GENERAL EDUCATION COMMITTEE MEETING
MINUTES
February 4, 2015
7:00 AM Marine Room, Shouldice Library
Meeting called by: Wright
Present: Barbour, Chaput, Fiebelkorn, Henderson, Hutchens, Hutchins, McPherson, Miguel
Andres, Myton, Neve, Neveu, Peters, Root, Swedene, Voutsadakis, Walworth, Weber, Wright
Absent: Peterson
Guests: C. Boger, Been
I. Call to order 7:02 AM by Wright
II. Approve Agenda
Action Item: approve agenda
Move to approve agenda: Henderson
Second: Barbour
Vote: Approved
III. Approval of Minutes from January 21, 2015
Action Item: Approval of minutes from 1/21/15
Move to approve (amended) minutes from 1/21/15: Henderson
Second: Chaput
Discussion: Add Barbour to list of those present
Vote: Approved
IV. Outcome subcommittee progress updates
Humanities subcommittee:
Swedene- We met 2 weeks ago, but have not finished the report, but continue to find
interesting items to share
Subcommittee on senior exit ETS testing:
Henderson- the committee has not met since December, but we’re “in a quagmire” because
our outcomes don’t match the ETS outcomes
Wright- your subcommittee could meet and make a recommendation
Root- our subcommittee met last week, expects to have report done next week
McPherson- we’ve discovered that a lot of the courses that are approved for humanities are
being taught by adjuncts; the adjuncts don’t do assessment; how do encourage the adjuncts to
assess?
Walworth- this is something that should be worked out at the school level
Wright- other faculty in the school could come in and deliver assessment tools in those couses
once a semester
Swedene asked Myton if he had indeed said he would physically enter data into TracDat; Myton
re-iterated that he would because he didn’t want data entry to be the obstacle to assessment
McPherson asked Myton to clarify where gen ed data is found in TracDat
Hutchins- of the humanities gen ed courses, only 251 and 252 have assessment entered
Swedene- asked Myton if the HLC was going to have direct access to TracDat, or only reports
Myton- that’s up to us; the system can give them read-only access to any portion we choose
Walworth- last time they were here, they wanted more documents than we initially gave them
Wright- we need to think about ETS, whether we really want to keep it since what it tests does
not necessarily line up with our general education outcomes
McPherson- reminded the committee that we knew when we adopted the ETS that it would not
be a perfect; we should not be relying exclusively on it for assessment.
Wright and Fiebelkorn- we need to discuss what we want all our graduates to have
Wright- in ~1 month, would like to have this year’s subcommittee reports
V. Provosts Gen Ed Comments
Walworth provided a handout with the official recommendation from the general education
committee regarding how to align our general education requirements with the MTA.
Comments reflecting conversations that he (Walworth) had had with people regarding the
document were provided in the margins.
The gist of the ensuing conversation, as the secretary understood it, was thus:
The General Education Committee issued the recommendation. Part of the recommendation
was that students would be required to pass each general education course with C or better.
This differs from the current requirements, which (for non-transfer students) are that as long as
the average general education GPA is at least a 2.0, any grade above “F” in a particular course is
acceptable. This change generated a lot of concern among the people that Walworth spoke to,
concern that too many students would have to re-take gen ed courses and/or the requirement
would be a significant bar to graduation for people whom we really don’t want to bar from
graduation. Walworth felt that, since this requirement was so controversial, it ought to be
discussed be the wider university community (or at least faculty) community before being
implemented. Several members of the committee (McPherson, Wright, Hutchens) were
puzzled by this, because prior to voting on the recommendation, the committee was under the
impression they had to approve a recommendation under a tight time deadline, as a policy was
needed for January implementation. This seemed to contradict the notion of further discussion
regarding the proposal; also the process by which the proposal was to become policy was
unclear. This matter raised questions (articulated by McPherson) about what, exactly, under
the new contract, the purview and power of the General Education Committee IS—does it have
any power to do what it is supposed to do? A related question is how and where the gen ed and
curriculum committee fit into the shared governance structure. McPherson expressed a sense
that there was some dishonesty during contract negotiations and ratification in it was said that
the contract language regarding the gen ed committee would not change, but in fact, one line
of it had been removed, and this change could be interpreted in a way that would remove
power from the committee and give it to the administration. Walworth said that the line in
question had been removed because “the faculty were not doing a good job of assessment for
the HLC, and the administrations’ hands were tied.”
In the meantime, the committee’s proposal apparently is to be discussed at the next all-faculty
meeting (February 24th) and for the time being, all gen ed requirements remain exactly as they
currently are in the catalog.
McPherson asked for clarification as to whether, in the proposal document, an apparently more
stringent requirement for Associate degrees than Bachelor’s degrees (ENGL110 and EITHER
ENGL111 OR COMM101 for the Bachelor’s degree, instead of ENGL110, ENGL111 AND
COMM101 for the Associate Degree) was a typo; Walworth said it was not a typo; it was due to
the Associate Degree needing a particular number of credits that were fulfilled by taking all 3
courses.
Fiebelkorn asked how we can begin moving away from a list of courses for fulfillment of general
education, and toward focusing on outcomes.
VI. English course proposals
Been- Changes to ENGL 236 proposal: on handout
Questions, further discussion?
Hutchins- recommend that both courses be accepted as general education courses for diversity
Second- McPherson
Walworth- will there be a common syllabus for all sections for 235 and common syllabus for all
sections of 236?
Been- Not a common syllabus, but common course objectives and a common assessment tool.
Myton- the general education diversity outcome is not listed among the course objectives on
the handout 236
Vote: to accept both ENGL235 and ENGL236, with the modifications presented today to the
committee, and the understanding that the General Education diversity outcome will be listed
as a course objective on the syllabi
For: 10
Opposed: 0
Abstentions: 3
Voutsadakis- “to justify my abstention, I think important items that require votes should be put
at the beginning of the meeting and save the “blah-blah” to the end.”
VII. Capstone survey progress
VIII. Other
IX. Motion to adjourn: McPherson
Second: Miguel Andres
Vote:
Meeting adjourned AM