Minutes

Undergraduate Studies Committee of the Faculty Senate, January 10, 2003.

The meeting was called to order at 1:07 in Gore 218. Present were Kenneth Koford, Hilton Brown, Doug Buttrey, Michael Gamel-McCormick, Thomas Leitch, P.K. Krishnan, Julie Waterhouse, John Courtright, Joe DiMartile, , and Sara Acuff.

The minutes of the December 2, 2002 meeting were approved, with Michael Arenson’s name spelled correctly.

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John Courtright, Undergraduate Studies Office, presented a review of his office. He has six units reporting, and he described activities in each. Honors will soon have a new Associate Director. John feld that the McNair Fellows program was his favorite of the various problems. Other units are CTE, General Education, Writing Fellows, Undergraduate Research, and the Advisement Center. He noted that currently the Advisement Center spends a large share of its time on senior checkout and he hopes to focus more on actual advisement. He noted that the advisers all have master’s degrees and should be capable of doing a fine job of advising students.

New Business

1. Art History major and minor. There were minor changes--more modern art. The increase in modern at the expense of other areas was discussed, and the increase in 3^rd world art. The changes in the major were passed 7-0-1, and the minor 7-1-0.

2. Computer and Information Sciences. Name change for major, to Computer Science. Passed 8-0, without opposition.

3. International Relations major. Small change in economics requirement. This led to a detailed examination of the different categories, where some had International Trade and others did not. The rationale did not seem to fit the detailed changes. The committee asked that the rationale be expanded ands that it explain the reason to delete Comparative Economic Systems--did the economics department declare that it would not teach this in the future? Why the changed location of Econ 340?

4. Political Science Department minors, two changes.

Political Science minor, omission of POSC 300, methods. The committee was doubtful about the reason for omitting this course. Koford noted the 15 credit for a minor, but Waterhouse noted that 15 is the permitted minimum, and this minor has had this for a long time. Several committee members wondered if a person could be an educated political scientist without knowledge of statistical methods. Also, most of the minors would see such methods in their majors, it seemed--sociology, for example, so it could be sensible to include a waiver for allowing students who had methods elsewhere to count that instead. Then only a few students would need to take POSC 300. Or, maybe this is not information needed for a minor in political science. The department should state its views on these points. The department could note the distribution of minors by major to indicate if students already had the needed background.

Public Administration minor, delete. It was noted that there were few minors in public administration, and since the department did not feel this was a significant need for their department resources, given the low interest, the committee agreed that the minor could properly be deleted.

5. Latin American Studies major and minor. The main element, according to the program’s description, was updating the course list, after the granting of permanent status last year. Both sets of changes were approved 9-0.

6. African Studies minor. Gretchen Bauer, program Director, visited the committee and described the program. There were significant changes--focusing on new faculty, and also increasing the directed focus on Africa. It was asked if a core capstone could exist, but Bauer pointed out that most of the classes were fairly high-level and so could satisfy this need.

The committee voted 9-0-1 to approve the changes.

7. Foreign Languages and Literatures, new minor, Business Spanish. The committee noted that there was only a two-course difference between the new minor and the already-existing minor in Spanish. Also, the new business classes had previously been, it appears, lower-level courses. The committee requested that the FLL department explain the rationale for the new minor and show how it is clearly distinct from the already-existing minor.

Spanish Studies concentration. Small changes were seen, and it was approved 9-0-1.

8. Legal Studies minor. The only element was adding extra electives. It was noted that the EDUC course should be numbered 240. The UAPP course in Administrative Law and Policy is currently temporary, and should be gaining permanent status this winter. Sara Acuff had considered the course, and decided that it was a good Legal Studies elective. The minor’s changes were approved, including the correct numbering of the two courses.

9. Sociology, deletion of concentration in Data Analysis. This was voted 9-0, given the lack of students and faculty.

10. Mathematics B.S. degree. The underlying goal was to add applied classes that students could take, by having a list of such courses in other departments that used applied math. In its current proposed structure, the math department would decide on these courses and place them on the web, without bringing the list to higher committees. The Committee opposed this arrangement, and requested that the department find an alternative solution--either more specific language that would identify these courses, a list, or some novel approach. The request was voted 8-0.

11. Biochemistry major. Partly this involved updating courses to include more current material. This seemed sensible. The required credits for the major is 127, and that was questioned. The committee voted to ask the department to consider reducing the required credits to 124.

12. Art Department, BFA: Fine Arts, and Art, both dropping ART 315. Dropping this course seemed reasonable, given the problems with it, and the committee voted in favor. [The committee did not note the issues raised at the Coordinating Committee about the added credits in art history, or distributional changes.]

Old Business:

1. Animal Science: General Animal Science changes. The Animal Science department notes that they made a small error, in including in the program changes, also a change in the prerequisite to a course. That should go through a different approval process. With this change, the committee approved the changes. [The Committee did not note the small inconsistencies noted by the Coordinating Committee].

2. Agricultural and Technical Education, had erroneously included a line about “animal science” in its rationale for changes, and did not describe PRAXIS II. P.Krishnan gave us some background on this new state requirement for education students. The proposal was passed unanimously.

3. Multicultural studies--an e-mail communication with President Roselle was handed out and discussed.

The meeting was adjourned at 2:57.