as Econ 2020b, and by the Business School as HBS 4011.

Avoiding confusion. Jointly listed courses should not be confused with "cross registration". A course appearing in the course offerings of more than one school is jointly listed. A HKS student "crossing" the Harvard campus to register for a course in another school, using that school’s course number, is a crossregistered student. So is a student from another school who registers for a HKS course using the HKS course number.

The HKS process for jointly listing a course. A request for a joint listing may originate in HKS or in another Harvard school. (Joint listing with a non Harvard course is not an option.) In either case, it must be approved by the relevant HKS Area Chair and HKS Academic Dean. The request to jointly list a course goes first to the Course Area Chair for a recommendation and then to the Academic Dean. The request must include a memo or email from the non-HKS department head agreeing to jointly list the course. (This is true whether the faculty member is asking to jointly list a HKS course with another department, or if its the other department requesting to list one of their courses with the HKS.) Requests are evaluated on the basis of content (especially policy relevance), course level, feasibility (expense, space, student access, etc.), and benefit to the school more broadly (e.g., bringing other student voices to the classroom, strengthening ties to faculty in other schools).

Who may teach a jointly listed course (Category E appointments). The specific issue here is not the actual teaching but rather who has authority to sign the grade sheet. In order to sign the grade sheet for any HKS course, an instructor must have a HKS teaching appointment. That’s not a problem when one of the instructors in the joint course is a member of the HKS faculty. When the jointly listed course has only a non-HKS instructor, however, that instructor must be given a HKS faculty appointment. In the Kennedy School, the appointment is a Category E appointment, a class of annual appointments that is reserved for this particular use. In one sense this is little more than a formality; the appointment by the HKS senior faculty is handled by mail. But more broadly it should be understood as a direct measure by which the school maintains control over its own curriculum, and therefore over what it is certifying in awarding a degree.

Administrative details to keep in mind when contemplating a joint listing

Rules and regulations. If the course is held at the HKS, the faculty, the course, and the students enrolled in the course must conform to the HKS guidelines regarding course grading, scheduling, enrollment policies, CA/TF allocations, copyright permissions, course materials, course evaluations, exam schedule, etc. (See below for details.) If the course is held at another school it follows the administrative rules and regulations of that school. In the joint listing architecture, form follows location rather than function.

Information flow. The faculty member is responsible for conveying and confirming all information that must be exchanged among the participating schools. He or she must be sure that the administrations of all schools that list the joint course have all the relevant details for the course. The faculty member must make sure that the catalog copy has been submitted in both places, that it says the same thing in both places, and that all participating schools understand when and where the course is being taught. In short, the HKS faculty member must not rely on the other schools to convey essential information to or from HKS about these details.

Scheduling. A jointly listed course conforms to the scheduling guidelines of the school in which it meets (again, form follows location). Faculty who are negotiating a joint listing should keep this in mind, for the variation in academic schedules across Harvard schools is a problem for HKS students.

Enrollment. A prescribed share of spaces must be held for students registering under the HKS number: half the spaces if the course is jointly listed in the HKS and one other school, a third if listed in the HKS and two other schools, etc. Consult with the HKS Registrar on establishing the number of total spaces.

Course materials. Course materials for jointly listed courses that meet at the HKS are usually distributed through the HKS Course Materials Office (CMO) and require compliance with federal copyright regulations. Materials for jointly listed courses held at the other school are distributed through that school’s CMO equivalent.

Course Evaluations. Course evaluations in courses that meet at the HKS are a matter of routine; see Course Evaluations. If the course meets at another school, consult the Assistant Dean for Teaching Support.

Grading. The grading system for a joint course follows the system of the school in which the course physically takes place. In most cases all students in the course must be graded on the same scale. Regular courses offered at the HKS award letter grades only; there is no pass/fail option. Only the R&R courses are graded using the pass/fail equivalent, Sat/Unsat. If the joint course meets at another school that offers a choice between pass/fail and a letter grade, HKS students are required to choose the letter grade. If there is no such option they may take the course pass/fail.

