EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE MINUTES
Present: Alloway,
Bradford, Fech, Flowers, Hachtmann, La Cost,
Ledder, Lindquist, Rapkin, Moeller, Prochaska-Cue
Absent: Bolin, Zimmers
Date: Wednesday, June 13, 2007
Location: 213 City Campus Union
Note: These
are not verbatim minutes. They are a
summary of the discussions at the Executive Committee meeting as corrected by
those participating.
______________________________________________________________________
1.0 Call to Order
Bradford called the meeting to order at 2:34 p.m.
2.0 Announcements
No announcements were made.
3.0 Approval of 5/30/07 Minutes
No objections to the minutes
were made and the minutes were approved.
4.0 Unfinished Business
4.1 General Education
Proposals
Bradford
noted and thanked Ledder for summarizing the points of proposals three and
four.
Bradford
stated that it is his understanding that departments will submit a list of
courses to their college curriculum committee for approval as an ACE
course. If approved, the courses would
then go to other colleges’ curriculum committees. Bradford asked
about the involvement of the University Curriculum Committee (UCC). Ledder stated that there is a certain amount
of time when another college can challenge a course on the list. He noted that an example of this could be the
Arts & Sciences
College objecting to all
writing courses that are not being taught in the English department. Bradford
asked if there is a limit on how many challenges can be made. He pointed out that the proposals do not
explain what the college committees are supposed to do with the list. Ledder stated that there might be some
inconsistencies that need to be resolved in the proposals. He pointed out that he does not think the UCC
will be very involved in the process. He
noted that the ACE committee will act as a surrogate to the UCC.
Moeller asked how the people will
be selected to serve on the ACE subcommittee that will approve the
courses. Ledder stated that the proposal
calls for one voting member from each college for a total of eight.
Ledder stated that he thinks the
proposals could be combined. Bradford stated that he has stylistic concerns about the
proposals. He noted that parts of the
proposals are rules and parts are justification. He questioned whether the justification is
needed in the actual rules.
Moeller asked for clarification
of the approval process for the college courses. She noted that the departments submit their
proposed courses to their own college curriculum committees, then they go to
other colleges’ curriculum committees, and then to the ACE subcommittee. Bradford
stated that the other college curriculum committees and the ACE subcommittee
review the courses simultaneously. Ledder
stated that if a course gets challenged by the colleges’ curriculum committee
then it needs to be discussed. He noted colleges
must submit any challenges within a specified period of time. Bradford
pointed out that if a course does not get approval from the other colleges representatives
on the ACE committee it will not be put on the list of approved ACE
courses.
Lindquist noted that proposal
four states that “a list of the courses will be made available for review and
comments before ACE Committee action.”
He asked whether people other than those on the college curriculum
committees can make challenges to courses.
Ledder stated that the ACE Committee will just post a list of
courses. Bradford
stated that the proposals are not clear on whether the courses can be
challenged by others. Ledder stated that
more people or groups should be able to formally challenge a course, such as
members of the ACE committee. He pointed
out that the details of this have probably not been discussed yet and he
reminded the committee that these are rough draft proposals.
Alloway asked if it takes a
unanimous vote of all eight members to approve a course. Ledder stated that this is his understanding
of the proposal. Fech stated that it
might be useful to have information within the documents, maybe as a footnote,
explaining some of these things. Bradford suggested that there be a clean document with
just the rules and another one that is more explanatory. Rapkin stated that justification could be put
as an appendix in the document. He noted
that a flow chart of the process for approval would be helpful.
Bradford
stated that he sees problems of having any course that is established as
equivalent through articulation agreements with other schools considered
eligible for credit as an ACE course. Ledder
stated that UNL needs to let other colleges know that there are similar courses
here and that they have to meet particular outcomes. Bradford
stated that UNL should encourage other schools to follow the ACE guidelines. He stated that UNL could give these schools
an incentive to do this by saying that courses must meet certain requirements
in order to be accepted by UNL.
Ledder stated that he thinks the
rules on accepting transfer courses could be problematic but he cannot think of
any alternative at this time. He pointed
out that one of the reasons for UNL to switch over to the ACE program is to
make things easier for transfer students.
Bradford noted that accepting all of
the transfer courses could give students another incentive for going to
community colleges.
Moeller asked how students are
going to document their courses through the year. She pointed out that it should be the
responsibility of the students to know that they have to meet the outcomes of
the course. Ledder stated that the ACE
program does not put the responsibility on the students. He argued that students should be responsible
for their own portfolio of work demonstrating that they met the outcomes for
these courses.
Alloway asked how UNL will be
able to determine whether the ACE content was met in the transfer courses. Bradford
stated that an ACE administrator will need to determine if a course meets the
outcome. Moeller stated that the
responsibility should be put on the students.
Rapkin stated that he would like
to see some figures on how many credit hours are transferred in from other
schools. Ledder stated that it would be
good to know how many credit hours are transferred in with schools where there
is an articulation agreement and those without an agreement. Ledder pointed out that we are tied with
giving credit to UNO and UNK courses whether or not they meet the ACE
requirements. Ledder stated that there
is no system that would be able to handle all of the transfer credits without
being overly labor intensive.
