Academic Affairs Meeting Notes—December 9. 2005
In attendance:
Carl Lovitt
Brian Parker
Matt Pugliese
Michele Ramsey
Danny Russell
I. Common Reading Program
A. Brian asked what progress had been made on the common reading program.
As neither were able to make the common reading meeting the previous
Wednesday, there was not much to report. It was noted by Carl that one comment
he heard coming out of the meaning was the suggestion of expanding the
definition of common reading to include other texts such as films. Both Carl and
Brian were against this proposition.
1. Carl noted that many of the suggestions sent to the committee by
students were just book titles, rather than thorough explanations/rationales
for the books as were requested.
2. Brian noted that the student SGA group on the common reading has
three suggestions for the committee and it was suggested that those
suggestions be sent to the committee as soon as possible since the
committee was going to start the decision process.
3. Carl noted that the committee would suggest 3 books for the College
community to vote on.
II. Academic Advising Survey:
A. Both students took the recent survey on academic advising sent out by the
office of Assessment and Institutional research and had suggestions for bettering
the survey.
1. The students noted that the way the questions were asked if you hadn’t
seen an advisor you could only answer N/A. Because we didn’t have the
survey there we assumed that there weren’t questions asking why a
student has chosen not to see an advisor.
2. The students suggested that some of the questions allow for vague
answers. What does “poor” mean, for example? They suggested a
comment section after each question to allow students to put their answers
into context. Carl, Michele and Danny how long it would take to analyze
that kind of data and it was suggested that a follow-up scale could be
added that included possible reasons for student answers.
3. The students noted that the main problem from their perspective was
faculty advising.
a. Michele noted that she serves on a committee looking at
academic advising and explained the work of that committee.
b. Carl mentioned that the College was moving towards changing
how advisors are trained.
c. Carl asked what we could do in FYS courses to change negative
attitudes about advising.
d. In discussing how to better communicate about advising to
students, Brian suggested that the College needed better PR, bigger
TVs and TVs placed in places easier to see.
e. The students mentioned that it was common for Orientation
Leaders to tell new students not to bother seeing advisors because
the advisors would cost them extra money and time due to
mistakes.
f. Michele noted that while some advisors do make mistakes, that
most do not and that ultimately students are responsible for making
sure that they are taking the right courses, which is easy to do if
students pay attention to mini-catalogs, websites, and the “Blue
Book”.
III. Use of student services:
A. Carl asked about how we could get more students to use The Learning Center
1. The students noted that one problem is that when teachers are perceived
as being uninterested in teaching or don’t do it well it impacts a student’s
willingness to go to tutoring because if students can’t learn in the
classroom, going to tutoring isn’t a good use of time.