Terminology

In the fall of 2004, IU implemented a new Student Information System (SIS) consisting of the implementation of both operational (SIS) and reporting and retrieval (IUIE) environments. This conversion has had a profound impact on business processes, terminology, and data structures. For analysis and reporting, comparability is often not attainable and has been noted throughout the report. In some cases, the terminology used in SIS is not directly comparable to terms used in our academic businesses (e.g., a program/plan in SIS is a department/major in our academic world). General definitions are provided here as a central point of reference.

Enrollment Totals:
All reports, unless otherwise noted, use the official reporting period, which since 1984 is the end of the first week of classes. Prior to 1984, the official reporting time was the end of the third week of classes. Beginning in 1988, auditors (students enrolled in audit hours only) are excluded from the headcount figures. The enrollment total provides a unique headcount of students on campus. For summer sessions, the official reporting period is midsession. While the SIS environment recognizes summer as one term, for reporting and historical comparisons, the two summer session model has been recreated. The campus enrollment total provides a unique headcount of students in each summer session.

School Enrollment Totals:
Beginning Spring Term 2005, students can be enrolled in dual careers (e.g., MBA/LAW students are in Graduate and Law careers). Students enrolled in multiple careers are counted under each school, so MBA/LAW students will be counted in both Business and Law. Since these students are counted under each school/career, the totals by school will not match the campus total (which is a unique student headcount). This report has been divided into two sections to help distinguish campus level from school level enrollments.

Auditors:
Students registered for audit enrollments and not taking any course for credit are considered auditors. Since Fall 1988, these students are excluded from Bloomington headcount figures and their enrollments are excluded from course enrollment figures.

Credit Hours and Course Enrollments:
Only course credit-bearing sections are included in credit hour and course enrollment totals. While the credit-bearing section is typically the lecture section of a course, there are instances where the credit is assigned to the discussion or lab section. Audit hours, waitlisted hours, and dropped hours are not included in the totals.

Course School:
The school in which a course is taught is considered the course school. For example, BUS-A100 is taught in the course school of Business and Math-M118 is taught in the course school of Arts and Sciences. University Division does not offer any courses and therefore is not a course school.

Student School:
The school that houses the student’s major is considered a student school. In this case, University Division is considered a student school. However, Military Sciences offers courses and is considered a course school but it does not offer majors, so it is not considered a student school.

Student Level:
For reporting purposes, students are classified into the following levels of study: Undergraduate, Graduate, Professional, and Nondegree. This is similar to the SIS terminology of student career; however, the professional student level contains the careers of Law and Optometry. Also, nondegree students are not discernable when using the SIS definition of a career.

Full-time/Part-time Status:
Full-time students are defined as undergraduate, professional, and nondegree students enrolled in 12 or more hours and graduate students enrolled in eight or more hours. Note that graduate students who are taking the 6-credit G901 advanced research course are classified as part-time students by this definition. For each summer session, full-time students are defined as undergraduate, professional, and nondegree students enrolled in six or more hours and graduate students enrolled in four or more hours.

Credit Hour Load:
Currently, Indiana University uses a flat-fee structure for undergraduates, which means that students can take between 12 and 17 hours and be assessed a flat fee. Undergraduates taking more than 17 hours or less than 12 hours, and graduate, professional, and nondegree students are assessed a per-credit-hour fee. Between Fall 1976 and Fall 1991, the campus followed a per credit hour fee structure for all students. For summer sessions a per-credit-hour fee structure is used.

New Students:
New students include those who entered during the preceding summer term and returned to campus in the fall as well as those who first entered this fall. Undergraduate students are assigned an entry status and semester by the Office of Admissions when evaluating each application. Class standing, as defined by the number of hours accumulated on a student's record, is not a factor.

Degrees:
Annual degree counts are based on the fiscal year, and therefore include all degrees from July 1st to June 30th. Degrees can be granted at the end of every month, and at the three major degree periods (December, May and August).

Term:
A term refers to the specific length of time a student is enrolled in a particular course. Previously, Indiana University had two semesters, and two summer sessions (one eight week, one six week) per academic year. The nomenclature for semester within the SIS system is “term”. Currently, Indiana University has three terms, Fall, Spring, and Summer. For reporting purposes, the summer term has been divided into the traditional two summer sessions

Session:
The summer term is broken down into two major sessions: Summer 1 which is six weeks in length and Summer 2 which is eight weeks. Also in summer term are five intensive sessions: Intensive I and II are included in Summer 1, while Intensive III, IV, V are within Summer 2.

Major:
A major refers to the student’s academic course of study. Students can enroll in multiple majors at once, as long as they finish all the requirements for each before graduation. In SIS, majors are called Academic Plans; however Academic Plans can also refer to minors and certificates. Majors are differentiated from minors in this report. For reporting majors, only plan-types of major are included.

Course Department:
A course department refers to the department which offers the course. In SIS, course departments are stored as part of the subject area. The course department is represented as the first three or four letters of a course number (e.g., FRIT-F100 is housed in the department of FRIT or French and Italian).

School Abbreviations:
Listed below are some common abbreviations that are included in this report.

Traditional Registration Periods:
CSR: Continuing Student Registration takes place in October for spring registration and in April for fall registration
FR: Freshman Registration takes place during the summer as part of the Freshman Orientation program
NSR: New Student Registration takes place for new students the week before classes begin
LR: Late Registration occurs the day before the term begins; a late fee is assessed

IEP (Intensive English Program):
The Intensive English Program was formerly CELT, Center for English Language Training. This is a nondegree program that enrolls international students to improve their English comprehension.

GPA (Grade Point Average)
GPA can refer to either the student's cumulative grade point average over all terms or it can refer to the grade point average for a single a term. It can also refer to the grade point average of students in a course or school.

Useful Websites:

Course and Section Enrollments http://registrar.indiana.edu/coursesectn/
Grade Distribution Report http://registrar.indiana.edu/gradedist.shtml
Special Course Listings http://registrar.indiana.edu/specialcourse.shtml
Comparative Enrollment CAS Required http://registrar.indiana.edu/dma/comp.shtml

 

Last updated: 6 September 2008
URL:http://registrar.indiana.edu/enrollreports
Comments: REGR-Regdata@indiana.edu or phone (812) 855-6235
Copyright 2000-08, The Trustees of Indiana University