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 The Arts and Sciences Council, October 18, 2016, 3:30-5:00, UMC 247

Meeting Minutes

Representatives present: Sabahat Adil, ALC; Daniel Barth, PSYC; Paul Beale, PHYS; David Bortz (for Vanja Dukic), APPM; Christine Brennan, SLHS; Andrew Cain, CLAS; Cathy Comstock, RAPS; Charles de Bartolomé, ECON; Kim Dickey, AAH; Erica Ellingson, APS; David Grant, MATH; Ruth Heisler, IPHY; Saskia Hintz, GSLL; Kwame Holmes, ETHN; Janet Jacobs, WGST; E. Christian Kopff, HNRS; Carl Koval, CHEM;  Joanna Lambert, ANTH; Julie Lundquist, ATOC; Ramesh Mallipeddi, ENGL; Stephen Mojzsis, GEOL; David Paradis, HIST; Lonni Pearce, PWR; Rob Rupert, PHIL; Kelly Sears, FILM; David Stock, EBIO; Ding Xue, MCDB; Masano Yamashita, FRIT

Representatives not present: Scott Adler, PSCI; Julio Baena, SPAN; David Ferris, HUMN; Holly Gayley, RLST; Mans Hulden, LING; Leslie Irvine, SOCY;  Fernando Riosmena, GEOG; Ted Stark, THDN;

Also in attendance: Vilja Hulden, HIST & LING; Steven Leigh, Neeraja Sadagopan, SLHS; Janice Jeffryes

Robert Rupert called the meeting to order at 3:34 PM.

Dean’s remarks, Steven Leigh

Dean Leigh congratulated the group on the Core Curriculum Revision, named and thanked the committees that contributed to the effort.

The Budget Committee met for the first time this semester. Due to the new enrollment budget system, the college is expecting an increase in the budget as we have more freshmen and better retention this academic year.

There has been an increase in start-up costs, mostly in the Natural Sciences, starting up labs that use expensive new technology. Dean Leigh would like to have a conversation with members of the faculty about better supporting those start-up costs.

Dean Leigh would like to begin strategic planning talks. The Chancellor has refreshed Flagship 2030 but Dean Leigh would like the college to be looking at its specific issues for instance:

• Within the university’s new budget system, what size should we be?
• Reviewing professional graduate programs and the process of developing them.
• Improving advancement.
• Infrastructure issues.
• Increasing the size of the college’s grants.
• How the university retains prominence as a research institution while charging tuition.

The assembled representatives questioned working towards having more graduate students on campus, how to fund them and make housing affordable. Colorado is 48th lowest in state funding per student so we have been leading the way in learning to work with reduced state support. The Chancellor recently mentioned working on retention and reputation; Dean Leigh noted that excellence in research and teaching will retain students and make our reputation.

The university is additionally burdened by the Taxpayer Bill of Rights (TABOR). Dean Leigh suggests we need a new social contract with the members of the public that understands the value of the university and will support it.

Chairs remarks, Rob Rupert

The Vice Provost for Undergraduate Education office under Mary Kraus is leading the work on the selection of a new . There is a lead committee that could use more faculty representation; let Professor Rupert know if you would like to be involved. The learning management system not only works with online courses but helps in the management of traditional “bricks and mortar” classes on campus so faculty input is crucial.

There is a process underway to review the Regent’s laws and policies. Article 4 has been reviewed and a draft of the changes has been made. If faculty members are interested in giving feedback, go through the department’s BFA representative. There are also changes being proposed to the APS in the Code of Conduct and Family Leave policies that can be ; feedback can also be given online. Professor Rupert encouraged the representatives to review the changes in both documents and consider the implications.

Professor Rupert and Dean Leigh have been discussing the development of Professional Graduate Programs. These are programs with a different tuition structure, tend to charge more and are financially self-sufficient. The goal would be for companies to see the need for the program and pay for student’s tuition. Faculty input is needed in what could be a large project.

There are currently three Professional Graduate Programs: Applied Shakespeare (certificate), a Masters of Environment and an Applied Math split degree.

There is a lot of interest in these programs and a big difference in how these are conceptualized so structure around them and quality feedback is needed from faculty. Contact Professor Rupert if you are interested in either curricular or strategic planning involving Professional Graduate Programs.

The ASC Executive Committee is responsible for setting and approving meeting agendas. Professor Rupert encouraged the representatives to provide ideas for subjects to discuss at the meetings. Please contact any committee chair with ideas.

Professor Rupert recently sent out an email concerning implementation of the core curriculum revision.

2. Core Curriculum Implementation Committee: The ASC should appoint a Core Curriculum Implementation Committee (CCIC) to facilitate the transition from the current core to the new core. In addition to other members, the CCIC would ideally include at least two faculty members who served on the CCRC, as well as representatives from A&S Academic Advising, A&S undergraduate education administration, and offices such as Information Technology that will be tasked with modifying and implementing new software systems.

