NPIC Meeting Minutes March 7, 2002 (amended)

Present: David Pettigrew, Mark Spence, Chuck Wieder, Tom Fleming, Troy Paddock

The Following courses were officially received by the Chair and read into the record

Special Topics Courses - Notifications received:

ART 498 Motion Graphics

CHE 498 Special Topics in Inorganic Chemistry

COM 298-02 Documentary in Mass Media

GER 398 Turn of the Century Vienna

JST 298-01 Beginning Hebrew I

JST 298-02 Introduction to Jewish Civilization

JST 298-03 Introduction to Prophetic Literature

PSC 298 Latin American Security

THR 498 Theatre Techniques

URB 298 The City, Globalization and Conflict

URB 398 Urban and Cultural Theory

URB 498 Planning & Urbanization in Connecticut

The group discussed the Academic Strategic Plan in preparation for the UCF's scheduled discussion of the plan on March 14, 2002. Prof. Paddock reported that Prof Tait requested that we identify concerns that might have broader relevance for the UCF

The following is a summary of the main points of our wide-ranging discussion..

*We discussed our concern that faculty should be more involved in the development and finalization of the Academic Strategic Plan.

*We discussed our concern with the language that permeates the plan. The title "managing a learning organization" and the emphasis on "numbers" seems to appropriate a conceptual model that is fundamentally corporate rather than academic in nature.

*Specifically, we found that the document stresses the "management of a learning organization," thereby reducing our work to the maintenance and increase in numbers of students. Apart from the fact that the University has thought about "growing" smaller in order to better serve a smaller number of students, the emphasis on managing and increasing numbers fails to address our more essential academic mission.

*We were concerned that the emphasis on "professional development" does not recognize our autonomy and integrity as research scholars.

*The description of mission of our graduate programs as responsible for the production of "professional practitioners" strikes us as unduly restrictive in its exclusion of research.

*Identified the urgent need for improved communication between Sponsored Programs and Research and Institutional Advancement and the academic mission of the faculty at SCSU

*We were critical of the approach the document takes to assessment, emphasizing as it does narrowly identified outcomes. We discussed at least one potential alternative known as "authentic, embedded, performance-based assessment.," that would highlight and support crucial moments in the learning process.

Respectfully submitted,

David Pettigrew