University at Albany, State University of New York
Governance Council
John W. Delano, Chair
Minutes for Meeting of December 10, 2007
Present:
Erin Bell, Nan Carroll, Richard Collier, Edward Cupoli, John Delano,
Nikki Kotary, John Monfasani, Helen Strother, Dan Truchan (substituting for
Karl Schlagel)
The meeting was convened at 3:35 PM in UNH 306.
Minutes:
The Minutes of November 19, 2007 were approved.
As requested during the Senate meeting of September 24, 2007, the Governance Council
members continued with their discussion (begun at the November 19 meeting) dealing with
possible changes to the Senate Charter that would deal with review processes for credit-bearing
courses and programs neither originating from, nor administered by, degree-granting
departments, colleges, or schools (e.g., Senate Bill No. 0708-02: First year Experience-FYEProgram; UFSP Courses), such as (but limited to) ITLAL, Office of Undergraduate Studies, and
Office of Undergraduate Admissions (henceforth referred to as NDGU = not degree-granting
units).
The Governance Council members proposed that a new layer of review be created for creditbearing courses and programs from NDGUs that would precede the required review by the
Undergraduate Academic Council (UAC). This newly created layer of review would be
analogous to the first layer of review that courses and programs receive from degree-granting
departments, colleges, and schools that also precedes review by the UAC. The members of the
Governance Council believed that this new layer of review would be equitable, and make it
unnecessary to bring course proposals from NDGUs to the full Senate.
The Governance Council members proposed that this new layer of review be composed of 9
members: 6 teaching faculty (chosen from existing Senate Councils); 1 professional faculty
(chosen by the Senate Executive Committee); 1 undergraduate student (chosen by the Student
Association); and 1 graduate student (chosen by the Graduate Student Organization). Analogous
to courses and programs offered/administered by degree-granting programs that are reviewed on
a regular basis (e.g., external reviewers; Middle States Review), courses and programs from
NDGUs would be regularly reviewed by the Council on Academic Assessment (Senate Charter
Section X.6.6.5)
If this proposal were to be approved by the Senate and signed by the President, the question was
considered as to whether the Freshman Year Experience (FYE) proposal with its 35 sections of
UFSP 101 would have sufficient time to complete these two layers of review by mid-April 2008,
so as to be available for first-year students for Fall 2008 registration. This was considered
severely time-constrained, but possibly do-able.
Meeting was adjourned at 5:40 PM.