College of Arts and Sciences
Council of Chairs
December 12, 2007
2:30 p.m., AS 122
Meeting Minutes
Present: J. Carson, J. Collins, K. Doolen, R. Dressler, P. Ferlo, S. Fessler (for DeBlasi), E.
Gaffney (recorder), S. Galime, G. Griffith, R. Hamm, T. Harrison, D. Hernandez, M. Hill, V.
Idone, S. Isser, J. Kimball, J. Mandle, M. Messitt, A. Millis, J. Monfasani, G. Moore, J. Mower,
C. Olsen, M. Sattinger, L. Schell, G. Stevens, M. Sutherland, E. Turner, J. Welch, K. Williams,
M.B. Winn, E. Wulfert, A. Zak. Guests: Nancy Denton, Chair, Academic Programs Committee,
Robert Yagelski, Chair, The Provost’s Task Force on Undergraduate Writing
Introductory Remarks: Dean Wulfert called the meeting to order at 2:33 pm
Minutes of the meeting of November 28, 2007: A motion to approve the minutes from the last
meeting was made by J. Mower and seconded by R. Hamm. Minutes were unanimously
approved by voice vote.
Announcements:
Research Report- L. Schell distributed a report of Grant Activity for July 07 – October 07. He
asked those present to review it and noted that there had been some fluctuations in grant levels.
The University as a whole is down quite a bit but hopes to make it up in the next two quarters.
Schell then circulated 2 copies of the Research Publication “Accent on Research” noting that it
contained a lot of good information, but was no longer distributed in paper form. Rather it needs
to be downloaded from the Division of Research web page.
Scheduling Finals: Dean Wulfert asked chairs to be aware of faculty who might be scheduling
finals outside of finals week. The Dean’s office is required to monitor this and report any
approved exceptions to the Provost’s office. Unfortunately the Dean’s office is hearing that some
faculty do not abide by the guidelines; this is of concern because this would be a cause for a
successful student grievance.
Dean Wulfert asked whether Chairs monitor finals. M. Sattinger reported that their departmental
secretary sends out a notice to all faculty reminding them of the regulation about finals. The
suggestion was made that if the main office sees a final being copied early it might be a sign of
an early final.
Dean Wulfert suggested that checking syllabi could be useful in monitoring finals schedules. She
asked Chairs to develop a way to monitor this because she is concerned that it will not reflect
well on CAS if we are found to be in violation of the campus policy.
Discussion ensued about not wanting to distrust faculty and wondering if it might be an issue of
education. G. Stevens pointed out that it might be GAs or new faculty who are unaware of the
regulations. D. Hernandez said that he holds an orientation each semester with GAs and new
faculty to review these policies. S. Fessler said that she believes that G. Stevens sends out a
reminder about this each semester and suggested that passing the reminder on to all teaching
faculty and GAs could help to ensure compliance.
Dean Wulfert endorsed D. Hernandez’ model of approaching this problem and said it might take
care of the problem.
J. Kimball asked for clarification on whether it was OK to move a final if everyone in the class
agrees to move it. G. Stevens indicated that this would only be approved if there were a
compelling reason. J. Kimball gave the example of a faculty member needing to attend a
conference that was in conflict with a final. G. Stevens indicated that this would likely be
approved, but would still need to be reported.
Fall Scheduling- The Fall rollover schedule will be up on the web shortly.
Promotion: Promotion cases are due to the Deans office Monday December 17, otherwise they
may not be acted on during the Spring semester. This date is normally the 15th but is being
extended to the 17th because the 15th falls on a weekend.
Student Satisfaction - Dean Wulfert provided 2 URL’s with student satisfaction data to the
Chairs and requested that they review them in preparation for a discussion about how we can
better serve students during the first Chairs meeting in the Spring semester.
Student Opinion Survey Executive Summary
http://www.albany.edu/ir/SOS2006_Exec_Summary_www.pdf
Student Experience Survey
http://web.albany.edu//ir/SOS_SES_Retention_Committee_Presentation_11_07.ppt
Old Business: Tabled in favor of allowing our guest speaker to make his presentation.
New Business: Undergraduate Writing Task Force Presentation:
Presentation by Dr. Robert Yagelski regarding the Writing Seminar Proposal.
Group was introduced to R. Yagelski and a list of background references to research about
developing writing skills was distributed to the Chairs.
R. Yagelski made a detailed presentation about the development of the writing program at
UAlbany and the research behind the taskforce’s conclusion that writing should be more than
teaching grammar and composition and should introduce students to college level intellectual
inquiry. Thumbnails of the PowerPoint presentation are attached.
After the presentation discussion ensued.
T. Harrison asked what governance bodies need to weigh in on this proposal. It was clarified
that CAS does not have to approve this proposal for it to move on to governance. R.Yagelski
indicated that he hopes to submit the proposal to governance at the end of this semester for
review and possible adoption during the spring semester. It will have to be reviewed by several
senate committees including UAC, UPC and the General Education committee.
