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Credit Hours

Federal regulations define a credit hour as an amount of work represented in intended learning outcomes and verified by evidence of student achievement that is an institutionally established equivalency that reasonably approximates not less than—

  1. One hour of classroom or direct faculty instruction and a minimum of two hours of out of class student work each week for approximately fifteen weeks for one semester or trimester hour of credit, or the equivalent amount of work over a different amount of time.
  2. At least an equivalent amount of work as required in paragraph (1) of this definition for other academic activities as established by the institution, including laboratory work, internships, practica, studio work, and other academic work leading to the award of credit hours. 

To comply with the federal definition, courses offered at West Coast University have an expectation of two hours of work outside of class for each hour of lecture, and one hour of work outside of class for each hour of lab work.

West Coast University measures its academic programs in semester credit hours, which are defined as follows:

    1. For lecture classes, one semester credit is equal to a minimum of 15 and a maximum of 20 clock hours of instruction.
    2. For laboratory classes, one semester credit is equal to a minimum of 30 and a maximum of 40 clock hours of instruction.
    3. For Supervised Clinical/Practicum classes, one semester credit is equal to a minimum of 45 and a maximum of 60 clock hours. Labs in the Nursing are considered clinical for credit hour calculations.
    4. For externships/internships, one semester credit is equal to a minimum of 65 and a maximum of 85 clock hours.  In such scenarios, a student works in an agency or other professional setting under the supervision of a designated and University-approved practicing professional. 

Since in the above definitions, credits are translated to "clock hours," West Coast University defines a "clock hour" as a minimum of 50 minutes in which lectures, demonstrations, and similar class and related student learning activities are conducted.