Academic Standards Committee Minutes April 21, 1999 Present: Ken Clark, John English, Marianne Taylor, Wade Williams, Peter Wimberger, Kate Evans, Tom Gething, Greg Elliott, Sue Hannaford, Jack Roundy 1. Minutes: The minutes of the April 7 meeting will be distributed shortly. 2. Announcements: Committee chair English offered congratulations to Wimberger and Elliott on their recent tenure news, and in return committee members wished English well in his impending retirement. 3. Petitions Committee: In Tomhave’s absence, the usual Petitions Committee report was not available. Committee members Williams, Hannaford, Clark and Gething reported that 20 petitions had been brought before them at the most recent meeting, only 10 of which they got through. Many of the petitions (6) were for a waiver of the rule that two Natural World core classes must be completed before the Science in Context requirement may be met with an SCXT course. Elliott inquired what the process would be for rescinding this rule, which many faculty, including him, didn’t believe in. English replied that he thought the ASC could send a recommendation to the Faculty Senate that the Curriculum Committee review the rule. English further asked for “context” (to a round of wry smiles) for this recommendation. Three problems with the current rules were advanced as arguments for rescinding: 1) the requirement that both Natural World courses be taken before the Science in Context course is taken causes many students scheduling problems, often in their major; 2) the Science in Context courses taken by students are often unrelated to the Natural World courses they have taken previously; and, 3) Science in Context faculty often develop the science they use in their courses “from the ground up” because so many of their students have not had introductions to the science discipline in question (see number 2). Several members of the Petitions Committee felt that their decisions on SCXT petitions were “arbitrary,” and the four scientists present (Elliott, Hannaford, Clark, Wimberger) all favored a revision in the prerequisite rule. English agreed to develop the recommendation to the Senate for a review of the policy. Gething suggested that he ask Tomhave how many SCXT petitions had been filed this year in addition to the six the Petitions Committee handled at their last meeting. 4. Housekeeping for the End-of-Year Report to the Senate: English, noting that today’s was the last scheduled ASC meeting of the year, asked for help preparing our final report to the Faculty Senate. We summed up our work on two major elements of that report: a. Academic Integrity: MSP to recommend that an annual letter be sent to faculty reminding them of our academic honesty policy and process, and encouraging them to report instances of academic dishonesty. Williams and Wimberger have agreed to draft this letter, which they will then send to English, who in turn will run it by committee members. English proposed that the letter be sent to faculty every year in early October, after the blizzard of early semester emails has relented a bit. MSP to commend the “teaching guide” on plagiarism developed by Wilson, Di Scala and Brodey to the Faculty Senate. MSP to recommend that the teaching guide be forwarded to the Curriculum Committee for use in first-year writing seminars. b. Class Scheduling: English requested of Evans that she write a summary of ASUPS Senate feedback to schedule proposals she took before them earlier in the semester. He noted that he would ask Finney to write a similar summary of the presentation to a meeting of department chairs. Williams asked whether we wanted to make a scheduling recommendation to the Faculty Senate, and the consensus was that we did not. English indicated that he intended to recommend in his senate report that ASC be charged in the coming academic year with continuing its work on class scheduling. 5. Class Disruption Policy: Roundy asked for committee input on classroom climate as it related to student disruptiveness. Had faculty seen an increase in disruptive behaviors of all kinds (students chattering, arriving late, sleeping in class, speaking out inappropriately or aggressively, etc.)? Consensus of those present was that such disruptions, while they did occur, were infrequent and insignificant enough that they did not pose a serious problem on our campus. Clark thought that inconsiderate tardiness had become more of a problem recently, and Wimberger thought that more instances of excessive absence had occurred in his classes this year, but when Williams inquired whether the ASC should take the matter up next academic year as a new charge, no one felt that it merited ASC action. Roundy also stated his concern that the “Disruptive Class Behavior” policy (Logger, p. 45), which was used again this year in one case, lacked a clearly stated “due process” step, whereby students could appeal faculty action against them. English thought that the usual chain of appeal (department chair, dean) was available in these cases and would suffice. Gething, amending Roundy’s use of “due process” with the University’s phrase, “fundamental fairness” (since Puget Sound is not bound by due process in the legal sense), suggested that a clarifying sentence about student appeals could be developed with John Finney’s help, leaving ASC involvement out of it. With this, we adjourned at 8:50. Respectfully submitted by the ASC amanuensis, Jack Roundy