The instructions below explain how to successfully submit a new Professional Licensure/Certification form in the CIM system. If you want to edit an existing form, please follow the instructions for how to find and edit an existing Professional Licensure/Certification form.
To determine if a program requires submission of a Professional Licensure/Certification form, please review the Guidelines to Identify a Program as PLC Decision Tree.
Go to the CourseLeaf CIM Miscellaneous Request Management dashboard at: https://psu-next.courseleaf.com/miscadmin/.
Log in with your Penn State user ID and password.
A dialog box will appear requesting that you complete your login to CourseLeaf. Click the circle icon in the dialog box to proceed to the CourseLeaf CIM Miscellaneous Request Management dashboard.
Once logged in, you will see the CourseLeaf CIM Miscellaneous Request Management dashboard. Click the Propose New Miscellaneous button to open a new Professional Licensure/Certification submission form.
The miscellaneous form will open in a new browser window.
The CIM miscellaneous request form is used to submit both Professional Licensure/Certification and Professional Accreditation information for Penn State programs. The information submitted will be used to complete University reporting requirements for Professional Licensure/Certification and Professional Accreditation and to provide the necessary disclosures to students planning to pursue employment in a career that requires professional licensure/certification.
Before starting on a new Professional Licensure/Certification form, please read the following tips and guidelines to help you successfully navigate form features and requirements.
The CIM miscellaneous request form is a dynamic form that allows you to submit either Professional Licensure/Certification or Professional Accreditation information for your programs. The fields that appear on the form will change depending on your answers to certain questions. For example, if you select "Professional Licensure/Certification" for the Request Type, the form will populate with form fields pertaining to Professional Licensure/Certification. If you select "Accreditation" for the Request Type, the form will populate with form fields pertaining to accreditation of your programs.
Fields that are required are outlined in red. You cannot start workflow (i.e., begin the review and approval process) on your form until all required fields have been completed. You can, however, save changes to your incomplete form and return to complete and submit the form later.
Instructions for each question appear in italics above the question heading and field. Please read these instructions carefully before entering your information into the form.
You can save your changes to a form at any time by clicking the Save Changes button at the bottom of your screen. This will save all changes made but will not submit the form to the approval workflow process. Saving changes allows you to come back to your form and finish editing at a later date.
Clicking the Cancel button will close the form without saving any changes made.
Once your form is finished and ready to begin the review process, click the Start Workflow button to submit the form to the approval workflow process.
A separate Professional Licensure/Certification (PLC) form must be submitted for every individual major, minor, and certificate that leads to licensure/certification. For majors with no options, a separate Professional Licensure/Certification form must be completed for every unique LionPATH plan code. For majors with options, a separate Professional Licensure/Certification form must be submitted for each option leading to licensure/certification with a unique LionPATH plan or sub-plan code. A PLC form is not required for options that do not lead to licensure/certification.
The listing below displays all form fields for the Professional Licensure/Certification form as well as instructions on how to pre-populate your blank form with the PLC template or information from an existing PLC form.
From the dropdown menu, select Professional Licensure/Certification.
The Title is created for each new form. The title is the name you will use in the future to search for and find your Professional Licensure/Certification form on the Miscellaneous Request Management dashboard when you need to make additional edits or updates. For consistency purposes, all Professional Licensure/Certification titles should be entered as PLC: LionPATH Plan Code. For example, the Bachelor's Degree in Agriculture and Extension Education has a LionPATH Plan Code of "AEE_BS". The title for this program should be entered as "PLC: AEE_BS".
For majors with options, the title should be entered as PLC: LionPATH Plan Code (LionPATH Sub-Plan Code). For example, the Biological Science Teaching option in the Bachelor's Degree in Secondary Education has a LionPATH Plan Code of "SECED_BS" and LionPATH Sub-Plan Code of "BISC_3201". The title for this program option should be entered as "PLC: SECED_BS (BISC_3201)".
From the dropdown menu, select the appropriate degree level of the program you are submitting (e.g., Graduate, Medical School, Penn State Dickinson Law, Undergraduate).
Select the campus(es) where the program currently is delivered (i.e., the campus(es) from which the student can complete the program).
For programs that are shared across multiple colleges, please only select the campus(es) that are assigned to the entered LionPATH Plan Code. For example, the submission form for the Civil Engineering, B.S. program from the College of Engineering (CE_BS) should select University Park as the campus. The separate submission form for the shared Civil Engineering, B.S. program from Penn State Harrisburg, The Capital College (CECA_BS) should select Harrisburg as the campus.
From the dropdown menu, select the name of this program.
Please note, the available names in the dropdown list correspond to the programs that are loaded into CIM Program Management. Naming conventions are as follows:
Once you open the dropdown menu, you can begin typing the name of your program so that the list automatically jumps to the name that begins with the letters you have typed.
Enter the LionPATH Plan Code for the program. Plan codes can be found on the Major, Minor, and Certificate Program Codes page on the Office of the University Registrar's website or in CIM Program Management.
Only one plan code should be entered on each form. If your college administers a major that is shared across multiple colleges and/or campuses, a separate PLC form must be submitted for each LionPATH Plan Code.
Enter the LionPATH Sub-Plan Code for the major option or certificate, if applicable. Sub-Plan codes can be found on the Major, Minor, and Certificate Program Codes page on the Office of the University Registrar's website or in CIM Program Management.
Only one sub-plan code should be entered on each form. Each option that leads to licensure/certification should be entered on a separate PLC form with its distinct LionPATH Sub-Plan Code.
If there is no sub-plan code, leave this field blank.
From the dropdown menu, select the academic college for this LionPATH Plan Code. The college selected here will determine the approval workflow.
Enter the full name and email address of the person to contact about this Professional Licensure/Certificate information.
