Academic Planning Tools
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ADDITIONAL RESOURCES
Tools to map your path
UCSC offers a suite of planning tools to help you track degree requirements, build quarter-by-quarter course maps, and prepare for productive advising conversations. The tools below work best together, so keep them all in your toolkit and choose the one that fits the task at hand.
Degree Progress Report (DPR)
- What it is: A live audit that shows every general education, university, college, and (for most programs) major requirement and labels each as Satisfied, In Progress, or Not Satisfied.
- Where to find it: MyUCSC → Student Center → Degree Progress Report.
- Review it regularly to:
- Consider courses listed as “not satisfied as courses to complete in your upcoming quarters.
- Track time-to-degree. The unit and quarter totals at the top let you compare your progress with expected milestones (90 units by the end of sophomore year, 180 by graduation, etc.).
- Catch issues early. Transfer credit, substitutions, or study-abroad courses sometimes need a manual update. If something looks wrong, email your advisors right away; fixing it later can delay graduation.
- Arrive prepared for advising. Bring a freshly run DPR to every appointment so you and your advisor start with an accurate snapshot of your record.
- Tips:
- Click an unmet requirement to see courses that fulfill it.
- Email your advisors if transfer work or substitutions aren’t displaying correctly—some updates must be entered by hand.
Need more detail? See this step-by-step guide.
Academic Planning Form (APF)
- What it is: A fill-in-the-blanks Google Sheet or PDF where you plot courses term by term, tally units, and note prerequisites.
- When it’s required: Declaring or changing a major, filing an appeal, readmission petitions, and some graduation checks.
Academic planning aids
- MyUCSC Academic Planner – drag-and-drop courses into tentative schedules, view prerequisite warnings, and export to Google Calendar.
- Time-to-Degree Calculator – estimates how many quarters you’ll need based on remaining units.
- Slug Success – schedule advising appointments, join workshops, and review notes and action items in one place.