Guidance notes: Principle 8 Essential Subject Set

Principles

8.1 The essential set includes all compulsory requirements that all students undertaking a course must meet.
8.2 The essential set consists of subjects that meet the specific depth of knowledge and skills requirements for the disciplinary or professional area of study in a course.
8.3 The essential set delivers the course learning outcomes.
	8.3.1 The subject learning outcomes in the essential set must be mapped to the course learning outcomes to ensure that all course learning outcomes are achieved through combinations of subjects in the essential set.
8.4 The essential set may consist of one or more of the following components:
	8.4.1 Core subjects - the essential set includes designated core subjects, all of which must be completed by students undertaking the course.
	8.4.2 Majors and Minors – the essential set in undergraduate degrees may include specified majors or minors that contribute to achieving the course learning outcomes.
	8.4.3 Specialisations – the essential set in postgraduate degrees may include specified specialisations that contribute to achieving the course learning outcomes.
	8.4.4 Restricted electives - the essential set includes restricted elective subjects, which offer students choice in their study from a list of specified subjects or subjects from a specified discipline.
8.5 The essential set includes key subjects for academic progress.

8.4 This commences the discussion about the nature and role of majors, minors and specialisations in undergraduate courses. See also principles related to Majors, Minors, Specialisations.
8.4.1 See Course and Subject Design (Coursework) Procedure, Glossary: Core subject definition.
Statement redesigned to describe outcome for multiple core subjects.
8.4.4 Creating boundaries for restricted elective subjects, to limit excessively long lists that are constituted without stated and justified rationales.
8.5 NOTE: In 50 Bachelor’s degree documents examined in 2022, 28 identified key subjects.

The key feature of the essential set is that it addresses DEPTH as required by the AQF.
As per 8.3, the essential set also delivers the course learning outcomes. This is critical to course design.
8.3.1 provides guidance in terms of the mapping of components in the essential subject set.
8.1 refers to compulsory requirements rather than compulsory subjects.