Master's Degree Program of Work Approval Process

The Program of Work approval is launched at the same time as the Master's Graduation approval process (when the student submits the application), but it is distinct. There are two approval processes:

• Master's Graduation Approval
• Graduate Coordinator is notified, but need not approve
• Graduate Adviser must approve
• OGS Degree Evaluators must approve
• Program of Work Approval
• Graduate Coordinator must approve
• Graduate Adviser must approve

On the administrative view of the Master's Graduation Application, there are two separate sections that track routing of the application and of the the Program(s) of Work.

Both approval processes generate email notifications with links to approval pages. Each process has its own approval page.

Online dual-degree graduation applications and Program of Work approvals are now available for most programs.

Exceptions: Dell Medical coursework is not compatible with the POW, so dual-degrees with Dell must continue to use the paper application. In addition, dual degrees leading to a doctoral degree must continue to use the paper application.

For all others, dual-degree majors may have 1 or 2 Programs of Work associated with a graduation application, one for each OGS-administered degree. Law and McCombs have their own internal processes for tracking student progress and do not use the EASI GCD Program of Work, so dual-degrees shared with these two colleges will only have a single POW--for the OGS-administered portion of their degree.

When a dual-degree application is submitted, OGS-administered degree Programs of Work are routed for approvals. If two Programs of Work are routed, the approvals will be completed independently. Co-departments may view each others' POWs, but are only responsible for approving the POW associated with their program's portion of the degree.

If a Program of Work is routed to you for approval, you will get an email notification.

The approval routing system is set up to operate by role, not by person.

Some departments have chosen to have more than one person authorized for the roles of Graduate Coordinator for their school/major code.

In that case, more than one person will be notified that a Program of Work is awaiting approval. If only one of these people signs, then that step of the approval is considered complete, and the approval is sent to the next step, usually the Graduate Adviser.

If you receive an email and you know you are not the person who needs to take action, you may safely ignore the email.

Departments are free to allocate work among their people as they see fit. As each department may have different internal procedures, we do not make distinctions between types of Graduate Coordinators for approval routing purposes.

We recommend that departments authorize more than one person for each of these roles. This ensures that Program of Work approvals can be handled even if one person is unavailable.

The Program of Work is approved on the Program of Work Approval page.

There are two ways to access the Program of Work Approval page:

• The email you received contains a link directly to the Program of Work Approval page for that student. However, we have noticed that some email clients don't interpret this link correctly.
• If you cannot access the Program of Work Approval Page by clicking on the link in the email, you can go to your EASI SIS Routing Inbox. Your inbox will list all the Programs of Work that have been routed to you for approval along with a link to the Approval Page for each one.

Note that once you approve a Program of Work, the SIS Routing Inbox considers it an "inactive" item, but you can return to view it later by choosing to view your "inactive" inbox items.

(Alternatively, you can view your students and their approval statuses in the Master's Graduation Application Administrative listing site)

Links to the EASI SIS Routing Inbox also appear in the email you receive, and in the navigation bar for the Program of Work Approval page.

The Program of Work Approval page has a view and an update version.

Graduate Coordinators and Graduate Advisers see the update version when they are currently tapped to approve a Program of Work. If they've signed it, they see the view version.

The view version of the approval page contains the following information:

• Student name and eid.
• Student email and phone if available. (The student must have agreed to release the info.)
• The current status of the Program of Work approval.
• Your name, your role in the process, and your current capacity (i.e., View or Update).
• A link to open the Program of Work itself in a new window. Note that this gives the view the student sees in UT Direct.
• The "signature history" for this approval. This lists, in order, every step currently taken in the process, who did it, what they did, when, and any notes they made.
• Sidebar navigation links to: EASI Services, SIS Routing Inbox, Graduate Coordinator Desktop "Grad School Progress" function, this help page.

The update version contains the view version information, plus:

• A "notes" field of 500 characters. You can save notes without signing the Program of Work, and you can modify your notes as often as you want before you sign. After signing, you will no longer be able to modify your notes.
• Two buttons: one allows you to only save your notes, the other will do that, but also "sign" the document and forward it to the next step in the approval process.