J. Collins asked 2 questions- How was the opinion about Writing Intensive split courses not
working developed? How will the change in writing ability affected by this program be assessed?
R. Yagelski admitted there was a legitimate debate about whether Writing Intensive split courses
and 1 credit add-ons were effective. The taskforce in the revised proposal now has accepted split
courses and add-ons; how these courses play out will largely depend on the instructors.
R. Yagelski indicated that there is a significant body of work that says that writing assessment is
very difficult and messy. SAT is an example of trying to make an assessment from a very narrow
definition of writing. In order to be effective you would have to use a whole series of data to
provide a richer perspective.
Dean Wulfert questioned this. If we are basing the need for providing intensive writing
instruction on the National Report Card (NRC), which is a writing assessment tool that has led to
the classification of the majority of students as non-proficient writers, why could this same
assessment tool not also be used to assess the effectiveness of the proposed writing seminar?
R. Yagelski indicated that this was a legitimate question but it would be really expensive and
time consuming to assess writing in this way. Stony Brook does a version of this assessment to
review a portfolio of first year work. However, even as sophisticated as the NRC is, they tend to
focus on form and language use, not on analysis. Analysis is one of the skills the seminar seeks
to develop in our students.
Dean Wulfert reported on a conversation with the Dean of Arts and Sciences at Stony Brook, Dr.
Staros. She learned that students at Stony Brook take an on-line assessment which is used to
determine whether they must enroll in the more basic level of two writing courses.
Approximately 50% of their students are exempt from the first course and enter the second
course in the sequence. This program does not start from the assumption that everyone needs the
basic writing course.
R. Yagelski countered that the UAlbany proposal does not include a course like Stony Brook’s
first year writing course. The proposal under discussion conceives of writing as a basic skill.
Instead, the first level writing course proposed is an introduction to writing as educational
discourse and is something every student should be exposed to. He stated that he would like to
see data from Stony Brook to see whether attendance at the two writing courses is correlated
with student retention in later years. At Ohio State University (OSU) they have a very
complicated program with three levels of remedial writing classes. Their data indicate that the
more writing courses students took, the more likely they were to remain in college. He
hypothesized that students who opt out of the first level course at Stony Brook might be less
likely to be retained.
G. Griffith asked, since the data on retention were only collected on US students, whether they
had considered the possibility that some international students might place out because their
preparation may might substantially different from that of domestic students and their writing
skills might be superior; thus, there would be a concern that these students might be bored. R.
Yagelski responded that writing is seen as an introduction to the intellectual life of college and
that the more successful students benefit the others in the class.
K. Williams raised as a significant concern the fact that more than 40% of our students are
transfers and they would therefore be exempt from taking the writing course. If this is the case,
then why can other students not be exempt as Freshmen? Alternatively, to require a change of
the transfer agreements so that transfer students would also have to take the writing seminar
would likely prove very difficult because of articulation agreements with other SUNY schools.
Alternatively, the University could also strive for a culture change and admit students with
higher qualifications. For example, one could use the SAT writing test for admitting students and
select those who are better writers to begin with.
S. Isser added that if this program helps us to retain students maybe we would be in a position to
have less transfer students.
He also raised a question of governance; would the committee that takes on the job of managing
this program oversee just this seminar or would it also be in charge of writing intensive courses.
R. Yagelski responded that the oversight committee has been proposed as a subcommittee of
UAC.
S. Isser also proposed that if 82-90% of the faculty perceive that there is a problem with student
writing, then the assessment of success in the writing program could be whether faculty actually
perceive an improvement.
R. Yagelski added that one of the key features of this proposal is the support structure for
faculty.
J. Monfesani indicated a philosophical problem with the program: it is incredibly expensive. He
asked whether one might use the same amount of funding to increase the number of faculty so
they could offer smaller classes and demand more writing of their students. R. Yagelski agreed
this was a viable alternative, but would likely be much more expensive.
N. Denton stated that she was struck by the Stony Brook statistics. While the proposed course
would enhance students’ experience she is still concerned that there is no remedial component to
the program. R. Yagelski stated that if the proposed program works as perceived those students
needing remediation would also be helped. Even with a remedial course, students would not be
able to overcome these difficulties without significant guided practice in writing.
J. Mandle asked who would teach the classes. R. Yagelski stated that, following a model
program at the University of Denver, we would hire 19 full-time, non-tenure-track faculty at the
PhD level with backgrounds in composition and rhetoric or comparative literature. Denver found
that many faculty preferred these positions to tenure-track lines and he hopes our recruiting
would find the same enthusiasm for the program.
Dean Wulfert thanked R. Yagelski for his presentation.
Adjourned: The meeting was adjourned at 3:56 p.m.
Handouts:
Agenda
Draft Minutes of 11/28/07 Council of Chairs meeting
Report of Research Foundation Applications/Awards by Academic Unit
Provost’s Task Force on Undergraduate Writing (Sources)
Provost’s Task Force on Undergraduate Writing (Powerpoint Presentation)