Guidelines on Executive Education and Non-degree Offerings at Columbia University

To build capacity, engage with corporations and working professionals, and help support their missions, most Columbia Schools are working independently as well as with Central University to launch new non-credit non-degree offerings. Such offerings help enhance the University’s and School’s reputation, education, and research, increase awareness of degree programs and deepen alumni engagement. In addition, non-degree offerings and executive education help expand networks by building new bridges to the private, public, and non-profit sectors, and create future engagement opportunities for Columbia graduates.

To facilitate faculty participation in developing and delivering such offerings, the Office of the Provost has clarified relevant academic and administrative policies and guidelines, as follows:

Caps on Add Comp for Teaching Executive Education

Add Comp limits for officers of instruction (e.g. program development fees, royalties) already do not apply to executive education and other non-degree non-credit offerings irrespective of modality (see Faculty Handbook for details).

Officers of Instruction
Payments stemming from executive education efforts are to be made at the School level.

For compensating Officers of Instruction, payments should be made via the PeopleSoft additional compensation module. Academic units are advised to use Executive Education specific earn codes. If such codes are not available for your schools, you should contact Academic Appointments for further information. When you submit each additional compensation transaction, the following information is required: 1) Name of the executive education program; 2) Short-description of the program; 3) Start/end dates of course or courses taught (include all courses if multiple); and 4) Type of payment made to the faculty (e.g. program development fees, royalties).

Officers of Research must obtain prior approvals from Chair/Director, Dean, Sponsored Project Administration (if any portion of the officer’s salary is charged to a sponsored grant/contract), ISSO (when relevant), and from Academic Appointments, before they can engage in executive education. All academic units should use the approval form to obtain such approvals.

Reporting and Compliance

In order to maintain and ensure quality and compliance with University policies, Schools are required to submit a report at the end of year 1 and year 3 of offering any new non-degree program. The report should include detailed information on the number of runs, number of learners/participants, curriculum development process, and feedback from learners/participants. Reports should be submitted to the Office of the Provost (Academic Programs).

Schools should also report every five years to Academic Programs on their entire non-degree and executive education offerings.