Queensborough Community College
of the City University of New York
ACADEMIC PROGRAM REVIEW
A.A. in Liberal Arts and Sciences,
Including Week-end Program
Program Review Committee:
Aranzazu Borrachero
Megan Elias
Wei Lai
Vartan Messier
Jane Poulsen
John Talbird
Sponsoring Department Chairs:
Joseph Culkin, Social Sciences
David Humphries, English
Sharon Reeves, Foreign Languages & Literature
Gil Visoni, History
Administrative Support:
Ian Beckford
Arthur Corradetti
Victor Fichera
Elisabeth Lackner
July 2013
Queensborough Community College
of the City University of New York
I.
PRIORITIES FOR THE FUTURE: NEXT FIVE YEARS
1. Space availability
Besides evaluating the success of the new scheduling template that the College is
currently implementing, the self-study committee recommends that the College start
searching for additional solutions to space problems, including the physical
expansion of current instructional and office space. The committee also
recommends that future plans for office expansion include spaces for private
meetings between faculty and students.
2. WE1 degree program
The committee recommends that the College consider phasing out the WE1
program in view of its decreasing enrollment.
3. Enrollment numbers
Future monitoring of enrollment figures in the LA1 degree program should assess
the impact of the new Pathways curriculum on enrollment, paying particular
attention to classes, majors and programs that are more affected by the curriculum
change. Future LA1 reviews should include an analysis of enrollment figures in
relation to the new curriculum.
4. Technology
The committee recommends that the College equip every LA1 classroom with a
digital podium or equivalent, and that it conducts a college survey to assess which
additional technological devices would be most useful for classroom instruction.
5. Online teaching
The committee recommends that online courses be assessed as online courses,
including the assessment of student learning in this modality, benefits and
disadvantages to the student population, and both quantitative and qualitative data
(i.e. students’ and instructors’ evaluation of their online teaching experiences).
Continued and/or expanded online offerings should be based on the quality of
student learning rather than on issues of conserving classroom space.
6. Advisement
Advisement by instructors and advisors will play a key role in:

Helping students understand the Pathways common core.
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Queensborough Community College
of the City University of New York

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Guiding them through the selection of an area of concentration that responds
to their professional and intellectual interests.
Ensuring consistent enrollments in courses that are essential to most Liberal
Arts degree programs, but that have been excluded from the Pathways
common core.
Because the Liberal Arts program is the largest in the College, it is not possible in
terms of time or staffing to provide each incoming student with several advisement
sessions. Therefore, the committee recommends the following actions:
 The use of faculty mentors to support students in their choice of
concentration.
 The designation of one faculty member in each department to serve as
liaison with the advisors. Faculty liaisons should maintain an on-going
conversation with advisors on the challenges arising from advising into the
new curriculum and new concentrations.
 The postponement of decisions about concentrations until the end of the
students’ second semester. At that point, students may know more about
what interests them. Given that retention numbers at QCC suffer
considerably after the first year of study, the choice of the concentration may
also help create a sense of connection that brings the student back for a
third semester.
 Overall, the committee would like to emphasize the pressing need for a wellstructured and well-staffed advisement process at the time of implementing
the Pathways common core curriculum and 15 concentrations.
The review committee thinks that it may be advantageous for faculty within the
disciplines to become involved in advisement for students registered in
concentrations.
7. Assessment
The committee also recommends that the Office of Institutional Research compile
the following data for analysis:


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Effect of the concentrations on second-year retention
Occurrences of switching from concentration to concentration
Enrollment figures in the different concentrations
Number of students that graduate in the same concentration they chose as
freshman and its correlation with loyalty-to-major at other CUNY colleges
 Effect of the Pathways common core on LA student retention and graduation
rates
 Pedagogical efficacy of LA courses that have been created or modified to be
included in the Pathways common core
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Queensborough Community College
of the City University of New York
The committee would also like to survey entering freshman students about the
concentration selection process. Knowing what factors play into the decision might
help the college in its provision of advisement and perhaps in tailoring
concentrations to student interests. Students who change concentrations should
also be surveyed about their decision to switch.
The committee recommends that the Office of Institutional Research study the
following:
 The correlation between the entering and exiting grades of students who
graduate. This might offer some explanations for the difference between
students’ entering grades (C/C-) and exiting grades (B/B-).
 The correlation between grades and other academic indicators of students’
preparedness for college. This data might be particularly helpful in assessing
the academic preparedness of students who score at the lower end of the
cutting-off grade (75) in the Regents examination.
8. Reading and writing
The committee recommends a more intense effort to understand the experiences of
students coming out of reading and writing remediation and transitioning into
English 101:
 Is there a progressive increase of expectations between remediation courses
and basic composition courses? Or is it an abrupt increase of expectations
and demands?
 Is there sufficient communication between Academic Literacy faculty and
English faculty? Have they had the chance to compare and contrast each
other’s curriculum? May they consider teaching each other’s classes to
achieve a better understanding of students’ learning processes in
remediation and composition classes?
Considering that the LA1 student population is becoming increasingly diverse (A3,
p. 9) and that there seems to be a consistent growth in the number of students
speaking languages other than English at home, ESL students’ low passing rates in
remediation classes might indicate a need for new kinds of support services. Two
semesters of traditional remediation might not work to bring these students up to
college level in reading and writing. The committee recommends that the College
study the learning curve of ESL students more closely and that it address the
probable need for a different type of remediation, one that targets ESL students’
challenges in a more integral way (i.e., taking into consideration the cultural,
academic and personal variables cited under Major findings: Remediation).
9. Faculty and staff
For the benefit of QCC students’ academic experience, and for the integrity of
QCC’s intellectual community, the importance of hiring full-time faculty cannot be
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Queensborough Community College
of the City University of New York
overstated. The committee recommends that the College make the creation of fulltime lines in all LA1 departments a priority. In addition, the committee recommends
that the College continue to strive to diversify its faculty and staff in order to reflect
the rich diversity of its student body as much as possible.
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