It's something we can possibly pursue this fall--activities that promote retention will be important. Les says he would vote for a "skills" lab since math is as big an issue as writing for our students. We would have to narrow down the purposes and clarify just what data about our students supports the need. And we would need to be convinced this really has a bearing on retention...
Jan and I are re-evaluating the Comp. 1 enrollments--at this point I am planning to close another section of Comp. at 0 (it's at 1:00, and we have another 1:00 section to move the 2 students into). That will leave us with all sections closed at 22 except one, the Monday evening IVN section that has one student enrolled. Jan thinks she can put students in that one for the next month, then reset all the sections to 25 on the late registration day, which will give her about 15 seats to fill on that day. Did that make sense?? We would both like to cancel the Monday eve. class, but don't feel we can since it serves Jamestown. Let me know ASAP if you see a problem with this arrangement--
Jan is checking with admissions projections before we make a committment to this tomorrow.
That will leave us with only three unstaffed comp. classes. If I take one (or Kay does)--I'll take the IVN one, since it will require the least amount of time with low enrollment and only one night a week to prepare for--and we ask
Mary Berglund to take the other two, we're done.
Did you know we were going to be writing our job descriptions this fall? Just heard that at a meeting this afternoon, but don't know how official it is, or why we are doing so. Also Les told us the policy manual states that all faculty are required to submit a development plan each September.
BTW--Mirrium had her baby (a girl, Sydney) about a week ago. I have her address, if you want it.
Margaret.
>>> Julee Russell 07/18 4:52 PM >>>
I would be interested in exploring the possiblity of a writing center - maybe Keri G. could find us a grant.
Julee
>>> Margaret Dahlberg 07/18/01 12:59PM >>>
Julee,
It appears that all but one of the three students in Kay's 11:00 201 course have the 1:00 time open on their schedules. I am going to get the other class set printed this afternoon, however, because most of the students in that class are freshman, who might be better able to switch.... I hope Kay is planning to talk with me about this early next week--
One class has 5, the other 3; 5 of the 8 are freshmen. Of the 9 students in Span 102 last semester, two have transfered, three have registered for 201, one is a community member (Dutton), and 3 may not have registered for fall yet
Apparently this is true across campus--50-60 returning students have not yet registered, we have a large number of transfers, and the freshman class of those actually admitted and registered is down considerably from last year.
(source, Jan Drake, who has been my companion all morning)
Regarding Kay's teaching load, I am thinking she might find a small class of Comp. 1 students less work than preparing Intro to linguistics. But I'm not opposed to either choice. You may talk with her about the Regional writers class--I'm not going to touch that one...it's yours, unless you do something about it. I am VERY opposed to giving Kay Span 345--this is Tony's only opportunity to work with upperdivision students in Spanish, and he may very well be a real draw for our Spanish program. He also needs a base of students to develop a Mexican trip/travel program.
Last, Jan Drake and I discussed developing a writing center as an arm of Student Services, not CASS, as a strategic move designed to improve retention, possibly funded in part by a small percentage of each division's budget, and staffed by someone like Joan Aus, who knows oodles about adult basic skills and has an ESL program background. The Director could be staff instead of faculty, because there is more flexibility in establishing staff positions, perhaps....I may raise the idea with Les at my meeting with him today, to find out what sort of information we should gather to develop a strong proposal for a campus writing center... What do you think about it?
Margaret.