Annual Program Review Update
*Be sure to include information from all three campuses.
Program/Discipline: Environmental Science (ENVSC)
Date:
September 10, 2007
Trends and Relevant Data
1. Has there been any change in the status of your program or area? (Have you
shifted departments? Have new degrees or certificates been created by your
program? Have you added or deleted courses? Have activities in other programs
impacted your area or program? For example, a new nursing program could
cause greater demand for life-science courses.) If not, skip to #2.
Note: curricular changes should be addressed under 12-14.
The Environmental Science courses are within the Science Department and
Science and Math Division. No new degrees, certificates or additions/deletions of
courses have taken place.
2. Have there been any significant changes in enrollment, retention, success rates, or
student demographics that impact your discipline? If so, please include data
sheets (Excel or Word format) showing these changes.
There was a drop in active sections district-wide from 8 to 4 sections in a
comparison of Fall 2005 with Fall 2006 enrollment data. In a comparison of
Spring 2006 and Spring 2007 enrollment data no significant differences were
noted with 4 and 5 sections, respectively. Student retention and success rates
were comparable for the same time frames.
Active Sections
% Retention
% Success (V1)
Fall 2005
8
86.1%
66.8%
Spring 2006
4
80.5%
70.8%
Fall 2006
4
85.8%
77.4%
Spring 2007
5
85.7%
56.4%
3. Occupational programs must review the update of their labor-market data, some
of it provided by Institutional Research, to illustrate that their program:
a. Meets a documented labor market demand,
b. Does not represent duplication of other training programs (in the region), and
c. Is of demonstrated effectiveness as measured by the employment and
completion success of its students.
Not applicable
Other Resources
4. Do you have needs (professional development, library resources, and so forth) not
previously required by the discipline or not previously addressed in budget or
equipment considerations? Please describe.
Professional development needs are adequate for travel to conferences for fulltime faculty.
5. Does your discipline need additional support from Student Services beyond that
previously provided?
Improved advising for science majors transferring to other institutions has been
identified as a need at the Eureka campus. To this end improved
communication between faculty and Student Services has been initiated. The
science major transfer advising has improved dramatically at the Mendocino
campus since the hiring of a full-time counselor.
Human Resource Needs
6. Complete the Faculty Employment Grids below (please list full- and part-time
faculty numbers in separate rows):
Faculty Load Distribution in the Program
Discipline Name
(e.g., Math,
English,
Accounting)
Total
Teaching
Load for
fall 2006
term
Environmental 20
Science
% of Total
Teaching
Load by
Full-Time
Faculty
% of Total
Teaching Load
Taught by PartTime Faculty
Changes
from fall
2005
46.2%
53.8%
- 19 TLUs
Explanations and
Additional
Information (e.g.,
retirement,
reassignment, etc.)
Faculty Load Distribution in the Program
Discipline Name
(e.g., Math,
English,
Accounting)
Total
Teaching
Load for
spring 2007
term
Environmental 21
Science
% of Total
Teaching
Load by
Full-Time
Faculty
% of Total
Teaching Load
Taught by PartTime Faculty
Changes
from fall
2006
35.7%
64.3%
+ 3 TLUs
Explanations and
Additional
Information (e.g.,
retirement,
reassignment, etc.)
Do you need more full-time faculty? Associate faculty? If yes, explain why and
be sure to include data sheets justifying the need.
There is sufficient full-time and part-time faculty to teach the course offerings at
the Mendocino, Eureka, and Del Norte campuses.
7. Complete the Staff Employment Grid below (please list full- and part-time staff
numbers in separate rows:
Staff Employed in the Program
Assignment
Full-time
Part-time staff
(e.g., Math,
(classified) staff (give number)
English)
(give number)
Gains over
Prior Year
Division office
coordinator
(Eureka)
1 classified
(shared with
division)
0
0
Losses over
Prior Year (give
reason:
retirement,
reassignment,
health, etc.)
0
Biology
technician
(Eureka)
1 classified
(shared with
Biology)
0
0
0
The Mendocino campus lost its Biology lab technician and at present there are
no plans for a replacement.
Do you need more full-time staff? Part-time staff? If yes, explain why and be sure
to include data sheets justifying the need.
None needed in the Environmental Science discipline.
8. If necessary, to clarify your needs, please comment on current available staff and
distribution of FTE's for contract and part-time faculty. Describe strengths and
weaknesses of faculty/staff as appropriate to program's current status or future
development.
Facilities
9. Comment on facilities the program uses, their current adequacy, and any
immediate needs. Have your discipline’s facilities needs changed? If so, how?
Please provide a data-based justification for any request that requires new or
additional facilities construction, renovation, remodeling or repairs.
The program has adequate facilities at the Eureka campus, although upgrades
of desks, cabinets, whiteboards, etc., are anticipated with the eventual new
academic building to be constructed following passing of the Measure Q bond.
At present the Del Norte campus has not received upgrades of science facilities
from the bond funds. The same can be said of the Mendocino campus science
facilities
Equipment
10. Have your discipline’s equipment needs changed? If so, how? Is equipment in
need of repair outside of your current budget? Please provide a data-based
justification for any request that requires a new or additional budget allotment.
In the past Partnership for Learning Excellence (PLE) grants have enabled
faculty to upgrade laboratories to improve learning opportunities. These
include the installation of computers, digital projectors, and microscopes with
digital cameras, etc., at the Eureka campus. Due to budget constraints PLE
grants are no longer available to faculty. In addition, funding for transportation
of students on field trips has been unavailable at the Eureka campus for the past
several years. It is hopeful that the financial future of College of the Redwoods
will improve to provide transportation for Environmental Science labs. Classes
in Environmental Science 10 (typically averaging 4 sections district-wide for the
fall semester), for example, would particularly benefit.
Learning Outcomes Assessment Update
11. How has your area or program been engaged in student learning outcomes
assessment?
a.
Summarize your results.
b.
What did your program learn from these results that enabled you to
improve teaching and learning in the discipline?
c.
How have part-time faculty been made aware of the need to assess SLOs?
Benchmarks for student learning outcomes are in the process of being addressed
through course outline updates. Full-time faculty district-wide are in
communication to establish a method to assess student success based on
consistent assessment questions.
Curriculum Update
(Reminder: Send updated course outlines to the Curriculum Committee.)
12. Identify curricular revisions, program innovations, and new initiatives undertaken
in the last year.
The ENVSC 12 curriculum was updated last year.
13. Identify curricular revisions, program innovations, and new initiatives planned for
the next year.
With the exception of ENVSC 12, all of the course offerings in Environmental
Science are overdue for curriculum updates. This deficiency will be addressed
in the coming year with updates expected for ENVSC 10, ENVSC 11, ENVSC
15, and ENVSC 22.
14. Complete the grid below
Course
ENVSC 10
ENVSC 11
ENVSC 12
ENVSC 15
ENVSC 22
Year Course Outline
Last Updated
1991
1989
2006
1989
1988
Year Next Update
Expected
2007
2007
2011
2007
2007
Goals and Plans
15. If you have recently undergone a comprehensive review, attach your Quality
Improvement Plan if applicable.
Not applicable
16. If you do not have a QIP, what goals and plans does your area have for the
coming year?
Our plan includes the following:
(1) Update curriculum outlines
(2) Develop methods to assess student learning outcomes district-wide
(3) Access enrollment trends, success rate of students, and other data to provide
feed-back for improvements