One way to start the curriculum-review process begins with deciding who should be involved in the process—who are your stakeholders in this process. Stakeholders include a wide range of individuals and organizations; this Clinic will discuss the tasks of selecting and involving them.

Determining the Stakeholders
Although it may seem simple, deciding the key stakeholders—the persons and institutions with a significant connection to or investment in your program—is not always easy. Clearly, the most obvious stakeholders are faculty members, administrators and students involved in the daily activities of the program. Those of you with advisory committees or boards will want to consider those individuals—current, past and possible future members—as well. However, alumni of the program, employers and internship or externship sites also have much to contribute in the revision of a curriculum.

There are two other groups that we sometimes ignore: other faculty, other administrators and groups at the college who may play a role in recruiting students, sending you students, providing support courses or approving any changes you want to make.

One way to ensure that you do not miss any key stakeholders is to use part of a faculty meeting to collect names of persons whose opinions could be and should be considered. Ask all the administrators and aides in the program for people they would suggest, as well. Spreading the net as wide as you can in the beginning stages helps to broaden the insights you can tap and provides a way of increasing support for your program.

Using key student groups such as clubs, student-council members, Eta Sigma Delta members and Dean’s List students can be a great way to develop a list of students that you want to consult, as well. Or you can develop a survey instrument to send to all your students, depending on the size of the program and the resources you have to solicit their opinions in this manner. Sometimes, there is plenty of information on course evaluations and annual program evaluations, and it is not necessary to conduct an independent survey.

Once you have all these possible names, the challenge becomes how to involve them in ways that can be helpful to—and not overwhelm—the process. Sometimes, that means deciding that you will not consult with all the names that have been provided, or it may mean finding a way to alert them to the final result, but not engage them in helping you get there.

Involving the Stakeholders
Connecting the stakeholders to your curriculum process of your curriculum revision typically involves three different steps: collecting ideas, comments, insights and reactions about the program, quality of graduates, etc.; using stakeholders in developing new program designs and courses; and obtaining reactions to the plans you create. Involving all the stakeholders in all three phases can be an overwhelming task and not an appropriate way to use their commitment to the program. Selecting which group you want to use at which stage can make the process more feasible and productive. For example, you might want to gather opinions from students about the current program and suggestions for changes, but they may not be appropriate to review the final design since they may not be aware of all the parameters involved in developing new curricula at your college or school.

Advisory-committee members should be involved in the beginning and final phases, but typically they do not have the time and expense to develop a coherent curriculum or to write new courses. Faculty members may be the best ones to develop the new curriculum, but a small group might be more effective than involving the entire faculty, depending on the size of your program, in each and every decision. The whole faculty can then discuss specific proposals and ideas, bring additional insight to the process and build support for any change.

Once you have decided who should be involved, then it is important to develop a vision for what you want at the end, a timeline for writing the new curriculum and consulting with various appropriate groups, and charges to all of the various groups involved in this process. The clarity you can provide at this initial stage of curriculum revision will help keep people involved and participating effectively since they will recognize their role and assist in ways that move the process forward.

Summary
Thinking carefully about who should be involved in the processes of revising the curriculum will help everyone know his and her role. It is an important way to use them to move the process forward and to collect as many ideas at the beginning and consult about proposals at the end.

If you have other ideas or suggestions about curriculum development, let me know and I will share them in future Mayo’s Clinics. Next month we shall discuss making course changes.

Fred Mayo is a clinical professor at New York University and a frequent presenter at CAFÉ events nationwide. He can be reached at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..