Baccalaureate Core Committee

Voting members present: Aidas Banaitis, Kathy Becker Blease, Kelsey Emard, Dan Faltesek, Andrew Harker, McKenzie Huber, Jack Istok, Matthew Kennedy, Lori McGraw, Rene Reitsma, David Roundy, Rorie Solberg, Kaplan Yalcin
Voting members absent: Heather Arbuckle
Ex-Officio members present: DPD Director– Bradley Boovy; Academic Programs and Assessment – Heath Henry; WIC Director – Sarah Perrault Tinker; Ecampus – Karen Watte
Guests present: Peter Betjemann, Tim Jensen

1:00-1:30 – Discussion of Student Progression in Baccalaureate Core Writing Requirements – Peter Betjemann, Tim Jensen

• WR I, WR II, Synthesis and WIC
  • How does the sequence of courses prepare students to write inside their majors for WIC and how it prepares them to write outside their major with Synthesis courses?
    • Students seem to struggle with writing for upper-division Synthesis courses
    • Students are consistently underprepared to find and properly cite secondary sources in some Synthesis Baccalaureate Core (BC) courses.
    • Some units have adjusted their own programs to give students a course that better prepares them for writing in general.
  • What is the vision for writing for OSU?
    • Lower course caps
    • Not spread out over multiple years
      • First-year was originally three courses
        • WR 121 – expository
        • WR 122 – argumentation
        • WR 123 – research, information
          • These courses have been condensed and one of the courses was dropped.
          • Numbers of students taking WR 121 at OSU have dropped significantly as many students have been taken first-year writing at other institutions
    • They’d like to build out the writing sequence again.
  • Has there been any discussion in raising WR II to 4 credits, as well?
    • There has been some discussion about this already.
    • There is an additional 1-credit writing course call WR 195.
  • Is there anything the BCC can do to help with the writing requirements?
    • Ideally this will be a big part of the Bacc Core revisions
  • Do Synthesis courses require revisions?
    • While the revision process is recommended, it is not a requirement under Synthesis courses that students must revise their writing in these courses.
      • It is heavily implied, but can the BCC make a proposal to make this a more explicit requirement?
  • Can mini-lessons be used in upper-division courses to refresh students on writing?

Course Proposals

• Discussion Needed
  • AG 455/555 – Social Processes & Institutions
    • Already approved for SPI, but it does no longer seems to make sense for the category. They do a good job tying in with social processes, but there is not much on institutions.
      • Proposal is to change the title and add a graduate level
    • Motion to send back with questions about how it meets the institution requirement for SPI and also about the appropriateness of a grad course being in the category; seconded. Motion passes with 10 in favor, 1 against. 2 abstentions.
  • REL/PHL 308 – Cultural Diversity
    • Generally pretty well put together and seems to fit the category.
    • There are 10 traditions they look at and most come from a broad range of cultural backgrounds. Two of them are considered more Western traditions.
      • Students can pick any of those themes for their thesis; if they pick one of those Western cultures to focus on, does it meet the category requirement?
    • Can it be made clearer how these traditions influence different processes?
      • The committee will discuss this proposal further during the next meeting.
  • HSTS/REL 476/576 – Difference, Power & Discrimination
    • Will be discussed at the next meeting.

Category Review

• Discussion Needed
  • HDFS 201 – Difference, Power & Discrimination
    • Will be discussed at the next meeting.

Synthesis Graduate Teaching Assistant Ratios for Course Capacities Over 70

• Will be discussed at the next meeting.