The Licensure(s) section is where you enter the specific licensure information by U.S. state and territory. When completed, a total of 56 entries should be listed in this section, one for each U.S. state and territory.
To add licensure information for a U.S. state/territory, click the Green Plus Sign Button in the form field header to open the Licensure(s) sub-form.
Tip: Creating a new form from a template will ensure you start with all U.S. states and territories with a default determination of Have not determined.
The Licensure(s) sub-form will open in a new window. Information should be entered for only one U.S. state/territory at a time.
While it is not possible to automatically populate the fields of one state from the information entered for another state, you can copy the text from one state's field and paste it into the same field for any other state that shares the identical information.
From the dropdown menu, select a U.S. state or territory.
From the dropdown menu, select the licensure/certification determination for the selected U.S. state/territory. The choices include:
Enter the License or Certification name.
(Examples: Professional Engineering, Physical Therapist Assistant, Secondary English 7-12)
Enter the name of the state licensing board.
(Examples: Pennsylvania State Board of Nursing, Kentucky Board of Engineers & Land Surveyors, Alaska Board of Accountancy)
Note: This field does not appear if "Not Required" is selected in the Determination field.
Enter the URL for the state licensing board website so that it can be accessed by anyone to find additional information.
(Examples: https://www.dpor.virginia.gov/Boards/APELS/, https://www.schools.utah.gov/, https://www.dape.org/)
Note: This field does not appear if "Not Required" is selected in the Determination field.
Enter the date when the determination was last confirmed or licensure data updated.
Dates should be entered as MM/DD/YYYY. (Examples: 05/31/2024, 11/06/2024)
Enter any needed additional licensure/certification information for the selected state not covered in the given form fields. Avoid entering specific information which can become out of sync with information on state board licensing websites. Instead, users should be directed to go to those websites for details.
(Example: Additional requirements to gain licensure are needed, please check with state licensing board for more details)
If the information entered applies to multiple states/territories, you will need to copy the text from this field and paste it into the Licensure/Certification Additional Details field for the other applicable states.
To save the licensure sub-form information, click the green Save Button at the bottom of the window.
Each state's licensure information will be saved back to your form and listed by state/territory in a row of the Licensure table.
To edit the information entered for a state/territory, click the Pencil tool in the row of the State/Territory you wish to view and/or edit.
This will open the Licensure sub-form in a new window, displaying the state/territory information that was last saved.
Once you have finished editing the appropriate information, click the green Save Button at the bottom of the window to save your changes back to the form.
To delete a listed state/territory, click the Red X Button in the row of the Option you wish to remove.
Note: The only valid reason for deleting a state/territory is if one appears twice in your list. Every PLC form submission must include all U.S. states and territories to ensure University data integrations and student disclosures function. If you do not know the licensure/certification determination for a state/territory, please select Have not determined as the Determination. If a licensing board does require professional licensure for employment, please select Not Required as the Determination.
Tip: Creating a new form from a template will ensure you start with all U.S. states and territories with a default determination of Have not determined.
To reorder the rows of State/Territory names, click the Green Arrow Up and Arrow Down Buttons to the right of the rows. Click the Up Arrow Button to move a row up. Click the Down Arrow Button to move a row down.
Note: It is recommended to keep the rows of states/territories in alphabetical order. Only use the up and down buttons to ensure the states/territories are in that order.
Once you have completed the Professional Licensure/Certification form, click the green Start Workflow Button at the bottom of your screen to submit the form for final review and approval. The form will be sent to the first step in the approved workflow.
Note: You cannot start workflow on your Professional Licensure/Certification form until all required fields have been completed.
To ensure you include all states/territories in the Licensure(s) section, it is recommended to pre-populate your blank form using a template.
When multiple programs share the same licensure information, you can pre-populate your new form with responses from another PLC form to speed up the data entry process.
The automated approval process in CIM is called the workflow. Once you click the green Start Workflow Button, your PLC form will begin this approval process.
Once a PLC form is submitted to workflow, it will be made available to your college's Associate Dean (for Graduate or Undergraduate Education, depending on which program is submitted) for review and approval. The remaining workflow steps are administrative process steps to ensure University systems and publications are updated accordingly. As reviewers in each step approve the form it will move to the next step of the workflow. As the form moves to the next workflow step, the appropriate user(s) will be notified via an automated email that the PLC form is ready to be reviewed, edited, approved, or rejected.
You can log in to the CourseLeaf CIM Miscellaneous Request Management dashboard at any time to see where your PLC form is in the workflow process. Once you have located your form in the dashboard, the preview will include the full list of workflow steps the form must complete. The current workflow step for the form will be in bold orange text. Completed workflow steps will be in bold green text.
At any point in the approval process a reviewer might have questions about the form. If a form edit is required, you can be added as a workflow step so you can directly edit your form while it is in the workflow process.
A reviewer may also choose to rollback the form to a previous step in the workflow. In this case, the form will need to repeat the workflow steps from the point the form was rolled back to.
After approval from the Associate Dean, the PLC form will go to the Office of the University Registrar to add the necessary PLC data to your program in LionPATH. This will enable the system to provide disclosures to individual students as needed. Then, the PLC form will go to the appropriate University Bulletins editor to add the PLC statement and interactive map link to your program page in the Bulletins publication.
Once the PLC form has completed the approval process, the form submitter will receive an automated email message notifying you of the form approval.
Using the PLC data inputted into CIM, the University's Professional Licensure and Certification interactive map will be updated every year in July. In some circumstances, such as a change to a popular program, there will be an opportunity for an on-demand map refresh outside the normal update period. If you believe the data submitted via the PLC form in CIM should be incorporated into the map before July, please contact the Office of Planning, Assessment, and Institutional Research at opair@psu.edu.
