WESTERN WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY

ACADEMIC COORDINATING COMMISSION MINUTES

Regular Meeting

October 19, 2004

Chair Tom Downing called the meeting of the Academic Coordinating Commission to order on October 5, 2004 in OM340 at 4:01 p.m.   There were fifteen (15) members present, the Registrar (1), recorder (1), and ten (10) guests, for a total of twenty-seven (27).  (See attached roster).

Approval of ACC minutes

Members approved the minutes of October 6, as written.

Appointments to ACC Standing Committees

International Programs Advisory Committee – Cheryl Peltier-Davis, Library, -2-yr term

Agenda Revised

Audiology Minor

Chair Downing  requested a change in the agenda to accommodate guests from the Communications Sciences & Disorders department for consideration of their major and minor:

§         Mike Seilo forwarded a response to questions which the Commissioners at the previous meeting (included in their packets).  The change in the CSD major is essential as a response to a change in certification by national standards that require more courses for the degree; as a result the undergraduate major must increase to 68 credits from 58.  The language that came to the ACC was ambiguous: It said “a minor is required” and then went on to describe the Audiology minor. The commissioners took this to mean that that particular minor was required, but in fact it is just required that the majors have some minor or other. The Audiology minor is not specifically required of majors as we had believed.

§         Commissioners recommended, and guests agreed to change catalog wording to state:  “Admission to Audiology Minor by permission.”

§         Commissioners continued discussion on the problem of increasing credits in a major or minor. They concluded that since the major is 68 credits that requiring a minor in addition does not constitute a clear violation of holding majors to 90 credits or less (save for those that are already larger, and they are prohibited from further increasing). Following discussion, the Commissioners accepted the postponed minutes of 5/20/01 from CHSS (see action items below).

Announcements and Reports

GER Committee:.  Chair Downing reported on attending the first GER Committee meeting of the new academic year, and noted the election of Robert Stoops as chair of the committee. 

§         The GER committee has been provided with initial catalog copy in which Karen Perry assigned CGM courses to a global or domestic perspective grouping, which seemed very appropriate. Final approval of the classification rests with the GER Committee.

§         Downing reported to ACC that he had identified the QSR requirements as requiring particular attention by the GER Committee and the ACC, primarily because the notion of “testing out” needs considerable clarification. Can the Math Placement Test be used to for this purpose? It would be convenient if it could, because that test is given statewide well before students even show up at Western. However, the Math Department has hinted at a preference for a math achievement test, which they would have to construct. This test would presumably not be available to students statewide and requiring it for certain purposes could delay students’ entry to sequence courses and others. Downing suggested that the GER Committee invite Dean Norman to their committee meeting to help work out QSR challenges.  Downing reported the discussion had continued with 2d year writing courses and clarification on how these courses will be integrated as writing in the disciplines. First Year Experience was also discussed, with a recommendation that a number such as #117 be used in the catalog for the FYE (higher ##__17) is reserved for upper division seminars, so this would be appropriate.  No final decision has been made and FYE is still being explored. 

One Commissioner suggested that department chairs and program directors be consulted to consider whether their CGM courses have been properly divided.

Letter from Provost Bodman re GURs

Chair Downing read from a letter to the commissioners which they will receive shortly which stated:

            “These new requirements will need to be phased into the curriculum in a way that ensures both access for students and support for departments as they develop and refine their offerings to meet the criteria for inclusion in these areas.  I believe that the campus community will need to “map” our curricular offerings and determine which existing courses might be revised or simply reclassified to meet the new area requirements.  Since the revised general education program is scheduled to begin in Fall 2005, this work must begin now and be completed in time for catalog copy in March, 2005.

            “. . . In the absence of Vice Provost Kris Bulcroft. . . I have asked Steve Ross (X4890, Steve.Ross@wwu.edu ) to serve as the ex officio member on the General Education Committee.  Dr. Ross will serve as the liaison between the General Education Committee and my office…..I  have asked Karen Perry, Catalog Coordinator, to prepare catalog copy that reflects the new curriculum.  This will be presented to ACC early in this quarter…

            “In the four areas of the curriculum which are significantly changed in this revision, I have asked the following individuals to take responsibility for implementation.

