Model the Course/Reading List association as a many-to-many relationship
We need to be able to affiliate the same reading list with multiple course objects in Alma. Currently, reading lists can only be assigned to a single Alma Course object at a given time. At our university with a complex course timetable structure we need to be able to accommodate complex relationships between cross-listed and "meets with" courses. For these courses, we must accommodate a single course that is offered by multiple departments or at multiple course numbers (e.g., undergraduate and graduate versions of the same course "meet with" each other by sharing a lecture).
For example, our Computer Sciences 352 course is cross listed with Electrical Engineering 352. In this case, in order to align the Alma course objects to student enrollments, we must create two distinct courses, one for each department. In this case the Alma Course object's Academic Department metadata is different. However, from the perspective of our university, these are not distinct courses. Therefore, they have the same course content, including their reserves reading lists. We need to be able to associate a single reading list with ECE 352 course object as well as the CS 352 course object.
Copying and creating a duplicate reading list is not a good solution because reading lists evolve throughout a semester. Our library relies upon student staff to process our reserves reading lists. These non-professional employees cannot be expected to know the intricacies of complex courses. They should only need to update a single reading list, not two.
Katie Sanders
shared this idea
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Hi,
Would using the option to assign multiple searchable IDs (codes) to the same course help ?
Moshe
Alma Product Manager
