Interested in doing something different with your syllabus? When we think of syllabi as contracts, we focus less on learning and more on policy – which should evolve from the course and students.Our syllabi can also get unwieldy when we tray to address every problem that came up in an assignment to policy based on past experience teaching a course. That’s about us and not the new students in a course who need the freedom to make mistakes and think for themselves rather than feel wrapped in rules and policies.

I switched to a more visual syllabus last year and had good results. Students seemed to actually read it because it was much shorter and to the point. Here are a bunch of examples and helpful tips for reimagining your syllabus visually.