Once a Program of Work has been approved, a view-only version of the Program of Work will be accessible to administrative viewers via the EASI "View Student Documents" function.

The SIS Routing Inbox is a service within EASI.

It lists all documents that have been routed to you via the SIS Routing System. Note that this may mean that documents from more than one approval routing process may be in your Inbox. Also note that if a approval process does not use the SIS Routing System, you will not see those documents in the Inbox. (The Doctoral Candidacy Application approval process, for example, does not use the SIS Routing System.)

At the bottom of the page, you can select "All Processes" (the default) or limit to a particular process. The name of the Program of Work approval process is "GS-Program of Work".

If a document is awaiting your action, it will appear in the "Active inbox documents" list. This is the default view when you first go to the Inbox. "Active" documents may be documents awaiting your signature, or "View" versions of documents with a checkbox out to the side. You can dismiss view-only documents by checking the checkbox AND hitting the button at the bottom of the page.

"Inactive inbox documents" will list documents you have already signed (or that someone who shares your role has signed, completing the step). If you wish to look again at the Program of Work Approval page once you've signed it, this is the place to go.

The "Document description" for each entry is a link that will open the approval or action page for each document.

Once all departmental approvers have approved the Program of Work, decisions fall to the OGS Degree Evaluators.

Evaluators will use the Program of Work approval status as information for the purpose of determining whether or not the student should be granted the degree. It is up to the Evaluators to decide what they require.

However, once approved, the Program of Work Approval is added to the EASI View Student Documents display.

Graduate Coordinators and Graduate Advisers can both edit the Program of Work up until the point a student submits their master's graduation application.

When the graduation application is submitted, the POW enters a formal approval path, and update capabilities begin to lock down. The Graduate Coordinator is the first approver, and only they can update while the Program of Work is under their approval purview. In part this limits the potential for someone to enter a change the Graduate Coordinator did not intend and for the GC to approve it by mistake.

Once the Graduate Coordinator approves, the Graduate Adviser should be able to update the POW once more, but the POW is locked down for the Graduate Coordinator. The Program of Work is under Graduate Adviser approval purview at that point, so Graduate Advisers are the only ones who can make changes.

Once the Graduate Adviser approves the POW, no further changes can be made without formally re-opening the approval process.

Please note: The POW approval pages link to a summary view of the POW that is not updateable. The updateable version of the POW can be found in the EASI GCD, Course Reqs tab.

If your Graduate Adviser has already approved the Program of Work, follow the steps outlined in the next FAQ.

If your GA has not yet approved the Program of Work or if you're uncertain, go to the Graduate Coordinator Desktop, Grad School Progress, Course Reqs tab for the student in question. Below the tabs, near the top of the page, you should see a link to "Program of Work Approval page" with an approval status next to it.

If the status indicates "Awaiting GA Approval" then you can recall the Program of Work on the approval page. Click on the "Program of Work Approval page" link and look for the recall button. Once you have recalled, return to the Course Reqs tab in EASI to update and re-approve the Program of Work.

The Graduate Coordinator can unlock the Program of Work, make the changes, and relaunch the approval process; the revised Program of Work will go to the Graduate Adviser for fresh approval.

In the Graduate Coordinator Desktop, Grad School Progress, Course Reqs tab, at the bottom of the page, the Graduate Coordinator will see a button that lets them "Unlock" with an optional notes field.

Once the Program of Work has been unlocked, the Graduate Coordinator can make any needed changes and in this condition only, the GC must re-approve the Program of Work from the Course Reqs tab. There will be no EASI SIS Routing Inbox record created for the GC when they unlock.

After unlock, the tab will contain an area that allows the GC to re-sign the Program of Work and relaunch the approval process. The Program of Work will then route to the Graduate Adviser in the standard way--the Graduate Adviser will receive an email notification and EASI SIS Routing Inbox record as they did for the first round of approval.

