Instructor Qualifications

Instructions for Creating and Revising Instructor Qualifications

Instructor qualifications are recommended by the Subject Area Committees (SAC) and approved by the administration, and are subject to the educational and experience minimums found on the Instructor Approval Form. To instate or revise instructor qualifications, the SAC recommendations should be outlined on the Instructor Qualification Form. The form can be used for qualifications that apply to one, several, or all courses in a subject area.

Approval Process

  1. The form is completed using SAC-approved recommendations.
  2. Using the AODocs PASS system, the proposed Instructor Qualifications must be recommended by the SAC Chair, Program Dean, Pathway Dean, and Dean for Teaching, Learning, and Curricular Innovation (full instructions provided on the form).
  3. If recommended, it is approved by the Executive Dean for Teaching and Learning Support.
  4. If changes to the original SAC-approved qualifications are adopted at any point in this approval process, the revisions must be returned to the SAC Chair in AODocs and sent through the full recommendation/approval Pathway
  5. Once approved, the qualifications will be posted on the Instructor Qualifications website.

For SACs to consider

There are no specific guidelines for outlining instructor qualifications, but SACs should consider that they will be used in conjunction with the Instructor Approval Form to qualify individual instructors. For this reason it is helpful to define the following:

  • For Lower Division Collegiate (LDC) and Developmental Education (DE) courses:
    • Acceptable subject area(s) for qualifying degree
    • Acceptable subject area(s) for degree in related field, given additional education (as identified by the SAC, generally 30 credit/hours of graduate work in an acceptable subject area
    • Acceptable evidence of demonstrated competency (if applicable)
  • For Career Technical Education (CTE, formerly Professional/Technical Education):
    • Acceptable subject area(s) for qualifying degree
    • Acceptable subject area(s) for degree in related field, given additional education (as identified by the SAC, generally 30 credit/hours of graduate work in an acceptable subject area
    • Definition of “recent full time non-teaching work experience in the  field”
    • Licenses or other qualifications established in the field
    • Other acceptable evidence of demonstrated competency
    • For courses that are used to fulfill the requirements of Related Instruction that are embedded within CTE courses, the SAC must identify specific education, training or experience that applies to the elements of related instruction. These elements must be documentable, as on a transcript or resume.

Provisional Approval

An instructor who does not meet the minimum qualifications may be approved for a limited assignment, typically restricted to specific sets of courses, and specific provisions, or criteria.

Process for developing and recording Qualifications for Provisional Approval, and Examples