Reporting grades. There is no master enrollment list for a jointly listed course. Rather, the instructor receives a separate class list from the registrar in each school in which the course is jointly listed. Thus for API-112, the HKS Registrar sends the instructor the names of students who enrolled under the HKS number. The FAS Registrar does the same for those enrolled under the Economics number, and the Business School Registrar for those enrolled under the HBS course number. Note that definite article – the instructor. Faculty who are co-teaching a jointly listed course should settle early on who will have custody of the grade sheets; in most cases it will be the instructor from the school where the class meets.

Credit toward a degree. Each school decides how much credit the students registering under its course number will receive. Students registering under the HKS number receive one credit for a semester long course, one-half credit for a module.

Financial arrangements. The joint listing process implicitly assumes that neither participating school compensates the other school for the use of faculty time. Exceptions are extremely rare and must be approved in advance by the Academic Dean. CAs and TFs are another matter; see below.

Course Assistants and Teaching Fellows. The general rules for CAs and TFs in jointly listed courses differ slightly from those for strictly HKS courses. See Assigning CAs and TFs for information on the allocation of CAs and TFs to jointly listed courses.

January Classes

The course enrollment process is the same in both fall and spring semester classes. Enrollment in January classes takes place in November. More information about specific enrollment dates are made available during the fall semester.

Class Lists

Class lists (Rosters) are generated by the Registrar's Office and may be accessed by faculty and their staff assistants via the intranet. The list will include cross registrants, but it will not include students registered under the other school’s number in the case of jointly listed courses. During online enrollment, bidding, and online add/drop course rosters are constantly changing as students are adjusting their schedules. Faculty can get the best idea of where their roster stands after the close of the online add/drop period.

Class Lists for Jointly Listed Courses. If the course is jointly listed with another school, the instructor will receive a separate list of the students registered under the other school's number from that school's registrar. For instance, PAL-115 is jointly listed as Govt. 1540. The faculty member receives one class list from the HKS Registrar for all students (including cross registrants) enrolled under PAL-115, and a second class list from the FAS Registrar for all students (including a different set of cross registrants) enrolled under Gov. 1540. Hence the faculty do not receive one fully integrated list of all students registered in the course under all numbers. See also Grade Sheets for information on submitting the grade list and changing a grade.

Auditors

With the excepton of National Security Fellows and Lee Kuan Yew Fellows (see below), whether or not to accept auditors in a course is entirely up to the instructor. Note, however, that if there are more students who wish to take the course than there are available slots, auditors will be the first to be eliminated. Auditors do not formally enroll in classes; the Registrar's office keeps no records of any kind of auditing or auditors. Hence their names do not appear on class rosters or grade sheets. Nor is the auditing of a course recorded on the student's transcript. It is perfectly permissible for the instructor to require auditors to participate fully in course activities, including completing all assignments.

National Security Fellows
For course enrollment purposes National Security Fellows are given the same access to classes as degree program students. National Security Fellows are senior officers in the US armed services who have had roughly 20 years of experience, and who come to the Kennedy School for a year of advanced study. Typically the group numbers 20 or more. National Security Fellows will not, however, appear on the class list. For additional information, call the Assistant Director of the program at 6-4980.)

Lee Kuan Yew Fellows
For course enrollment purposes Lee Kuan Yew Fellows are also given the same access to classes as degree program students. Named for the former Prime Minister of Singapore, Lee Kuan Yew, these Midcareer officials from various Asian countries attend Kennedy School classes during the fall semester. The LKY Fellows are candidates for the degree of Master in Public Management (MPM) at the National University of Singapore's Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy. The Kennedy School component is part of that school's MPM curriculum. At the Kennedy School, the LKY Fellows Program is part of the Kennedy School's Singapore Program. LKY Fellows are included on the Class Roster. For further information on the LKY Fellows Program, call the Program Director (5-1233). For additional information on the Singapore Program, call the Program Coordinator (6-2280).