Academic Scheduling: Policies

Below is a list of policies with the intended purpose of the policy and applicable phases and terms.

Standard Time Blocks | Reduces unused half-hour blocks and facilitates room changes.

• Both phases
• Terms: Fall and Spring

70/30 Prime Time Percentage | Reduces unplaced classes and promotes equitable allocation of rooms and time slots.

• Both phases
• Terms: Fall and Spring

Allowable Hours | Promotes equitable allocation of rooms and time slots, and prevents circumvention of the 70/30 Prime Time policy.

• Priority Phase only
• Terms: Fall and Spring

Pre-algorithm 98/198s | Prioritizes non-DeCals and reduces circumvention of the 70/30 Prime Time policy.

• Priority Phase only
• Terms: Fall and Spring

Non-15-Week Courses | Helps fully utilize classrooms for the entire semester and to facilitate room changes.

• Both phases
• Terms: Fall and Spring

Contact Hours | Complies with the Committee on Courses of Instruction to reduce unused half-hour blocks and prevent unnecessary enrollment time conflicts for students.

• Both phases
• All terms

Colloquiums | Mandated by the Campus Committee on Classroom Policy & Management.

• Both phases
• All terms

Enrollment Capacities | To protect student and instructor safety and to comply with fire code.

• Both phases
• All terms

DeCals in Active-Learning Rooms | Prioritizes specialized classrooms for faculty use.

• Both phases
• All terms

Room-Switching | Allows and encourages departments to find internal solutions for their scheduling needs.

• Manual Phase
• All terms

Semester Start-Up Deadlines | Prioritizes academic classes while allowing classrooms to be reserved for other purposes.

• Manual Phase
• All terms

Policies that require calculation, such as the “70/30 Prime Time Percentage” and “Allowable Hours,” are calculated by cluster. A cluster is a group of subject areas with the same department scheduler. For example, Anthropology and Folklore belong to the Anthropology cluster. This means that each subject area does not need to comply as long as the cluster is in compliance when all its subject areas are calculated together.

Due to the heavy demand for classroom space, classes must be scheduled in standard time blocks (see table below). This helps minimize the number of unused half-hour blocks and accommodate room changes. Classes in non-standard time blocks must be scheduled in a departmentally controlled space.

The “Standard Time Blocks” policy applies to all phases of scheduling. Room assignments officially begin on the hour or half-hour mark. However, according to the “Berkeley Time” convention, instruction in class meetings typically begins ten minutes after the official start time. Besides allowing students and instructors time to travel from one class to the next, the ten minutes are for the class scheduled in that period to set up, not for the preceding class to finish. Classes are expected to vacate their classrooms promptly at the published time. Nevertheless, instructors and students of the scheduled class should show those of the preceding class the courtesy of allowing brief, final actions to be completed even after the published time, and to refrain from entering a class while such activity is ongoing.

Classes are published with end times of “59” or “29” as a workaround for the Student Information System's constraints. These times are not intended to affect actual class meeting times. Instructors are welcome to end class on the hour or half hour rather than a minute earlier.

During the Priority Phase, prime time requests are limited to 70% of each department or cluster’s room requests.

• Percentages are based on the number of classes, not the number of hours.
  
  • e.g. M 10–11 a.m. + MTWRF 8–9 a.m. = 50% Prime Time
• Percentages for primary and secondary sections are calculated separately. The prime time policy cannot be met by scheduling all primary sections in prime time and only secondary in non-prime time.
• Departments or clusters with five or fewer requests are exempt.

This policy exists because there are not enough classrooms to accommodate the volume of prime-time classes that departments would like. If unlimited prime-time requests were permitted, many more unplaced classes would have to be resolved manually.

The most impacted class meeting times are collectively called “Prime Time.” Prime Time for Monday/Wednesday/Friday and four weekdays is defined as follows:

Prime Time for Tuesday/Thursday is defined as follows:

Prime Time Description for Tuesdays and Thursdays: Starts later than 8 a.m. and earlier than 5 p.m.

Every semester, each department or cluster is allotted a maximum number of hours per week that it may request during the Priority Phase. This number equals the number of hours per week of classes in general assignment classrooms with at least one student enrolled during the previous corresponding term, plus ten percent. For example, if a department had 100 hours in Fall 2025, the department could request up to 110 hours for Fall 2026.

The number of classes is not limited, only the number of hours. This policy does not distinguish between primary and secondary sections. After the algorithm has been run, departments may request an unlimited number of additional hours.

When requesting a general assignment classroom, each class is limited to the maximum number of contact hours per week approved by the Committee on Courses of Instruction for a 15-week offering of the course (for fall and spring courses) or for however many weeks the course is being offered (for summer courses). For example:

• A course approved for 3 hours of lecture per week for 15 weeks may not request MW 10 a.m.–12 p.m. for its lecture.
• A course not approved for discussion sections may not schedule discussion sections in general assignment classrooms.

Contact hours can be viewed in the Course Management System (CMS) at course.berkeley.edu.

Summer classes may round up their contact hours by 30 minutes per week if desired (e.g., from 7.5 to 8 hours per week). This is because summer classes’ approved contact hours are often less easily divisible than those of fall and spring classes.

