Baccalaureate Core Committee

Voting members present: Aidas Banaitis, Geoffrey Barstow, Daniel Faltesek, Kelsey Emard, Colin Johnson, Matthew Kennedy, Michelle McAllaster, Lori McGraw, Rene Reitsma, Kari-Lyn Sakuma
Voting members absent: Jack Istok, Randy Rosenberger, Justin St. Germain, Kaplan Yalcin
Ex-officio members present: Academic Programs & Assessment – Heath Henry; Difference, Power & Discrimination – Nana Osei-Kofi; Ecampus – Karen Watte; WIC – Sarah Perrault
Guests: McKenzie Huber, Michael Jefferis, Caryn Stoess

GenEd Implementation Management Structure – McKenzie Huber

• Outcomes: fully implemented OSU general education curriculum addressing best practices in higher education, equity & inclusion and transfer student needs. Operational in all relevant OSU systems.
• Spring 2023 – Senate Approval of LOCR >> Summer 2023-Winter 2025 – Course development and redesign institutes >> Fall 2023-Winter 2025 – BCC will review and approve courses >> Winter 2025 – Initial set of courses fully approved through CIM >> Summer 2025 – General Education goes live.
• Core teams – Learning Outcomes, Criteria & Rationale (LOCR), Baccalaureate Core Committee (BCC), Pedagogical Support and Development, Operations, Organizational Change Management.
• LOCR Updates
  • 108 applications
  • Based on strong applicant pool, the selection committee invited additional faculty to serve on each committee to promote diverse and holistic perspectives.
  • Each college and campus type is represented throughout the categories.
  • Timeline
    • December 14, 2022 – Mentor training meeting
    • January 11 – LOCR Workgroup Kick-off meeting
    • January 17 – Seeking Solutions Listening Session
    • February 67 – Listening Sessions & feedback
    • February 11 – Feedback from AAC&U based on VALUE rubrics
    • February 17 – Final LOCR Workgroup meeting to review LOCRs
    • February 20 – Present to Executive Committee
    • Present to Faculty Senate in March with an anticipated vote at the April meeting.

New Course Approval

• ENG 101 – Intro to the Young Adult Novel (Literature & the Arts)
  • It does not appear that any of the three learning outcomes are adequately addressed.
  • The reviewer feels that the course could meet the category, but needs some additional work.

Action: Motion to send back and request that they demonstrate historical context, influence logic, and effects logic and that they address the dispositive Ecampus question; seconded. The motion passed with 10 votes in favor, 0 votes against and 0 votes in abstention.

Discussion – GenEd Policies

• Instructor Training (cont'd)
  • Waiting for feedback from Regan Gurung.
• Use of University Learning Management (LMS) Platform
  • Some faculty do not use Canvas for a variety of reasons.
    • How big of a problem is it? How many faculty are refusing to use Canvas?
      • No exact numbers, but it seemed fairly extensive during Dan and Rene’s research in 2020.
      • Caryn noted that she is pulling syllabi from Canvas for a project and the majority of courses have a Canvas site.
  • It was a temporary requirement to set up a Canvas site during COVID, but it is no longer required.
  • Pros: standard accessibility, unify experiences, aligns with the new Course Specific Learning Outcomes (CSLO) policy, avoids secondary purchases/ala carte LMS vendors, continuity for review process, assessment could be managed through Canvas.
  • Cons: learning curve for instructors, current LMS is not most user friendly 
  • Should this be a strictly Baccalaureate Core (BC) policy or should it be a university policy?
    • Curriculum Council could enact a policy for all courses. BC only has purview over General Education courses.
    • Ecampus already has a policy in place.
  • Has the problem solved itself since 2020?
    • Many highly technical faculty tend to use their own sites – requiring the use of Canvas would align with existing Ecampus policies.

Action: Motion to accept the proposed policy - All General Education courses must make use of the University Standard Learning Management System for purposes of communication with students, distribution of syllabi/learning outcomes, and accessible grading information; seconded. Motion passed with 9, 0, 0.

• The Bacc Core chairs will reach out to the Curriculum Council regarding a university wide policy.
• Syllabus Publication
  • No university requirement to publish, some colleges have policies but it does not seem to be enforced and syllabi are not easily accessible to students.  
  • Pros: students need transparency and access to syllabi so they can make determinations in selecting courses, transfer student friendly policy  
  • Cons: third parties outside the university could see it as an opportunity to litigate, puts faculty at risk from threats  
  • The Registrar’s office is working on a process to get Course Learning Outcomes (CLOs) into CIM.
  • Some faculty make major changes from each time the course is taught – this could lead to students becoming confused or frustrated about the syllabus changes/inconsistencies. Faculty want the freedom and flexibility to make changes before the course starts.
    • Some faculty put the following or a similar statement into their syllabus - *NOTE: The instructor reserves the right to revise this syllabus during the course; students will be notified in writing of any revisions. The instructor reserves the right to assign and/or accept alternative learning activities or extend deadlines as deemed appropriate.
  • Ecampus once published syllabi, but it became difficult to manage as the number of courses grew. The exception are transfer friendly courses and they only publish a stripped-down version of the course syllabus.
  • Sometimes students want to see a syllabus to determine if there are exams or writing assignments and use them to make decisions on which courses to take.
  • Some schools/departments provide repositories with general syllabus information.
  • The committee elected not to impose a syllabus publication policy.