Proofing the Undergraduate Studies Academic Calendar

Timelines and deadlines

Proofing can commence at any time because you already have access to the content.

Timelines

Here are some general timelines to be aware of for items Under Review:

Updated Dec 18, 2025:

• Wednesday, February 4: Senate Undergraduate Council (SUC) meeting
  • Largest meeting of the year.
  • Expect items (not moving on to Senate) to be fully coded as quickly as possible; goal is to get courses coded by March 2 due to Quest timeline due to course selection processes.
• Monday, March 2: Senate meeting for proposals that went to February SUC
  • Expect items to be fully coded approximately one week after the meeting (RO first needs to receive the items from the Secretariat).
• RO post-approval work includes creating proposals when dependencies are involved for subject code changes, number changes, title changes, unit weight changes, and course/plan retirements. Additional proposals not already Under Review will also be created during these windows.

You can follow Under Review proposals by looking at the workflow status; if you are the original proposer, you will receive an email notification immediately once the item is fully coded.

Deadlines

The deadline to complete all proofing work is Monday, March 23 at 4 p.m., no exceptions.

• All proofreading and link checking must be completed.
• All editorial changes in Kuali Curriculum Management (CM) must be submitted and approved by this date. Reminders:
  • Ensure your faculty/AFIW is indicated in the Faculty/AFIW Path(s) for Workflow field for every submission.
  • It is important you do not wait until March 23 to submit your items in Kuali to ensure they can be reviewed and approved by your faculty/AFIW contact and the Office of the Registrar by 4 p.m..

Preparing to proof the Calendar

What type of things are we proofing at this time?

For courses:

• No retired courses should be listed in the linked rules for prerequisites, corequisites, antirequisites (they should have been moved to Free form text rules).
• Check spelling in the description (must follow Waterloo Writing Style Guide and Canadian Oxford Dictionary).
• For any references to course subject code+number (e.g., in Description, Notes, Free form text rule), ensure there is no space between the subject code and number (e.g., MSE211).
• Can request old courses that appear in requisites that were renumbered or retired over five years ago to be removed (considered editorial). These generally appear in Free form text rules. Not sure how long ago the change occurred? You can ask your faculty contact or the Office of the Registrar to look it up for you.

For plans: 

• Check all links in text boxes like Declaration Requirements, Additional Constraints, Notes and ensure they work (if external to Kuali) or are formatted properly (if internal to Kuali).
• For any references to courses not using the Rules function, (e.g., text boxes, Free form text rules), ensure there is no space between the subject code and number (e.g., MSE211). These instances should not contain manually typed titles or unit weights (i.e., should not mimic the automatic database information).
• Ensure all references to subject code changes for fall 2026 have been updated:
  • Some GEOG are now GDS (not all - course dependent)
  • In some cases, alphanumeric order will need to be updated accordingly.
• Check course requirement list(s):
  • Check if alphanumeric order has been disturbed by any course renumberings and edit as needed.
  • Check if any courses that have been retired were missed being removed and remove as needed. This can be verified quickly enough by:
    1. Checking courses against the list of retired courses.
    2. Creating a temporary draft proposal:
       • Select Propose Changes.
       • Select New Version > Next.
       • Scroll to the Course Requirements section.
       • Review to see if a "(Retired)" notation appears next to any courses.
       • Select Cancel.
       • Select Delete Proposal > Delete.
  • Check if all cross-listed courses are listed (if appropriate, see questions below the requirement lists for individual determination), in alphanumeric order.
• If the plan has had a name change for fall 2026:
  • The Field of Study has changed and/or is still appropriate.
  • The name has changed in all locations within the record (e.g., text boxes).
  • The CM Program Code (the name appearing before the | in the ribbon) has been updated appropriately. If this needs to be changed, submit a Jira ticket (the field is only visible to system administrators).

Tools and resources

Use the following tools and guidelines when proofing to ensure consistency throughout the Calendar. 