The Executive Committee wants to move forward with forming the committee, the ASC has to approve the ad hoc committee and the Executive Committee select committee members including people such as Kathryn Tisdale from Academic Advising; Patrick Tally from the Curriculum Office; Kyle McJunkin, Associate Dean of Undergraduate Education; Cora Randall, previous chair of the Core Revision Committee; Leslie Irvine from the Curriculum Committee, David Stock from the Planning Committee. Faculty are invited to volunteer to join this committee.

Motion from the Executive Committee, do you vote to form an ad hoc committee to implement the core curriculum revision?

Motion carried by acclamation with one abstention.

Report from ad hoc committee on online education

The report from last year’s ad hoc committee for Online Education and Technology was distributed. When a committee issues a report that doesn’t require action, it needs to be entered into the record and sent to department chairs and program directors. Professor Rupert identified and thanked the members of the committee, most of who were in attendance to speak about the report and answer questions, Ruth Heisler, Dan Barth, Vilja Hulden, Neeraja Sadagopan, Tom Zeiler and Professor Rupert.

The report contains 5 parts:

I. Progress on action items from previous online committee recommendations.

In 2013, the ad hoc Committee on Online Education issued 5 recommendations; in the current report the committee looked into what, if anything, had been done on these. Professor Barth felt that the most important recommendation was to label the online courses as such and nothing has been done towards that goal. It appears the regents and administrators want the online courses to appear the same on transcripts. The committee wants to follow up on this issue.

• Professor Rupert recently spoke with Kyle McJunkin and he feels that the major push back on labeling is coming from the Registrar and best practices from a national organization of registrars doesn’t recommend labeling online courses.
• No online courses are taught in A&S Continuing Education and other colleges have courses taught completely online. Dean Leigh thinks it is a CCHE issue that keeps online courses from being labeled.
• In A&S online instruction happens within the regular structure of classes but faculty members still spend 3 hours a week in the classroom.
• Tenure and tenure track faculty teach summer courses online. So even though A&S doesn’t have online courses, their faculty are teaching them with regular A&S labels.
• Revenue sharing could be a possibility with faculty teaching online courses.

II. What do we know about the effectiveness of Online Teaching?

Research on the effectiveness of online education has been spotty and results are inconclusive. Reading the research seems to show that online courses can be as effective as classroom teaching to specific audiences and if done well. For instance, teaching writing online seems to have good results but is labor intensive. The thought that online courses can bring in a lot of revenue without a lot of labor doesn’t seem to be true.

There are more opportunities for hybrid classes and using techniques such as online discussions can be very valuable but instructors must commit to reading every post and responding. In a completely online course there is no face to face interaction.

There is no consensus that online courses broadens access. The least prepared students don’t tend to finish online classes and some household still lack internet. Online classes work better with well prepared, motivated students.

Enormous amount of cheating goes on with online classes. Different models to prevent cheating are being developed by groups that do online teaching.

Professionals in the field stress that online teaching won’t be easier; it will be harder.

At 2009 Department of Education study seemed to show good results for online education but most of the classes they looked at were either hybrid, with a face to face component, or additions to regular classroom courses. It is difficult to find good research.

Many people want to take online courses because they can’t come to campus. That would also exclude bringing students in for final tests that can be monitored.

Students can apply only 30 hours of Continuing Education credits to their degree. The courses are also generally more expensive. Students take them either because they are away from campus or because they want the flexibility that online classes offer.

III. Current Online Courses offered via Continuing Ed

Online courses offered through Continuing Education were listed.

SLHS offers online courses for distance learners. The grade distributions are different; online courses are skewed to narrow distribution and higher grades. A wider grade distribution is usually considered an indicator of rigor. SLHS offers two online programs, Speech Language Pathology Prerequisite Program for undergraduate students from other places trying to get prerequisites for the graduate program and Speech Language Pathology Assistants Program, a professional program for people with bachelor’s degrees who want to practice as an assistant.

Dean Leigh thinks we can develop more effective partnerships with Continuing Education, for instance, seeing if students on probation can benefit from online courses.

IV. Distance Education: Professional MA Programs Online

In section IV of the report, catalogues were surveyed to see what kind of online programs are available. Almost all of the MA online programs are in professional schools, engineering, health/nursing, public administration and business and finance. Arizona State is the exception offering online graduate and undergraduate degrees and certificates in nearly every field including the humanities.

V. The Future of Online Education at ���񱦵�

The final section of the report deals with the future of Online Education at ���񱦵�. Many unanswered questions are posed concerning logistical issues, faculty authority and other issues with online education. The college hopes to learn from those institutions that are doing online education well.

Motion to accept the report from the Online Education and Technology Committee.

Passed by acclamation with one opposition.

Professor Rupert let the representatives know that the late drop issue will be coming back to the ASC and asked them to consider what they want in that policy.

The meeting was adjourned at 5:02 pm.

Minutes submitted by Janice Jeffryes