Baccalaureate Core Committee

Voting members present: Pat Ball, Isabelle Brock, Natalie Dollar, Filix Maisch, Weihong Qiu, Dana Sanchez, Bill Smyth
Voting members absent: Nancy Barbour, Bob Paasch, Inara Scott, Rorie Spill Solberg
Ex-Officio members present: Academic Affairs – Heath Henry, WIC Director – Vicki Tolar Burton
Guests present: Jon Dorbolo

• Category Reviews
  • Discussion Needed
    • MTH 323 (WIC)
      • The outcomes are denoted with bullets, but are referred to elsewhere by number. Recommend to the submitter that they use numbers throughout the syllabus to keep it consistent and clear.
      • Course specific outcomes are listed, but it is not clear in the syllabus how students are assessed on these.
        • Recertify, with minor syllabus changes
    • OC 334 (WIC)   
      • The verbatim statement is missing.
      • The third learning outcome has also been altered and is not verbatim
      • The grade distribution is not balanced
        • 96% of students got an A in the class
          • Only 45% of students met outcome 1
          • Only 65% of students met outcome 3
            • The instructor made a note about how bad some of the writing was, but despite this, and despite not achieving all course outcomes, a large number of students have received A grades.
      • The learning outcome table was submitted, but is not present in the syllabus.
      • It is not clear when revisions are taking place
      • The big assignment has been broken down into smaller parts. It was confirmed these parts are then submitted together and thus meets the 2,000 word minimum requirement
        • Decertify, send back for major revisions
          • It was discussed that submitters are not getting enough time to make the changes they need or to get an appointment with the WIC Director. It was recommended that the wording in the letter is changed, giving submitters until April 1 to have a plan in place for going forward. Changes to be made by May 1.

• Category II Reviews
  •  No Discussion Needed
    • AG421/521 (WIC)
      • It is missing the verbatim Baccalaureate Core statement
      • Approved, with minor syllabus change

• Discussion
  • The HB2998 outcomes were submitted for the Baccalaureate Core Committee to compare to current OSU outcomes
    • There are several recommendations for when students should be taking their courses (for example, Writing courses within the first 45 credits and the progression from WRI to WRII to WIC). How will this be enforced?
      • During the Baccalaureate Core revitalization, it was determined that students were not being successful or not completing their degrees because they were putting off their writing classes and coming into their WIC courses without taking WR II. The Baccalaureate Core began recommending that students take it during their sophomore year.
      • After a two year review, in which the recommendation was not actively enforced, it was observed that most of the colleges were following the recommendation on their own and it was decided that immediate enforcement was not worth the negative feedback, as most colleges were compliant without active enforcement or punishment.
    • It was noted that the learning outcomes for the Sciences (OSU Bacc Core Biological and Physical Sciences category) courses are vague and open-ended, esp. CSLO3
      • The learning outcomes need to be to cover a wide base so that all the sciences are covered and…Making any changes to the outcomes would require a vote by the Faculty Senate
    • There is significant concern among BCC members that students could fulfill the Science or Computer Science transfer requirement with ONLY computer science coursework. What are the unintended consequences? F. Maisch quickly checked that at least one Community College's computing science offerings (for an Associates) would make that a realistic possibility.
      • This could also allow students to fulfill the requirement without any coursework that would include no coverage of scientific reasoning principles
      • Additionally, there is no science LAB requirement in the block
      • And there is risk that Students will transfer to OSU and may find that they do not meet the General Education requirement for Science.
      • Thus there are concerns that Computer Sciences meets the Science General Education Requirement but not the content expectations
        • Students going into the Physical Sciences may find that they now need to take additional lower division science courses to meet the requirements
          • Recommended that they add an asterisk to the Computer Science course that it will not meet OSU’s General Education for Science requirements.
    • Cultural Literacy is covered in other categories, encouraging students to take courses that cover a range wider than just the US or Western Europe. While it does line up to fulfill OSU’s Cultural Diversity, there are concerns that making it a stand alone category would lead to students focusing only on Western Culture. (Also noting that our DPD specifically and intentionally does focus on the U.S. context, so even when a student reaches OSU, there’s no guarantee that they’ll take any coursework to stretch them beyond Western cultures.)
    • It is suggested that a great way to help students not lose credits or to save them money, would be to allow the backwards transfer of credits from Universities to Community Colleges, where credits might make them eligible for an Associate’s Degree
      • Dana made a motion to support the HB2998 when it goes before the Faculty Senate, seconded. Approved
        • Concerns will be brought to the attention of John Edwards and Alix Gitelman
  • Does OSU have a fragrance policy?
    • There is no university-wide policy in regards to fragrances
    • The WGSS Graduate Program does have a departmental policy in place, but it needs to be clear on their syllabi that it is a department policy only and not a university policy.