Courses with catalog numbers 98 or 198 may not submit requests during the Priority Phase. They must wait to request general assignment classrooms until after the algorithm has been run. Catalog numbers with suffixes (such as 98W or 98BC) do not count as 98 or 198 courses and are, therefore, permitted to go through the algorithm.

Classes that do not meet every week for the entire 15-week term (14 weeks excluding RRR week) are not eligible to request general assignment classrooms at any point in the scheduling process.

Summer classes may meet for any duration and on any dates, even if the dates do not match any of the five standard summer sessions, as long as the instructional time matches the contact hours approved by the Committee on Courses of Instruction (see Contact Hours and Instructional Formats below).

The Campus Committee on Classroom Policy and Management must approve any change to the day, time, and/or room of a colloquium in a general assignment classroom.

The enrollment limit of a class may not exceed the capacity of the room assigned to it. Note that the capacity for enrollment purposes is equal to the number of seats in the room and may therefore be less than the maximum occupancy posted in the room.

In very few cases, valid reasons exist for allowing registered enrollment in a specific course to exceed classroom capacity. These exceptions exist for classes that use ETS course capture services, which enable students exceeding the room capacity to view the lectures online. In these cases, department chairs may appeal to their deans in writing for special consideration.

Special arrangements will be considered only in cases in which:

1. Demand is high and enrollment in the course in question is vital to students' ability to progress through the curriculum, AND
2. Departments can demonstrate that they have a plan to avoid overcrowding.

Examples of such a plan include:

1. Statistical evidence regarding previous attendance relative to registered enrollments that indicates it is extremely unlikely that more than the allowable number of students will actually attend, OR
2. Reservation of an overflow room and arrangements for instruction of students displaced to that room because the primary classroom is full.

The department and the instructor are responsible for ensuring that actual attendance does not exceed classroom capacity. This responsibility obligates instructors to request that some students leave if there are not enough seats. Students should not be permitted to sit on the floor, as this impedes rapid egress in an emergency and is a safety hazard.

Instructors should be aware that there is no guarantee that overflow rooms will be available on days when full attendance is expected, such as during midterm exams. Final exams may need to be held in multiple rooms, possibly in multiple buildings.

Questions about classroom capacity limits may be directed to the Classroom Scheduling Office (510-642-0313 or scheduling@berkeley.edu) or to Space Management and Capital Projects (510-642-1781), which maintains the campus classroom inventory.

The general assignment active-learning classroom inventory currently consists of:

• 110 Social Sciences Building (54 seats)
• 122 Social Sciences Building (36 seats)
• 118 Social Sciences Building (30 seats)
• 230 Mulford (30 seats)
• 100 Wheeler (15 seats)
• 212 Wheeler (122 seats)

DeCals (generally, courses numbered 98 or 198) are not eligible to be scheduled in active-learning rooms at any point in the scheduling process.

More information can be found at Active Learning at Berkeley.

When a given combination of day + time + room has been assigned to a class, the department scheduler may transfer that combination to a different class within the same department or cluster. This is traditionally called room-switching but may also be called class-switching. The room cannot be switched independently of the day and time; instead, the day, time, and room function as one unit. For example:

• 1-way transfer:
  
  • Class A has no room, so Class B donates its day, time, and room to Class A. (This may occur if Class B is being canceled or moved to a departmentally controlled room.)
• 2-way mutual swap:
  
  • Class A and Class B both have day + time + room assignments and trade with each other.
• Multiple-way transfer:
  
  • Day + time + room combinations are transferred from Class A→ Class B → Class C → Class D → Class A.

Only the exact combinations already assigned to you are at your disposal. This means that room-switching does not change room availability. If you wish to change any element(s) of a combination (e.g., the same room but a different time), a regular room request must be submitted.

All scheduling policies remain in effect. For example, room-switching cannot be used to transfer an active-learning room from a non-DeCal to a DeCal. If room-switching for summer classes would result in a class changing day, time, or session after enrollment has begun, it must be approved by the Summer Sessions Office.

Room-switching may be submitted through Friday of the third week of instruction (one week later than the deadline for regular room requests). This is to ensure that the class schedule is finalized before the Scheduling Office begins scheduling final exams at the start of the fifth week of instruction.

To request a room switch for two or more of your classes, please email Academic Scheduling at scheduling@berkeley.edu.

Instructions and student facilitators should be informed of the following deadlines.

General Assignment Classroom Requests for Academic Classes

• Room requests may be submitted through the Friday of the second week of instruction. The first week of instruction is defined as only the instructional days that occur before the first weekend. For example, if instruction begins on a Wednesday, the first week consists of Wednesday through Friday, not the first Wednesday through the second Wednesday.
  
  • Exception: Room requests for Summer Session E (the 3-week session) may be submitted through the Friday of the first week of instruction.
• DeCal courses are considered regularly scheduled academic courses and are subject to the deadline above.
• Room-switching/class-switching requests may be submitted through the Friday of the third week of instruction.
• Department schedulers will receive an email notification regarding the outcome of their room and room-switching requests by Friday of the fourth week of instruction.

Deadlines for classroom reservations (i.e., events other than regular class meetings) can be found on the Classroom Reservations page at Berkeley Event Services.

Summer classes may be scheduled in any available time block that begins and ends on the hour or half hour. Standard time blocks specific to summer classes are encouraged but not required. 

All standard meeting patterns can be applied to any day(s) of the week and any session.

Summer Standard Time Blocks