LHE-7400: Academic Program and Curriculum Development in Higher Education

Stefaniak, J.E., & Baaki, J. (2013). A layered approach to understanding your audience. Performance Improvement, 52(6), 5-10.
Stefaniak and Baaki (2013) examine the what and the who of a learner audience and the need for those who propose and design learning to pay greater attention to this aspect of program planning and curriculum development.

Atif, M. R., Shields, S.M., Fowler, D. A., Claridge, D. E. (2017, June). Industry-aligned interdisciplinary program design [paper]. 2017 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition. Columbus, OH.
Atif et al. (2017) provide an excellent case study in the value and results of including cross-department cooperation and engaging industry professionals and stakeholders in the development of a new degree program. The authors also include their process for justifying the new degree program and its early consideration and inclusion of the learning outcomes aligned with the program accrediting agency. This resource includes examples of program outcomes, rubrics, and a curriculum map.

Marcus, J. (2018). Panicked universities in search of students are adding thousands of new majors. The Hechinger Report.
Marcus (2018) provides a brief report of various attempts by institutions to create niche degree programs using various justifications and the subsequent success or failure of these strategic decisions.

Probst, S., Masst, W., Farmer-Thompson, A., & Santilli, N. (2020, August 27). Academic program portfolio planning: Preparing to thrive. [Webinar]. Society for College and University Planning.
This webinar takes an inside look at how to examine data to evaluate market demand for academic programs. They provide some strategies you can apply yourself, but also present some interesting graphics for determining where a new academic program might fall with regard to a program to grow, sustain, fix, or sunset.

Eastern Michigan University. (2019). Eastern Michigan University to launch new academic program to prepare students for high-demand careers in business, government and non-profit sector.

Christopher Newport University. (2019). New graduate program launched to meet growing demand for financial analysts.

Business Wire. (2019). Purdue University Global launches Analytics Degree Program to meet growing demand in data-driven economy.

Igoche, D.A., & Branch, R. M. (2009). Incorporating cultural values into the ADDIE approach to instructional design. Educational Technology, 49(6), 4-8.

Saxena, M. (2011). Learner analysis framework for globalized e-learning: A case study. International Review of Research in Open and Distributed Learning, 12(5), 93-107.
This article offers a real-world example of how a learner analysis informed practice.

Perez-Vergara, K., Lathrop, R., & Orlowski, M. (2018) Community college program planning: A method to measure and meet community need. Community College Journal of Research and Practice, 42(3), 204-217.
Perez-Vergara et al. (2018) emphasize the important role academic program planning plays in community colleges and highlight a method that includes critical elements such as market demand, learner interest, community needs, etc. The article includes links to many sources that might can be used to assess labor market demand for your program.

DeSilets, L. D. (2007). Needs assessments: An array of possibilities. Journal of Continuing Education in Nursing, 38(3), 107-112.

Pennsylvania’s State System of Higher Education. (2016). Pennsylvania’s supply/demand gap analysis: A briefing paper.
This resource is an example of a market needs analysis for the state of Pennsylvania. An institution within this state that is considering a new degree program would look to this document to identify trends in the data that would support the market demand for the degree to argue that the new degree would close one of the supply/demand gaps identified.

Wiley Education Services. (2019). State of the graduate education market: Trends and insights in key Masters disciplines. Wiley.
This resource from Wiley is an example of market demand data that can be used to either determine what new degree programs should be considered or to justify the demand for a new degree program being proposed. This is an example of demand for specific graduate degrees. Other types of trend reports can be found for undergraduate and other programs.