Setup Considerations: Academic Calendars

What It Is

The academic calendar provides the time framework for your Workday Student system. The basic structure comprises academic period types, such as Fall, Spring, and Intersession. You can use this structure to create the academic years and academic periods that build out your calendar.

Example:

Academic Calendar: Semester Calendar
.

Academic Year: Semester Year 2019 - 2020
.

Academic Periods: Fall Semester 2019
and Spring Semester 2020
.

Calendar policies enable you to assign these components to an academic unit and level or a program of study (POS) as of an effective date:

Academic calendar.

Starting academic year.

Typical attendance pattern.

Unit type to track the student's academic credit and financial aid, such as semester units or clock hours.

The calendar policy applicable to a student's POS drives all date-specific processes and transactions for the student.

Business Benefits

Academic calendars in Workday Student enable you to:

Maintain accurate student records and financial aid data.

Manage date-specific processes and tasks effectively.

Report on student data at a granular level.

Calendar policies give you the flexibility to:

Support multiple academic calendars across an institution.

Change the academic calendar over time.

Define unique calendars to meet the needs of specific academic unit-level combinations or POS.

Enable students to change POS across academic calendars.

Enable students to have multiple academic records across academic calendars.

Meet your unique institutional requirements while protecting data integrity.

Set up at least 1 academic calendar and calendar policy to use Workday Student.

Use Cases

Most processes at an institution use the academic calendar. Examples include:

Automatically build out the years and periods needed in academic plans for students.

Track student statistics, such as credit earned or GPA, and academic progress by academic periods.

Set up and manage processes such as the enrollment window, grading window, or conferral date.

Ensure student registration into the correct course sections and at the right time.

Track financial aid data by academic periods for correct financial aid processing.

Set up disbursement schedules and award packaging for financial aid.

Questions to Consider

Subjects	Questions	Considerations
Academic Structure	What is the academic structure of your institution? Does your academic structure support separate calendars by academic unit or POS?	The hierarchy of the academic units in your academic structure drives the inheritance of the calendar policy. If any subordinate academic units or POS require a different policy, you can override the inheritance by assigning a different calendar policy directly to it. To maintain a single calendar and restore inheritance, you can reinherit the calendar policy from the superior academic unit. See Example: Restore Calendar Policy Inheritance from Superior Academic Unit.
Academic Period Types	What academic period types does your institution have? What period types are associated with a specific calendar? What is the order in which the period types occur? What periods make up the financial aid summer term?	You can use academic period types in multiple calendars. Workday uses the period type along with the academic calendar in processing. You can't delete academic period types once they're in use. You can rename them and the change applies to all academic calendars that use them. Once you specify the order of the period types in an academic calendar, Workday retains it for all the academic years in the calendar. You can define date rules for academic period types per academic calendar and node (academic unit-level combination or POS). For accurate financial aid processing, you can specify academic period types that are considered summer for federal financial aid.
Academic Years	What is the start date and period of the academic year? What is the end date and period of the academic year?	Prepare yourself with this information to save time and effort when you configure the academic calendar in Workday.
Academic Periods	What are the academic periods at your institution? What smaller sessions (modules) do you use within your standard academic periods? Do any sessions (modules) begin during a standard period and end in a different standard period? Does your institution use any nonstandard academic periods? Do you have programs that require nonterm financial aid processing? How many weeks of instruction are there in each academic period?	Standard periods represent reporting windows and can't overlap. Nonstandard periods (modules) can span across standard periods, only if you've enabled Standard Academic Period Spanning. Ensure that you carefully consider the decision to span academic periods because the action is tenant-wide and irreversible. See Setup Considerations: Standard Academic Period Spanning. You can add nonstandard academic periods to every year on an existing academic calendar, including past years. You can configure nonstandard period types for academic periods in order to create nonstandard academic period records. When a student registers into a course section that's associated with a nonstandard period, Workday displays it as a distinct period record in their academic statistics. You can report on standard and nonstandard periods based on the start or end dates of standard periods. Example: A report on course sections offered in the fall semester can include course sections that started within the period but end in a different period. A report on graded courses for the fall semester can include course sections that ended within the period but started in another period. You can process financial aid for students in modules or courses offered in nonstandard academic periods. Workday uses the total weeks of instruction (WOI) in academic periods for financial aid calculations. Workday excludes holidays and scheduled breaks that are 7 days or longer, including adjoining weekend days, from WOI totals. For more information, see Concept: Standard and Nonstandard Academic Periods.
Term and Nonterm Course Sections	Do you have both term and nonterm course sections? Do you offer nonterm course sections that start in a standard period and end in a different standard period?	You can have course sections that: Don't start and end with the academic period but fall within a fixed period. Span standard academic periods. Course sections tied to nonstandard periods roll up to the standard period in which they start. By default, Workday limits course sections to start and end within a standard academic period. To offer courses that span standard periods, you can enable Standard Academic Period Spanning. This option has wide impacts on Financial Aid and Student Financials, so discuss the decision thoroughly. See Setup Considerations: Standard Academic Period Spanning.
Multiple Academic Calendars	Do you use multiple academic calendars at your institution? How many programs require a unique calendar?	Calendar policies enable you to have multiple academic calendars at your institution. You can have a unique calendar policy for an academic unit and level or a POS. To protect data integrity, strive for the fewest possible academic calendars for your institution. Create a new academic calendar only when you need a structural change. Examples: Different academic period types. Changing the order of the academic period types. Changing which period types are standard. Small date-driven changes, such as changing the start date of the academic year, don't require a new academic calendar.
Student Program of Study Transactions	Can students have POS that use different academic calendars?	A student can have multiple POS that use different academic calendars. The calendar used by the primary POS controls the academic period records and financial aid period records. A student's academic record can have multiple academic calendars when: They change their primary POS across calendars. The calendar policy for their POS changes. To accommodate the change, Workday updates the academic plan to display academic years and periods based on the new calendar.
Academic Calendar Changes	Can you change the academic calendar at any time?	Calendar policies enable you to change the academic calendar without impacting any transactional data. A policy change can occur only at the start of an academic year and can't have gaps or overlaps. Built-in validations restrict calendar policy changes when student transactions, such as applications or disbursements, exist for the academic year. You can change the typical attendance pattern or unit type in some cases. To configure a calendar policy earlier than the earliest policy at a node that inherits the earliest policy, create a copy of the policy for the same effective date. You can then make the intended earlier change.
Effective Date	What is the importance of an effective date for the academic calendar? How far back in the past should you date the calendar?	Effective dates on the calendar policy enable you to change the academic calendar and track changes over time. Workday automatically applies the effective date to a calendar policy to ensure that changes occur only at the start of an academic year. Ensure that your calendar policy dates back to accommodate the earliest active students with registrations.
Holiday Calendar	Do you want to include a holiday calendar or noninstructional days (such as spring break) in your academic calendar?	To specify holidays and noninstructional days for your academic calendar, create a holiday calendar on the Create Holiday Calendar task.
Period Activity Pay	Do you use any academic periods for paying employees for activities performed during the period?	For academic periods used for period activity pay, specify Activity Pay as a Usage Type on the Maintain Academic Period Usage task. Consider if you need academic periods with different durations than the periods used for academic activity in Workday Student. You can't change an academic period for which you already processed period activity pay.

