Baccalaureate Core Committee

Baccalaureate Core Committee

November 16, 2015 ~ 10:00-11:30 AM

109 Gilkey Hall

Agenda

 

Voting members present: Gerd Bobe, Robert Brudvig, Susie Dunham, Kevin Gable, McKenzie Huber, David McMurray, Bob Paasch, Bill Smyth, Rorie Spill Solberg, Ariella Wolf

Voting members absent: Dennis Bennett, Isabelle Brock, Steve Giovannoni, Kira Hughes

Ex-officio members present: Academic Affairs – Heath Henry

 

CAT II Reviews

a.        ART 432/532 (DPD; New)

Action: Postpone to upcoming meeting.

 

b.        CH 122 & CH 123 (Physical Science; Change)  General Chemistry

• Request adding minimum grade restriction of C- in Chem 121 and 122 to proceed to the next course in the sequence.
• Syllabi and responses looked great, very thorough and detailed, good description of assessment plans.

Action: Approve

 

c.        CH 232 & CH 233 (Physical Science; Change) General Chemistry

·         Request adding minimum grade restriction of C- in Chem 231 and 232 to proceed to the next course in the sequence.

·         Syllabi were the same for both, but there was no course schedule outlining what will be done each week.

Action: Send back for inclusion of the course schedule.

 

 

d.        ENGR 352 (STS; New) Creative Collaboration: Designing and Building

·         Concerns: incomplete syllabus; lacks required materials – syllabus states that students must contact instructor; difficult to determine how it’s connecting to Science, Technology, and Society (STS); may not be accessible to students outside of Art and Engineering; and, is the course appropriate for the STS category? STS outcomes are weak across the board. How would this course be useful for students outside of Art and Civil Engineering?

·         Need to include descriptions of projects and exercises so determination can be made whether this qualifies as a course in the STS category. It was suggested this may be appropriate in a Literature and the Arts category as a three-credit course.

Action: Send back with above concerns.

 

 

e.        ES 231 (CD; Change) Introduction to Asian American Studies

• The only change is to add ‘Introduction’ to the title.

Action: Approve

 

 

f.         ES 357 (DPD; New) Farmworker Justice Movements

Action: Susie will review and discuss at an upcoming meeting.

 

 

g.        HEST 412/512 (CGI; New) Multidisciplinary Case Studies in Humanitarian Engineering, Science and Technology

·         Concerns: no grading criteria, no required text, and course assignments are unknown; send back for more information and reflection.

Action: David suggested meeting with the proposer to discuss the missing elements.

 

 

h.        PS 300 (WIC; Change) Research Methods

·         No DAS statement

Action: Rorie will check with the proposer re: DAS Statement and approve when DAS statement is added.

 

 

i.                     PS 322 (DPD; Change)

Action: Postpone to an upcoming meeting.

               

 

j.      REL 215 (CD; New) Introduction to Jewish Traditions

• New course; cross listed with History 215; the intent is for the same instructor to always teach both courses. This is a four-credit Cultural Diversity course. The Student Conduct link didn’t work – the instructor has been notified. Recommended approval with reservation of the course being four credits.
• Two members had an issue with this being a four-credit course rather than three credits.

Action: Approve upon correction of the Student Conduct link.

 

 

k.            SUS 103 (Physical Science; New) Intro to Climate Change

• Proposal looks ‘perfect’; approval recommended.

Action: Approve with no suggested changes.

 

 

l.              PS 346  

Action: Send back so proposer can add liaison and address the deeper conversation with History overlap. Add specific course number – Rorie will send Susie the course number to include in the request.

 

 

Rorie asked Heath to add a final question on Qualtrics for the reviewer to indicate what specifically is needed, or whether it can be approved to facilitate discussion. If approval is recommended, the chairs can approve without all discussing the proposal during a meeting. All present agreed with the suggestion.

Action: Heath will draft language and forward to Susie and Rorie prior to inclusion on the form.

 

BI 231/233 fulfilling– Follow-up

Background: Michelle Bothwell requested the BCC on November 2 to create extend an exemptionfor 231/233 to fulfull bacc-core requirements for biological engineering majors. Previously there was an exemption for two 300-level courses, for which no documentation could be found,  which are now at the 200-level and the course content is quite different from the previous 300-level courses.

Ariella discussed with Brock McLeod and Bob Mason who are  not interested in making the course Bacc Core; not interested in discussing an exception; they’re not aware of an exception in the past; the current class is totally different from the past course. Classes are tnot the same; BI is not interested in an exception or adding to the BACC Core courses. Can ask Michelle for an official request, with justifications, or Engineering can take care of it by exempting all of the courses (head advisor can make the exemption). Should BCC weigh in or leave it to the department to handle.

~ One felt that it the preference was to take the latter route of allowing the college to create a work-around and noted that it cannot be coded into MyDegrees – this would be an ongoing discussion with students during advising, and would need to occur every term. May risk raising confusion with the student. Hesitant to allow one-time exemption.

~ The BCC would develop questions to which the proposer would respond.

~ One felt that allowing an exemption for Anatomy & Physiology would be inequitable to other colleges which will not be allowed to have a work around for their students.

~ Another felt that the college work-around would also not be equitable to students in other colleges.

~ It was noted that community college articulation already creates a work around for transfer students.

~ Before taking action, it was suggested to review the 2008 BCC minutes to determine whether the minutes refer to an exemption.

Action: Rorie asked members to think about whether or not they are comfortable with making a decision related to the decision.

 

Send a Doodle to determine how many will be present for a meeting on Nov. 25. First poll those who have courses to review.

 

HST 350 – Category Review – Cultural Diversity

• Non-liberal arts majors may struggle with this course; there is a high number of low grades – high proportion of D’s and F’s – instructor indicted that the students didn’t do the last assignment, but didn’t indicate why they didn’t try.
• Syllabus lacks the course name, credits, pre-req statement, course specific measurable Student Learning O’s, DAS statement is missing, no link to Student Conduct statement.
• D

Action:  Provisional approval. Note to proposer that they must meet the minimum syllabus standards (provide link to APAA site); BCC observed a high proportion of DFW’s, but doesn’t appear to be any remedial change to achieve student success; and it appears to favor Liberal Arts major.