Courses in Drexel Learn can be cross-listed to allow the populations of two or more individual sections to exist inside a single Blackboard course shell. There are a number of benefits to this process, including only building content once to reach all of the students, a shared grade book and discussions which include all of the students.

Types of Cross-lists 

There are two types of cross-lists that can exist in Drexel Learn: Merged Courses and Banner Cross-lists.

Merged courses can be created for multiple sections of the same course. These must have the same:

• Subject code
• Course number
• Schedule type
• Instructional method (F2F, Hybrid, Online)
• Term and part of term 

For example, ENGL-100-001 and ENGL-100-002 could be merged together in this fashion, whereas CHEM-101-A (a lecture section) and CHEM-101-061 (a lab section) cannot be merged, nor can CHEM-101-A and CHEM-230 A (different course numbers).

Additionally, special topics sections cannot be merged in Learn if the topics are different and students are permitted to enroll in multiple sections of that course in the same term.

To request a merged course, the instructor of record can send an email to itg@drexel.edu, containing all of the desired sections, as well as the CRNs of the sections.

Banner cross-lists, on the other hand, are courses that are officially listed as cross-listed in the Term Master Schedule. These often span multiple disciplines, or course numbers, such as PHYS-137-001 and SOC-137-001, because they are the same course but can be listed under different departments. These must at least be taught at the same time, in the same place, for the same amount of credits. If your course isn't cross-listed, but you believe that it should be, you can review the university's cross-listing policy and then contact the Registrar's office. Approved Banner cross-lists are processed in Learn at the beginning of week 7 of the previous term. The Registrar's office will notify us of any course cross-listed in Banner after that point, so that we can ensure that it is properly listed in Drexel Learn.

How Cross-lists Appear

When a cross-list is created in Learn, a new parent course shell is created and both/all of the child sections are merged into it. After the cross-list is created, students and instructors will only be able to access the parent course shell.

Cross-lists Deadlines

Requests to cross-list courses for an upcoming term must be received by no later than 5:00 p.m. ET on the Thursday before Week Zero (ie. Two Thursdays before the start of the quarter) due to issues that arise when courses are cross-listed after students begin to generate content.

Cross-listing standalone course sections after student generated content will result in the loss of all student generated content, including academic integrity statements, discussion board posts, recorded grades and submitted assignments.

Exceptions may be made when requesting the addition of a standalone course section to an existing cross-listed group of courses, but data loss will still occur for the standalone course section being added.

If an instructor would still like to proceed with cross-listing they will want to save grade data and student work so they can manually re-enter necessary grades in the grade center after the cross-list has been completed. They must reach out to the Office of the University Registrar’s Academic Services Team to request a late cross-list and expressly convey their knowledge of the data loss and give permission to move forward.