CoE Policy for Engineering Minors

Approved by the College of Engineering curriculum Committee March 22, 2011

Undergraduate students enrolled in a College of Engineering degree program can often benefit from study and practice at some depth outside of their major. An engineering minor is a coherent program of student, but with requirements far less comprehensive than those of a BS or BSE degree. Engineering minors can be sponsored by CoE departments, programs, or, for the purpose of supporting cross-departmental programs, sponsored by the Office of the Associate Dean for Undergraduate Education. An engineering minor is not intended to provide specialization within a students’ major field.

An engineering minor will require:

  1. At least 15 credit hours, including some upper division courses.
  2. A minor must contain some structure and coherence and cannot simply be a requirement for a number of credit hours. A minor can contain grouping of courses and provide students with approved menus of courses within these groups.
  3. Courses used to satisfy BSE or BE requirements can also be used to satisfy minor requirements.
  4. Courses taken to meet the requirements of a minor must be taken for a grade. however a minor may include pass/fail courses if justified by the sponsoring department.
  5. An engineering minor can require prerequisites.
  6. To create a minor the sponsoring CoE unit will submit a curricular plan for the minor to the College of Engineering Curriculum Committee for consideration and approval/disapproval. If approved the engineering minor proposal will be forwarded to the CoE faculty for final approval/disapproval. The CoE Curriculum Committee must approve all subsequent modification to the minor requirements (including adding or removing courses from a menu of courses).
  7. If a department wishes to allow transfer credit to count towards the minor this must be specified and justified as part of the proposal for the minor.
  8. The sponsoring unit is responsible for administering the minor, and must submit with the curricular plan an administrative plan that: identifies faculty/staff positions responsible for providing advising and timely auditing of the minor requirements during the student’s final term. The advisor for an engineering minor will be responsible for approving variances to minor requirements for individual students.
  9. For minors sponsored by the Office of the Associate Dean for Undergraduate Education, the ADUE will identify faculty to provide advising and staff to assist with advising and auditing.
  10. Students taking an engineering minor will have a notation on their CoE audit. When that student applies for her diploma the CoE registrar will contact the unit(s) sponsoring her minor(s) to request an audit of the minor requirements.
  11. The program advisors for a minor, and their designated staff, are responsible for responding to the CoE Registrar’s request for the audit of the minor requirements.

Rules:

  1. Completion of an academic minor is optional; no student can be required to complete an engineering minor.
  2. A student’s enrollment period will not be extended for the purposes of completing a minor (once a student has completed the requirements for their BS/BSE degree, they should not remain enrolled for the sole purpose of completing a minor).
  3. A student can complete one or more engineering minors, along with one or more LSA minors. however, a minor is not intended to provide specialization within a student’s major field. Therefore, the posted rules for each minor will outline any restriction on the availability of a minor for students in a particular program, e.g. “A student seeking a BSE in NERS cannot earn the minor in NERS.”
  4. Advanced placement credits may not be used to meeting the requirements of an academic minor, but may be used to meet the prerequisites to a minor.
  5. Transfer credit may not be used to fulfill the requirements of a minor unless specifically stated in the minor requirements.
  6. Courses taken to satisfy the requirements of a minor must be taken for a grade, unless the course taken was specifically approved as Pass/Fail within the requirements of that minor.
  7. A student must earn an overall GPA of at least 2.0 in courses taken to meet the requirements of an academic minor.
  8. Students are responsible for notifying both the sponsoring program and their major department of their intention to pursue a minor. Such notification should take place prior to enrollment in the upper division courses for the minor.
  9. The advisor for each minor is responsible for approving any variance in course requirements for a minor.
  10. Responsibility for auditing completion of requirements for a minor lies within the sponsoring unit.
  11. Students will always be allowed to count courses towards an approved minor retroactively, as long as the minor is approved before the date of their graduation.
  12. Engineering minors will be noted on a student’s academic transcript, but not on her diploma.

Notes on significant difference from LSA minors

  1. LSA minors require 10 credits to be taken in residence (we require all courses to be taken in residence unless specifically allowed by rules of the minor).
  2. LSA minors and concentrations (majors) allow double counting only one course (we allow any number of courses to be used for both major and minor; this is consistent with current CoE policy regarding LSA minors).
  3. LSA minors do not allow any double counting of courses between minors (we allow any number of courses to be double counted between minors).
  4. LSA minors do not allow any Pass/Fail grading in courses used for a minor (we allow some Pass/Fail graded courses in a minor, if specifically approved in the design of the minor).