Lindquist stated that a possible
issue is with the use of the term course work in the document. He pointed out that some students could get
credit for internship or independent study courses. He wondered whether course work would stop
some people from considering certain projects for acceptance into the ACE
program. Ledder stated that he is
particularly interested in getting credit for these independent studies and
projects. He pointed out that this
should not be difficult to do. Bradford noted that this kind of work will need to be
evaluated anyway.
Bradford
stated that proposal four does not discuss recertification of courses for the
program beyond their initial approval.
He stated that courses should need to go through the same process for
recertification as when they are originally approved. Ledder pointed out that the original
certification procedure does not discuss past practices. He stated that he thinks it would be strange
to have the same process for recertification as when a course is first accepted. He stated that when a course is being
recertified it should have to show results that it was effective as an ACE
course. Alloway pointed out that one of
the reasons for revising the general education program is the concern of the
faculty about a lack of review and recertification of courses in the current
ES/IS program. Ledder stated that he
would like to see a formal section on recertification. Bradford
agreed.
Ledder stated that he does not
like the idea of having an 8-0 vote needed for recertification. He pointed out that one person could veto a
course simply because they don’t like it.
He stated that this should not be allowed to occur if the results show
that the course has been successful.
Ledder noted that he does not know if the GEAC committees planned to
write a recertification section. Bradford stated that he thinks this section is
needed.
Rapkin asked why there needs to
be a unanimous vote. Ledder stated that
this is because of the state law that says that each college can choose their
own curriculum. Bradford
pointed out that if the proposals are approved the procedures will not violate this
state law.
Lindquist noted that if the
requirement of having a unanimous vote is kept there needs to be a very clear
process on how a vote can be appealed.
He pointed out that people would need to know how the course can be
corrected in order for it to be accepted.
Bradford
stated that there should be discussion about the composition of the
committee. He stated that he does not
understand why the UCC cannot be the committee that does the work of approving
the courses for the ACE program. He
stated that the committee could still function with a 7-1 vote of the college
representatives. Ledder wondered whether
the person appointed to the ACE subcommittee would be a different person than
the one on the UCC. He stated that he
believed that it would be better to have people on the ACE subcommittee who
were genuinely interested in general education and not just the curriculum
committee. Bradford
suggested that the non-college representatives from the UCC would have a
broader overall perspective on the curriculum.
Ledder stated that he thinks the composition of the subcommittee will
generate a lot of discussion.
Ledder stated that there should
be some mechanism that allows students to make a request to have exceptional
work they did for a course counted towards meeting an outcome. He noted that generally, the requirements
that are set up for course proposals looks good and it is simple. Bradford
stated that the form does not require much work for the faculty member but the
department form might be different.
Alloway noted that point number
ten in proposal four discusses the need for student products in an ACE course. He questioned whether the guidelines would
allow for recordings of creative works like plays or concerts. Bradford
stated that he believed they would.
Ledder stated that there is a flaw in number ten that could generate
objections. He noted that no distinction
is made between individual or collective work.
He stated that collective work can be allowed but credit needs to be
given for individual work.
Ledder stated that he did not
think the requirements on the instructor will cause much discussion because
they will just need to write a short analysis of what the students did in the
course.
Bradford
stated that he does not believe that evidence collected in the assessment
section will not be used for personnel and budget decisions. Ledder noted that the assessment should not
be intended for these uses.
Bradford
asked if there will be a representative group of faculty members who will help
develop scoring guides. Ledder stated
that what is in the proposals sounds similar to what he suggested. Bradford
asked what group of faculty members will act as the ACE Assessment Team. Moeller pointed out that it needs to be
faculty members who are vested in general education. She suggested that the Academy of Distinguished
Professors could be involved. Bradford
stated that the selection process for this assessment team needs to be
clarified and needs to be specific.
6.0 New Business
6.1 ASUN
and Electronic Balloting
Bradford
reported that when the Executive Committee officers met with the ASUN officers
ASUN discussed having an on-line voting procedure for the election of their
officers although there is concern with security issues. He stated that ASUN is interested in sharing
the cost of having a program written with the Faculty Senate for email
balloting.
Bradford
pointed out that the Board of Regents approved email voting by the Senate and/or
by the full academic assembly. He stated
that an advantage of having a program written is that it would tabulate the
responses. He noted that if the
balloting is done by email for the Senate it would not be anonymous.
Bradford
stated that he will speak with ASUN to see what the costs will be.
6.2 Senate Webpage
Bradford
stated that the Faculty Senate webpage will be put on the university
templates. He asked the Executive
Committee to think about what features should be on the webpage and whether
things should be changed or added. He
asked that people with ideas email either him (sbradford1@unl.edu) or Karen (kgriffin2@unl.edu) with their ideas.
The meeting was adjourned at 4:12 p.m. The next meeting of the Executive Committee
will be on Wednesday, June 27 at 2:30 pm.
The meeting will be held in 201 Canfield Administration. The minutes are respectfully submitted by
Karen Griffin, Coordinator and Rick Alloway, Secretary.