ASCRC Minutes 4/19/05

Members Present: S. Derry, J. Eglin, L. Hayes, V. Hedquist, C. Johnston, D. McCormick, D. McNamer, E. Moore, V. Pavlish D. Potts, H. Thompson

Members Absent/Excused: A. Bissel, C. Healow, C. Henderson, J. Luckowski

Ex-Officio Present: L. Carlyon, A.Walker-Andrews

Chair Potts called the meeting to order at 2:10p.m.

The minutes from 4/4/05 were amended and approved.

Communications:

§ The Senate approved the C requirement for ENEX 101.

§ There was considerable debate about the draft General Education transfer policy pertaining to the creation of the General Education Council to approve courses that satisfy the MUS Core. The sentiment is that the Council should be advisory and members should be nominated by the various faculty governance bodies of the units. The Faculty Senate chair will be sending a letter to the Board of Regents.

§ The Provost announced at the meeting that the Regents have eliminated the American Indian Education course from the policy because of resource issues. A group has been assigned to evaluate the issue and come up with a recommendation.

§ Another issue debated at the Regents was requiring a minimum grade of C for general education transfer courses. This could be problematic for UM because of plus minus grading. Therefore, the Senate Chair is proposing an amendment to C-. Registrar Bain pointed out that this would actually make it more difficult for students to transfer. The current practice is to accept Ds.

§ The accreditation report went well. There was a recommendation that students be more aware of the learning outcomes and the general education program needs to be assessed as an integrated whole. It needs to be more transparent to students what general education is about. Assessment needs to measure whether students graduate with the qualities and skills outlined in the preamble. There will be another visit in five years.

Old Business:

§ There have been a few communications with regard to the articulation agreement between the College of Technology and the Accounting program. Chair Potts spoke to Registrar Bain about the program and he suggested that the Ts be removed from the College of Technology courses that apply to the program because COT is considered a unit of the main campus. COT courses appear on the student’s transcript unlike transfer credits from other institutions. Removal of the Ts is not agreeable to Stan Jenne, the chair of the Accounting Department. The T differentiates COT accounting courses from the School of Business Accounting courses and this differentiation is important to the accreditation. However, the abbreviation also slightly differentiates between the campuses by an additional letter in the suffix.

Ideally the request should be put on a level II form to be approved by the Board of Regents and then put in the catalog. If it is a legitimate degree program it should be in the catalog. Requiring students to petition for an approved program is absurd and somewhat disingenuous.

This issue needs to be resolved because other collaborations are pending between COT and Information Technology and Management and Marketing. The Board of Regents are also looking at the transfer difficulties between the two- year schools and the Universities.

It was suggested to invite Stan Jenne to ASCRC or have a meeting with him, and a few others to resolve the issue. It is necessary to understand the position of the accrediting body on the issue to come up with the best solution. Chair Potts will contact Jenne and committee members should think of questions.

There was discussion about the trust that takes place with the transfer of any credits. The University basically trusts the academic integrity of the agency where the course(s) were taken. It is assumed that if the student does well in upper division courses than the lower division core was appropriate.

Draft language was discussed to be added to pg 17 in the catalog under the Vocational Technical Credits section. The committee eventually voted to change the limit from 10 to 30. There were 6 members in favor, 3 apposed and 2 abstentions.

The petition process in this language is different from the appeals that go to the Graduation Appeals Committee. These petitions are taken by the Registrar’s Office and maintained in the student’s file until they apply for graduation. At that time the student’s record is checked to see whether they changed majors and then the credits are counted. Petitions related to vocational transfer credits go to the Graduation Appeals Committee only if the request is over the number identified as allowed in the catalog. This has been the practice for forestry students, who have been granted an exception.

§ The proposed new Social Work courses (475 and 480) were approved.

New Business:

§ Associate Provost Walker-Andrews provided samples of the three latest appeals to scores on the writing proficiency exam. The exams either received a score of 2/2 or 2/3.

The meeting was adjourned at 3:45 PM.