A Preliminary Study on Improving Criteria for Laboratory and Practicum Courses in Higher Education

The pedagogical and policy importance of laboratory and practicum courses has increased as education shifts toward competency-based learning.In South Korea, however, national-level operational criteria remain limited, and universities often rely on institutional regulations to classify course types, assign credits, allocate teaching assistants, and manage facilities and safety.This may lead to inconsistent standards and make it harder to ensure educational quality.This exploratory policy study reviewed official guidelines and institutional cases from accreditation bodies and universities in the United States, Germany, the United Kingdom, Australia, and Japan.It addressed three questions: how laboratory and practicum courses are defined and classified; how credit hours, contact hours, workload, teaching assistant support, facilities, and safety standards are specified; and what common principles can inform Korean higher education.The findings suggest that universities should clearly distinguish laboratory and practicum courses, set a minimum practical-activity threshold for blended courses, adopt a student-centered Total Workload perspective, and introduce differentiated support standards based on safety risk, equipment dependence, and feedback intensity.A course-packet-based responsibility confirmation procedure may also strengthen safety management and instructional transparency.Because the proposed framework is derived from literature review and comparative case analysis, its applicability should be validated through Delphi studies and stakeholder surveys.