Description elements in XCRI-CAP
XCRI-CAP has many built-in descriptive text elements that have their own specific names, such as applicationProcedure, assessment and learningOutcome. The designers of XCRI-CAP recognised that institutions might wish to include other descriptive text items that were not covered by the built-in elements in the standard. At the time of publication the likely extent of usage of the other items was unclear, so the XCRI-CAP 1.2 specification has relatively few built-in descriptive text elements, but has a mechanism for including additional ones by labelling the general 'description' element.
Some of these other descriptive text items are defined in a separate schema, called the XCRI-CAP Terms schema, which can be found with other technical documents in the 'Schemas and information models' section. Where producers wish to add in more items that are not covered by either the main schema or the XCRI-CAP Terms schema, these can be defined through the Course Data Programme schema. Please contact the Course Data Programme Support Team for further information. The items defined in the XCRI-CAP Terms schema and the Course Data Programme schema are detailed below.
From XCRI-CAP Terms schema
Namespace URI: http://xcri.org/profiles/1.2/catalog/terms
Term |
Definition |
| careerOutcome | Description refinement typically used to specify career outcomes for a course of study |
| contactHours | Description refinement typically used to specify the number and style of contact hours that a learner should expect on a course of study |
| contactPattern | Description refinement typically used to specify the style of contact that a learner would receive on a course of study |
| events | Description refinement typically used to specify events relevant to a course of study, such as open days |
| indicativeResource | Description refinement typically used to illustrate the kind of resources that would be used on a course of study, such as IT facilities and reading lists |
| leadsTo | Description refinement typically used to describe opportunities likely to flow from a course of study, such as opportunities for further study (course articulations) |
| policy | Description refinement typically used to specify policies relevant to a course of study, such as diversity of adjustments for disability |
| providedResource | Description refinement typically used to clarify resources that would be provided to learners by the institution |
| requiredResource | Description refinement typically used to clarify resources that the learner must provide in order to engage in a course of study |
| specialFeature | Description refinement typically used to highlight special features of a course of study |
| support | Description refinement typically used to specify support facilities available to learners |
| structure | Description refinement typically used to provide an overview of the module composition of a course of study |
| studyHours | Description refinement typically used to specify hours of study expected of a learner for successful completion |
| teachingStrategy | Description refinement typically used to specify the teaching strategies that will be employed on a course of study |
| topic | Description refinement typically used to specify a syllabus of topics that would be covered in a course of study |
From Course Data Programme schema
Term |
Definition |
| metadataKeywords | Description refinement used to specify metadata keywords relating to the course |
| targetAudience | Description refinement typically used to specify the target audience |
Technical note and marked up example
The XCRI-CAP 1.2 specification encourages the use of vocabulary encoding schemes for descriptive text elements. The vocabulary terms are specified in the tables above and also in the XCRI-CAP Terms schema ( xcri_cap_terms_1_2.xsd) and the Course Data Programme schema (coursedataprogramme.xsd).