Academic Standards Committee
Minutes
November 21, 2011
Present: Debbie Chee, Duane Hulbert, Ben Lewin, Gary McCall, Sarah Moore, Kali
Odell (student), Lori Ricigliano, Brad Tomhave, Landon Wade, Maddi Werhane
(student), Ann Wilson, Paula Wilson
Approval of Minutes: The minutes of the meetings of October 31 and November 7
were approved as written.
Petitions Committee Report: Brad Tomhave gave the petitions committee report for
petitions for the Period 11/01/2011 - 11/14/2011
The Petitions Sub-Committee held meetings on November 7 and on November 14,
2011. The petitions work yielded the following results:
1 Approved Late Registration
3 Approved Schedule Conflict Registrations
1 Approved Medical Withdrawal
1 Denied Waiver of a Core Requirement
2 Denied Appeals of a Transfer Credit Evaluation
2 Approved Appeals of a Transfer Credit Evaluation
10 Total Petitions
Registrar Approved:
0
Preview Team Approved:
3
Sub-Committee Approved:
4
Total Approved:
7
Sub-Committee Denied:
3
Total Petitions:
10
For the year to date, 39 petitions have been acted upon with 8 involving late registration
and 12 involving registration with a schedule conflict. (For comparison, by November
16, 2010, 47 petitions had been acted upon with 15 involving late registration and 14
involving a schedule conflict.)
Of the 39 total petitions to date, 11 have been denied.
Of particular interest over the last two weeks were the 4 petitions concerning transfer
credit. The petitions concerned 3 students and the first student received approval to
apply a transfer course to the Core and denial to apply another transfer course to the
Core. The second student matriculated in 1979 and is completing the degree he never
finished and was granted special consideration by the Committee regarding his final
Core course. The third student asked to complete a Core requirement with a transfer
course dissimilar to any Puget Sound Core course and was denied because the
student's schedule could accommodate the Core requirement in question.
Report from Paula Wilson regarding formation of a joint subcommittee of members of
ASC, CC and IEC to discuss the six week requirement for summer courses.
Lisa Ferrari called a meeting on 11/11/11 with representatives from the ASC (Paula Wilson
went), CC and IEC to discuss summer course length when it deviates from the current norm of
six weeks length and 45 contact hours. At the end of the meeting, she asked each of us to
request a volunteer from our respective committees to serve on a subcommittee to consider
questions to ask regarding the length of summer courses in order to merit one unit of academic
credit. I agreed to volunteer on the subcommittee. ASC members were asked to share their
thoughts about criteria to consider for academic credit. Sarah Moore offered that it is not just
about seat time. Currently, summer courses over six weeks meet for 45 hours. Some duration is
needed for reflection. Brad Tomhave reported that faculty believed six weeks of calendar time
was needed, especially if students had to complete a research paper. Duane Hulbert asked
whether any requirements exist, such as a paper after returning to campus.
Report from ASC subcommittee looking into mechanisms for implementing the Student
integrity code: Ann Wilson, Lori Ricigliano, and Debbie Chee reviewed the work the ASC
committee completed last year. They considered a checklist but decided lists were not effective.
The Matriculation Ceremony was mentioned as an avenue and Ann Wilson noted that currently
only undergraduates participate. The Academic Honesty Tutorial that library staff developed pre
Prelude was mentioned. A suggestion was made to consider another survey for students
already on campus. Items could be added to the Spring Survey on academic integrity. If we go
this route, we need to submit items to Institutional Research before the end of January. Sarah
Moore asked what we wanted to learn from the survey. Ann Wilson suggested we generate
some questions to see if we can get at what we want to know. Sarah suggested meeting with
Ellen (IR) to ask for her ideas.
Continuation of discussion on creating a mechanism for staff members to report a
violation of academic integrity: Last meeting ASC talked about creating a mechanism for staff
to report a violation of academic integrity. Ann Wilson gave us a Handout titled “Proposed
revisions to Response to Violations of Academic Integrity academic Handbook 2011-2012 p. 4
1.D” with Version 1 authored by Bill Barry and Version 2 authored by Brad Tomhave. (To
include Handout as an attachment). The wording is in addition to faculty reporting violations in
the classroom. Debbie Chee and Gary McCall like Version 2 and Ben Lewin believes Version 1
could cause tension. If a violation of academic integrity is a second offense, it goes to a hearing
board. The committee discussed that the staff-reporting process departs slightly from the
current faculty-reporting process to the extent that a first offense might be forwarded to a
hearing board for sanctioning, should viable sanctioning options not be under the purview of the
associate dean who is serving the role normally held by the course instructor. It might go to a
hearing board at strike 1. Ann Wilson summarized the discussion by saying it sounds like we’re
leaning toward Version 2. She will run Version 2 by Bill Barry.
Our next ASC meeting is Monday Dec 5.
The meeting was adjourned at 5:00 pm.
Respectfully submitted,
Paula Wilson