Members Present: J. Eglin, K. Hill, S. Kalm, S. Miller, D. Pletscher
Members Absent/Excused: S. Greymorning, T. Manuel, G. Smith R. Welsh
Ex-Officio Present: L. Carlyon A.
Walker-Andrews
Chair Eglin called the meeting to order at 3:08 PM.
The minutes from
Communication:
§
The Gen Ed committee briefly discussed the
revised BOR general education transfer policy.
Chair Eglin pointed out the various changes. 1. a)
27 rather than 30 credits can transfer for a general education program. This was to accommodate MSU’s
new core. 2. a) Stipulates that if a student has less
than 20 credits in the general education core then they will be required to
meet the general education requirements at the institution to which they are
transferring. 6. The draft policy also
sets up a committee to review courses that meet the transferable core
requirements; and 8. There is now a required course in Native American heritage
and culture to be included in the campus general education curriculum or as a
separate requirement for all baccalaureate degrees.
§
The preamble was presented to the Faculty Senate
as an information item and senators where encouraged to send comments to Chair
Eglin. He has already received a few. One in particular finds the use of
inter-disciplinary inappropriate because the meaning implies collaborative
courses rather than a selection of courses from many disciplines. The committee agreed that multi-disciplinary
would be more appropriate. The committee set a deadline date of
New Business:
§
The committee spoke briefly about some of the
suggestions made by Tim Manual. There
was a comment that the proliferation of courses isn’t necessarily a bad
thing. The current criteria for the
perspectives do not have a mechanism for measurment. It was suggested that at some point a
template should be developed for the various criteria. However, the committee first needs to decide
on the structure, which leads to the question of whether there is agreement
that general education should be foundational rather than distributional. If requirements are too tight students do not
have an opportunity to explore.
The committee needs to explore different models that follow the preamble, meets
the needs of students, and accommodates credit intensive professional programs.
The meeting was adjourned.