Undergraduate Curriculum Forum (UCF)

Minutes 2/16/06

Present 

B. Phelan, R. Vaters-Carr, J. Feng, G. Kowalczyk, Frank Sansone, D. Weiss, R. Glinka,  H. Podnar, A. Abugri, B. Achhpal, N. Marano, N. Henderson, M. Fede, E. Schmidt, E. West,  N. Chrissidis, N. Disbrow, J. Fields, R. Mugno, C. Dellinger-Pate, J. Goralski, R. Kustin, M. Moss, S. Bochain, D. Flynn, K. Gatzke, C. Weed, C. Novosad, K. Marsland, R. Hunter, M. Kiarie, J. Kenty-Drane,  J. Tait, W. O'Brien, N. Bobrek, L. Kohrn, K. Laing, B. Galla, K. Mauro, M. Heidmann

I.          Call to Order
The meeting was called to order at 9:44 a.m.

 II.        Announcements

The chair and UCF members welcomed Brittany Galla, our new representative from student government.  She will be replacing Melissa Kurowski this semester.

III. Chair's Report

The chair announced that several programs will be submitting program revisions based on mandates in the education programs.  He asked members if there was a method for streamlining this process, so that each individual program did not need to submit an entire program revision.  In discussion it was pointed out that the changes might mean different things for different programs, and UCF will probably need to see the ways in which the changes affect each individual program in order to approve the change.  It was suggested that in order to meet the deadline for this particular change, UCF might be able to approve an initial, block proposal for all programs, and complete a more in-depth review of each program revision at a later date.  It was pointed out that the deadline for this is fast-approaching.

IV.       Approval of Minutes of 2/2/06

The minutes from 2/2/06 were approved with one abstention.

V.        Approval of standing committee minutes of 10/20/05

New Programs and Innovations (NPIC)

NPIC minutes from 2/7/06 were accepted.

NPIC logged the following New Special Topics courses:

·        ART 498-01: The Urbino Experience

·        ENV 398: Environmental Systems Inquiry

Program Review and Assessment (PRAC)

PRAC minutes from 2/7/06 were accepted.

PRAC announced that they were continuing their discussion about appropriate assessment language to be recommended for the UCF standards document.  Their discussion focused on the appropriateness of using goals, objectives, and/ or outcomes.  PRAC also reminded us that they will be holding another assessment workshop on March 8th at 1:00.

University-Wide Impact Committee (UWIC)

UWIC minutes of 2/7/06 were accepted.

UWIC announced that they had held a "lively" discussion about the issue of plagiarism at SCSU after having received information from others (Faculty Senate, Judicial Affairs) who are discussing the issue.  They decided to present the following motion:

Motion:

"We recommend that all instructors provide information on their course information sheet about their policy on academic dishonesty."

The motion was seconded and discussed ensued. 

Ken Gatzke provided more information about UWIC's discussion, particularly in relation to the ethical and legal issues surrounding individual faculty members' plagiarism policies.  Nikos Chrissidis clarified that the recommendation was not meant to be a requirement, simply a recommendation from the UCF.  He said Sandy Bulmer of the Faculty Senate had said that such a recommendation from the UCF may be helpful.  Members expressed the usual confusion surrounding this issue, and once again, asked that the administration clarify this issue for faculty.  It was suggested that in the midst of this confusion, we might not want to make such a recommendation to faculty.  It was also suggested that we invite the campus constituencies who can speak to this issue to one of our meetings.

The chair proposed a substitute motion, which was accepted by UWIC:

• Motion:

The motion presented by UWIC concerning academic dishonesty will be tabled until we are able to devote a UCF meeting to this issue.

The motion was approved with two abstentions.

• Motion

A member moved that we suspend other business at this time and move to our guest speaker, John Mattia.

This motion was approved with one abstention.

VII.     Guest Speaker, John Mattia

John Mattia, who is responsible for the production of the University Catalogue along with Dr. Ellen Beatty, was welcomed by the chair and introduced himself.  He shared that he has been with SCSU for 50 years, beginning here as a student, and that he has been involved in the production of the catalogue for 38-years.

He explained that through the years, they have consistently worked to revise and improve the process.  He outlined the process for submitting information:  A letter is sent to department chairs in mid-November, along with a copy of the current catalogue.  Chairs look for existing syntax and informational errors and make those edits directly on the page, but are asked not to edit pending curricular issues into the catalogue.  Instead, they are asked to provide a list of items pending or items they are prepared to submit.  In the past, he explained, chairs had edited-in pending curricular changes anyway, and some of that information made it into the catalogue.  He explained that this will no longer happen. Instead, he will not make any curriculum changes until he receives approval documentation from the Provost.

Currently (as of last year), they are also providing two dates to which department chairs are asked to come and check over the proofs for any mistakes.  They intend to do this again this year, probably in April and early-June.

John Mattia pointed out that this summer, Kim Laing went through the entire catalogue and noted inconsistencies between the catalogue, CPR forms, and banner, which they are working to resolve.

He noted that when to print the catalogue had been in discussion for 30-years.  Currently, the catalogue is printed before the online version.  They are considering whether this process should change.

Members made a couple of suggestions for changing the layout of the catalogue, including the suggestion by Nikkos Chrissidis to include faculty members' names in the academic department sections instead of simply at the end of the catalogue.  John Mattia said he supported and would note this recommendation. He said he was also working on better ways to present the AUR information.   He explained that Dr. Ellen Beatty has final say in the catalogue production.

Rachel Vaters-Carr raised the issue of courses-not-offered-for-two-years being taken out of the catalogue.   She explained that this is a problem when those courses, even if they are not offered every two years, are located within programs, but don't appear in the catalogues in the year the students enter the program.  John Mattia explained chairs are asked to "box" courses that were not offered last year, are not being offered this year, and will not be offered next year.  When chairs "box" these courses, he removes them from the catalogue.  Chairs can reinstall those courses by simply xeroxing the catalogue from the year the course last appeared, and making note of the addition.  However, he said, if those courses are essential to a program's structure, the chair does not necessarily need to "box" them in the first place.  They can simply be left in the catalogue with the good faith they will be offered in the foreseeable future.  The process of taking courses out, he explained, is primarily in place to eliminate those courses which are unlikely be offered in the foreseeable future.

The meeting was adjourned at 10:51 a.m.

Minutes recorded by Nicole Henderson, Secretary for UCF