• Karen Perry (X3757, Karen.Perry@wwu.edu ) has prepared a listing of courses in our current CGM offerings that fulfill domestic and global perspectives. . .
• Carmen Werder (X7329, Carmen.Werder@wwu.edu ) will work with academic departments and programs to help identify second writing courses, based on the criteria established by ACC in Spring 2004. 
• Joseph Trimble’s (X3058, Joseph.Trimble@wwu.edu ) work group on QSR has already made a significant contribution to the new requirement by providing a set of criteria that were approved by ACC.   This work group will continue to be pivotal in helping departments and programs identify courses that might be considered for QSR designation.
• Janice Lapsansky (X7337, lapsansky@biol.wwu.edu ) will assist departments as they develop first-year seminar offerings. 

”Please contact the people noted above for assistance or with questions. .  . (letter from Provost Bodman to Academic Deans and Department Chairs, dated October 18, 2004)

TIMELINE

Bodman emphasized the tight timeline on this, and that the catalog has to be put to bed by March 1^st.

Bodman will continue to update with a bi-weekly “e-gram” to Deans and Chairs, forwarded to ACC and GER committee members.

Creative Experience Component

In response to questions Downing confirmed the Committee will revisit this, very likely next year, but also stated that it could represent an increase in the GUR program.  The area is insufficiently defined and is not, as many believe, in effect a fine and performing arts requirement.

ROUTING for Courses with No Formal Home

§         Several orphaned courses that belong to no specific college need to find a proper routing for approval.

§         Associate Dean Kathy Knutzen suggested that a particular body should be assigned to review these orphaned courses that come from American Cultural Studies, Women Studies, International Studies and other areas, so that they get the same ordinary scrutiny as other courses.  Writing II course which are new courses for the GERs should go to the appropriate college committee, and then on to the GER Committee.  Commissioners insist that all courses go to a college curricular committee, including First Year Experience.   If they have a question, they should contact the ACC Executive Committee. The Executive Committee will provide a motion formalizing this for the next ACC meeting.

§         If it is at some point deemed artificial or unreasonable to have all interdisciplinary and non-disciplinary courses vetted by a college curricular committee, we may wish to establish an “Interdisciplinary Programs Review Committee” or something to that effect. We should try to avoid committee proliferation, however. 

WRITING POINTS   

Chair Downing explained that some departments did not want to specify certain courses as writing proficiency, but wanted to have points assigned to courses in which there was some concentration on writing, but not as much as is required for a writing proficiency course as currently described, and several of these could add up to constitute writing experience similar to that gained in a single writing proficiency course (say one point for each of three courses, with a requirement that students accumulate at least three such points). The Registrar has found this difficult to administer in the case of Geology, which has had a “pilot” point-system in operation for several years.  Communication has started something similar (as limned in the current catalog).   Accounting has been considering following suit.

o        Provost Bodman noted that with the arrival of “degree auditing”, the point system seriously complicates the tallying and recording of writing credits, and the Commission considered this “proliferation” problem.

o        The programs work well, although their success rate is not measured, but they appear to be good and sustainable models.  Several guests were present to ask the ACC to approve the point process or to designate what the process should be.  Commissioners learned that in a degree audit system everything has to be quantified.  Members discussed the merits and complex nature of the point system for writing.  Bodman noted one of the flaws is that the catalog does not identify which is writing proficiency, and we cannot have a system which is centrally “indeterminate”.

o        Commissioners decided to declare a moratorium on any further efforts in this direction.

o        Speaking against points, Jeff Newcomer suggested “a sequence of courses flagged as completing the writing proficiency.  Just the third course will not satisfy the conditions.  It will be noted as third in a system that meets the requirement.  Don’t even give a flag for the first two. Just flag the third course.  By flagging the courses you still have a control.