If you recalled a Program of Work to make changes before your Graduate Adviser approved it, visit the EASI SIS Routing Inbox and look for an inbox record to link to the approval page.

If you re-opened a Program of Work after your Graduate Adviser approved it, you will not have an inbox record. To re-approve, go to the Graduate Coordinator Desktop, Grad School Progress, Course Reqs tab. You should see a link to "Program of Work Approval page." Click on this link to visit the approval page and approve the Program of Work. For more details on what happens next, see the previous FAQ item.

Students use the student application page and Evaluators and departmental administrative staff use the Doctoral Candidacy and Master's Graduation Applications Administrative Listing page. The listing links to applications that have full detail, and contain a shortcut column containing the Program of Work Status codes. Each status code will be a link to the Program of Work itself. Code values are:

• PEN GC - Pending approval by the Graduate Coordinator.
• PEN GA - Pending approval by the Graduate Adviser.
• APPR - Approved by the Graduate Adviser.
• REO GC - Reopened by the Graduate Coordinator.

On the "list" page, the student's name is a link to a view of the submitted Master's Graduation Application.

On the Master's Graduation Application page, students and Evaluators can see details about the approval process via the "Program of Work Approval Information" box at the bottom of the page. The box contains:

• a link to open the Program of Work in a new window or tab (view-only version, used by OGS Degree Evaluators and also visible in the student's view of their submitted application).
• The current status of the Program of Work routing process (approved, pending approval, etc.)
• A link the the Program of Work Approval page.
• The "signature history": a list of who took what action, when, and any notes they made.

If a Master's Graduation Application is withdrawn, the Program of Work approval and routing process is unaffected.

Normally, when an application is withdrawn, it is temporary and the application is resubmitted. The Master's Graduation Application checks to see if there's already a Program of Work approval process in progress, and if so, associates it with the new application.

After degrees are processed and before the Master's Graduation Application opens for a new semester, any Programs of Work associated with students who did not graduate are cancelled.

If the student submits a new application to graduate in the following semester, the Program of Work approval process will be started from scratch and must be completed anew.

The student will see multiple Programs of Work appear on the Master's Graduation Application and will be required to select one to associate with the application. The student sees the Program of Work title the Graduate Coordinator designates in the EASI GCD. A message will appear that tells the student to contact their Graduate Coordinator if they are unsure which to pick.

The Graduate Coordinator can either tell the student which to pick, or they can submit a request to the Graduate School Director to inactivate or delete the unwanted Program of Work. In the latter case, if the student refreshes the application page they'll only see the remaining active Program of Work.

If the student hasn't yet submitted their Master's graduation application, they can update their selection on their application. If they have submitted, you can change it for them.

First, ensure the POW that you want to attach to the Master's Graduation Application is attached to the student. You can verify this on the Graduate Coordinator Desktop, Grad School Progress, Set Profile tab.Check this first as the next steps will not work if this step is not complete.

Next, you can locate the page to make this change starting in one of two places:

1. Visit the Graduate Coordinator Desktop, Grad School Progress, Course reqs tab. Select the degree profile that is attached to the Master's Graduation App and hit the "Choose Profile" button. A link to the Master's Graduation Application associated with that POW will should come up just above the selection pulldown. (If no link comes up, this is not the POW associated with the application.) Click that link.
2. Visit the Doctoral Candidacy and Master's Graduation Application Listing. Look up your student and click on their name to open up a view of their Master's Graduation Application.

Scroll down to the "Program of Work Approval Information" section, and you should see a button to "Switch Program of Work." Click that button and you will be brought to a page that will allow you to change the POW. Select the POW you want to update TO, click the "Save change" button, and the change should be complete. (You may need to refresh the application view page to see the change.)

If you are a Graduate Coordinator and need to add another GC, visit the ARR System to add or update a Secondary Graduate Coordinator

If you need to add or change your Graduate Adviser, there is a HOP-outlined procedure for doing so. Contact the Administrative Roster Reporting System admin for more information. Be sure to include the school-major code(s) impacted.

Review screenshots of the process in this document, also attached at the top of this Wiki page.