Recommendations

Map out your academic calendar structure, including the academic period types, academic years, and academic periods to make setup easier.

Ensure that your academic periods span the duration of the entire financial aid award year. Example: If the 2023-2024 award year covers 2023-07-01 to 2024-06-30, configure academic periods (2023 Summer Semester, 2023 Fall Semester, 2023 Winter Semester, 2024 Spring Semester, and 2024 Summer Semester) that span this date range.

For complex configurations with multiple academic calendars, map out your academic structure and the academic calendar required by each node.

Be careful when you override the inheritance of the calendar policy to prevent inadvertent changes to subordinate nodes.

Ensure the accuracy of your calendar policy before associating any transactional data, such as applications, course sections, and disbursements.

Requirements

The academic calendar replaces the academic years and periods used in older implementations of Workday Student. For any such academic years and periods without a calendar, you must run the

Assign Years to Academic Calendar

task during setup.

Run this task for academic periods created in Workday Human Capital Management (HCM) if you want to use the same periods in Workday Student.

Limitations

No impact.

Tenant Setup

No impact.

Security

Domain	Considerations
Set Up: Academic Calendar in the Academic Foundation functional area.	Enables you to set up academic calendars and calendar policies.
Set Up: Calendar in the System functional area.	Enables you to create holiday calendars.
Manage: Academic Calendar Updates in the Academic Foundation functional area.	Enables you to update academic calendars, including dates for existing academic periods.
Set Up: Financial Aid Foundation in the Financial Aid functional area.	Enables you to designate academic period types as summer for federal financial aid.
Set Up: Typical Attendance Pattern in the Academic Advising functional area.	Enables you to create, edit, and view typical attendance patterns.

Business Processes

No impact.

Reporting

Reports	Considerations
View Academic Calendar	Enables you to review the details of an academic calendar.
View Academic Periods	Enables you to view all the academic periods that aren't part of an academic calendar.
View Academic Period Types	Enables you to view all the academic period types in use.
View Academic Year	Enables you to review the details of an academic year.
View Non-Instructional Days	Enables you to view the events and dates for noninstructional days in an academic year.

Workday provides these report data sources that you can use to create custom reports:

Academic Calendars

Academic Date Ranges

Academic Periods

Academic Years

Integrations

No impact.

Connections and Touchpoints

Features	Considerations
Academic Advising	The interaction between the academic calendar and typical attendance patterns controls the years and periods displayed in student academic plans. The Academic Progress report on the student profile uses the default unit type configured on the calendar policy.
Admissions	Uses academic periods for: Anticipated start date of student applicants. Application groupings. Configurable online applications. If you update dates using the Edit Academic Period Dates task, Workday automatically updates the dates for: Student applications. Student application evaluation information. Student recruitment data.
Financial Aid	Academic calendar policies impact several financial aid processes, such as: Financial aid attendance plans. Disbursement schedules. Financial aid packaging. Because of the high impact, Workday recommends including stakeholders from the financial aid office in calendar design discussions.
Student Core	Uses academic periods for: Athletic team assignments. Student residency data. If you update academic period dates using the Edit Academic Period Dates task, Workday automatically updates these dates as well.
Student Financials	Academic calendar policies impact several processes in Student Financials, such as: Fee calculations. Student payment plans. Due date configurations. Because of the high impact, Workday recommends including stakeholders from the finance and bursar offices in calendar design discussions.
Student Recruiting	Uses academic date ranges and academic periods for events such as: Student recruiting campaigns. Student recruiting cycles. Student recruiting events.
Student Records	The academic calendar impacts many areas, such as: Academic period records for students. Course registrations. Program of study changes. Because of the high impact, Workday recommends including stakeholders from the office of the registrar in calendar design discussions.
Workday HCM	You can use academic periods for period activity pay by designating them for Activity Pay .

Workday offers a Touchpoints Kit with resources to help you understand configuration relationships in your tenant. Learn more about the Workday Touchpoints Kit on Workday Community.