MOTIONS

§         Jeff Purdue made a motion, seconded by Jeff Newcomer, that “we form an ad hoc committee to look at writing proficiency for this year” (and to report back not later than the end of February), which passed.

§         Jeff Newcomer made a motion, seconded by Jeff Purdue, that “we put a moratorium on new writing proficiency point systems”, which passed unanimously.

General Studies Major.

Members continued discussion on how to address the general studies major and help to relieve tension between the desire for greater planning and the need to get students through who don’t have a major until late in their senior year. There was  also considerable discussion of the matters of advising and accessibility. 

¨       Kathy Knutzen suggested that General Studies needs to be run out of some academic configuration where it will have some oversight.  Knutzen suggested “maybe we would have General Studies in the Humanities that would run thru CHSS, or General Studies in the Sciences, or General Studies in the Social Sciences; this would give it structure and a home.  Currently we are talking about the degree for all the wrong reasons.  Better to give the degree some integrity by having some oversight or somebody who says ‘I approve your degree’”

¨       Begin to form some templates within a college.  Certainly if CBE had a “General Studies” in Business they could control it better.  Russ Tiberii seconded the idea, calling the degrees a “General Studies “Humanities” Concentration for example.   Saving a certain number of spots for students within a college will take care of some of the access issues.  Matt Wood, student member, asked if the General Studies major could be phased out.

¨       Jeff Newcomer agreed with Matt that we should abandon what we do and choose one direction or another.  Let the colleges decide if they want to offer a general studies major within their colleges, and those that don’t want to don’t have to.  Another idea, so as not to interfere with the early planning required of the student designed majors, is to not offer the General Studies major until after 150 credits, or some other assigned number have been accumulated.

¨       Provost Bodman stated that the average General Studies student usually exceed by 2/3 of a year all other credits by graduating students.

¨       Grant Donnellan recounted that in the Music Department there is excellent advising throughout, but when a student gets to senior year and can’t hack the senior year requirements they still deserve a college degree, so they get a B.A.  with a “music emphasis”.

¨       Newcomer countered with the fact that in engineering technology, this was meant as a nice safety net, but because you can go into it, they tend to choose it, when they could be capable of doing one of the more difficult degrees.

¨       David Curley decribed the very different kinds of students ending up with this degree:  1) they cannot be accepted into any major --we give them degree as pretense; 2) they go through a major and find they cannot meet requirements to the major, such as in psychology.  But these requirements ought to happen sooner, so they learn the bad news earlier; or 3) For personal reasons they choose not to finish what they started.  Curley suggested we meet the needs of students best by having some process that says okay if you need to get out of here, here is the major that will let you do this.

Recommendations

§         Commissioners noted that students are misinformed about the student designed major, and that needs to be addressed.

§         Make a commitment to the colleges -- identify some body in the college to review their work and support them.

§         Fix timing issues with student designed majors; fix details in the catalog so they know how far ahead they must plan.

§         Redesign the general studies major.

§         Bodman:  Part of the problem here is created by extremely uneven entry level requirements in majors; GPA requirements are uneven.  Why is a student in good academic standing denied access to a major?  We operate “a benign oligarchy” We don’t actually know if there are more people who want to get into psychology, for example, is it a zero or 1000?

§         Insist on “barrier” courses occurring earlier in the student’s college career.

§         Enable a student to find out how to fit some pre-designed template.

§         General Studies majors tend to stay in their cluster.  So define a framework of courses set up for that particular cluster. Not hard to move from a major to that cluster.

§         Members will continue discussion next meeting.

AGENDA ITEMS

Action Items

Reading of College Curricular Committee Minutes.

The following Curricular Committee Minutes came before the Commissioners:

College of Humanities and Social Sciences, 5/201/04.  Approved.

Adjournment

Commissioners adjourned at 6:03pm.

Rose Marie Norton-Nader, Recorder, October 19, 2004.  Revised by the Chair.

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