• University of Waterloo Writing Style Guide – especially the Conventions for academic calendars section
• Canadian Oxford Dictionary – all campus employees have access to this resource for free via the Library
• Academic Calendar & Curriculum Management Resources site, including:
  • Guidelines for course requisites
  • Guidelines for plan requirements
  • Guidelines for Kuali CM text boxes with formatting
  • List of courses retired effective fall 2026 (XLSX) – will be made available after all February SUC coding is complete
  • List of courses renumbered effective fall 2026 (XLSX) – will be made available after all February SUC coding is complete
  • Instructions for links in Kuali CM, especially the instructions for links to the Calendar ("internal links") [internal links = those that are manually added in text boxes, excludes links in course requisite fields (prereq, coreq, antireq) and plan course list fields (course requirements, term by term, course list).]
    IMPORTANT: If an internal link in Kuali CM has been coded properly, it should not work when clicking it while in Kuali CM (a 404 Not Found error is expected). If it does work in Kuali CM, this indicates a problem as it will not work in the published Calendar.
    • You can verify a correct internal link the following two ways:
      1. When hovering over the link in Kuali CM, the URL should begin with "https://uwaterloocm.kuali.co/cm/#/".
         • Bad URL begins with "https://uwaterloo.ca/academic-calendar/undergraduate-studies/catalog"
      2. In Kuali, copy the part of the link following the # symbol and in another browser tab/window, paste it to the end of this starting URL: https://uwaterloo.ca/academic-calendar/undergraduate-studies/catalog# and it should work in the browser.
         • For example, checking internal links in the Honours Anthropology record:
           • Hovering the cursor over the "See Bachelor of Arts degree-level requirements" link displays the URL in the lower left corner of the browser window (Firefox in this instance). At a glance, it appears to be correct as it contains https://uwaterloocm.kuali.co/cm/#/ followed by the Kuali database code (in this case, programs) and a unique 9-10 digit code (SyLzAe5R3).
             
           • To confirm the link will work, right-click on the link, select copy link, and then paste the part of the URL following the # into the address bar of a new browser tab, with https://uwaterloo.ca/academic-calendar/undergraduate-studies/catalog# at the beginning.
           • In this scenario, the new combined URL will be https://uwaterloo.ca/academic-calendar/undergraduate-studies/catalog#/programs/SyLzAe5R3.
           • The URL should navigate to the expected Calendar page for the 2025-26 Calendar, which is the Bachelor of Arts Degree Requirements page in this example.
         • Note: If the internal link is pointing to a page that is newly created for 2026-27 (e.g., Bachelor of Medical Sciences), the copying and pasting into the 2025-26 Calendar option will not work as it does not currently exist. Your faculty/AFIW contact can conduct this test in the staging Calendar.

Steps for proofing: Proposers

Proofing must be done within Kuali CM. There is no visible draft of the 2026-27 Calendar that is available to the public; only certain contacts within the faculties/AFIW have access to an authenticated site.

Regardless of if your record has had a change for fall 2026, you will want to review it. If you focus only on what has been seen by committees throughout the year, that's how things get missed year after year!

In Kuali CM: Identify and review all your academic unit's records.

1. Navigate to the Courses database in Kuali CM.
2. Use the filters on the right to sort for Active records from your academic unit. Tip: Selecting the column Code once will sort your results in ascending order.
   You will need to complete this step twice, once for courses and once for Programs & Plans.
3. Open each record and review.
4. If you notice a correction is needed, you will need to create an editorial proposal and then submit it before the deadline. Not sure if the change you want to make qualifies for an editorial change? Begin by reviewing the approval vs editorial guidelines.
   • Reminder: Do not create an editorial proposal to workflow if you see the View Current Proposal button. This means that a proposal for that record is still Under Review and you will receive an error if you attempt to submit another change to the workflow. You can view the workflow status of the current proposal to see where it is in the process; if it is at the Registrar's Office step after the February SUC meeting has occurred, patience is needed due to the volume of proposals that are being processed after the meeting. The original proposer will receive a notification once coding that proposal is completed and the record is once again available to create a new proposal. 
     

     "View Current Proposal" link is present. Do not proceed with changes.
   • If the base is already Fall 2026 > choose Same effective date (revision) and then don't change the effective date on the Draft.
   • If the base is not Fall 2026> choose New effective date (new version) and change the effective date to Fall 2026 on the Draft.
   • In either scenario, ensure the Faculty/AFIW Path(s) for Workflow field includes your primary Faculty as the contacts will review the request before the RO for appropriateness. Note: If the course is cross-listed, a proposal for each offering of the course needs to be submitted, regardless of whether the other course is being changed (this is so Quest integration works properly). Co-ordinate with the other owner as necessary.