Undergraduate Studies Committee
March 7, 2012
Minutes
Present: Damian Bacich, Bem Cayco, Cary Feria, Deepika Goyal, Laura Ingraham, Dennis Jaehne,
Ravisha Mathur (Chair), Lori Salazar, Weider Yu
Absent: Rocio Avila
Guests: Stephen Branz (UGS), Gloria Edwards (UGS)
I.
Approval of Minutes
The Minutes for February 29, 2012 were unanimously approved.
II. Role of UGS and the UGS Committee
The AVP, Undergraduate Studies considers the UGS Committee to be the Board of Directors for
the Office. In other words, the UGS is a faculty advisory committee; and as the SJSU faculty are
responsible for curricular decisions at SJSU, the UGS Committee is where faculty can express
opinions and debate options.
It is each committee members responsibility to report back to their college (either through the
curriculum committee or through their Chair) all the decisions and discussions in the UGS
Committee. The student representative from Associated Students is responsible for reporting
back to the AS Board.
The areas that are of particular interest to the UGS Committee for this meeting include discussing
the preparations for the WASC re-certification and the credit hour policy (see attached C&R draft
Policy).
A. WASC Accrediting Commission
As stated on their website (http://www.wascsenior.org/redesign/february2012update)
WASC is looking for SJSU to:
…define the outcomes of its degrees, set appropriate levels of attainment for graduates,
and select for itself the most appropriate means of assessing and assuring that these
outcomes have been achieved. It is the responsibility of the Commission, through the
peer review process, to validate that the outcomes and levels of attainment set by the
institution are appropriate for the degree and that there is sufficient evidence to
demonstrate that graduates “consistently achieve these stated levels of outcomes.”
The challenge before the Commission, and all WASC accredited institutions, is to find
ways to address the criticisms of both accreditation and higher education regarding
transparency, completion, and educational quality. The Commission has moved to
address transparency and completion and is deeply concerned with the perceived and
real “quality gap” in the levels of performance and achievement of graduates. Such a gap
has been reflected in multiple surveys of academics, studies of student performance, and
employer surveys. The Commission views that accreditation can and must demonstrate
that quality can be assured within the context of institutional mission and type.
When WASC visits SJSU, it is critical that all faculty have an understanding of SJSU’s curricular
policies and procedures. This is where the UGS Committee is invaluable.
In the past, the faculty was responsible for imparting information to students. However, with
graduation and retention rates declining, success is now gauged by how involved students are in
the learning environment. It is no longer about input from the faculty, but about output—how
students show the skills that they have learned in the course. Although the faculty may not have
embraced assessment, this is the only way we know to determine if students are learning what
the faculty have defined as their teaching goals (student learning outcomes).
Assessment is critical and departments need to have conversations about their learning
outcomes and how the curriculum supports those outcomes. Currently there is a problem with
many faculty not being able to define measurable outcomes. For example, “become familiar with”
is not a measurable outcome.
This may be more of a problem in the Humanities and Social Science where outcomes may not
be as easily defined as in some of the science laboratories. However, WASC will be looking for
assessable outcomes.
Departments determine the competencies that students taking classes should achieve. While
there may be more standardization at the lower division level, the faculty will still need to define
outcomes for lower level classes that assure student preparation for higher level classes.
Currently each department is required to complete an Annual Assessment Report. These annual
departmental assessments will be summarized and included as part of a 5 year Program Plan
that is publicly available. WASC will be looking to see how transparent SJSU is and how well
SJSU is at assessing its curricular offerings and making adjustments to assist students in
graduating.
In the past it was felt that department should keep this information on their own website.
However, many departments do not have a full-time chair or administrative support, much less IT
support. Because it may not be possible for every department to maintain their own website, the
UGS website will host this information.
WASC will be looking for student competencies in written communication, quantitative literacy
and information literacy. To date, SJSU only has a clear path for writing (communication).
Faculty will need to start conversations on how to integrate both quantitative and information
literacy into their curriculum.
While there are clearly defined competencies developed for the GE courses, many faculty feel
divorced from GE courses. This split in the major between major and GE courses should be of
concern to all faculty. Degrees need to be integrated with GE. If a student does not meet the GE
competencies, they may not be considered to meet all the graduate competencies, even if they
meet the major competencies. There needs to be more discussion on how to integrate GE into
the major.
UGS Committee members can assist in this process by beginning some of these conversations in
their departments and colleges.
B. Credit Hour Policy
The Department of Education (DOE) was concerned about the ‘selling’ of degrees, primarily by
private for-profit colleges. To prevent this, all institutions of higher education must develop a
formula for determining how much time a student should expect to spend for each unit of credit.
This information is important, not just in the development of the policy, but in making sure that
faculty understand what is expected of them. Each department will need to develop a standard
and a periodic review of all of their courses. The formulas will be different for each discipline and
different for the type of class (for example, labs meet for longer periods of time, but there is less
work that expected outside of the meeting time). Over the length of the course an average of 3
hours of work for every unit granted must be maintained. In other words, departments will not be
required to develop a formula for each course, but instead departments should develop a
mutually, agreed upon standard to judge that each course is providing for enough work for the 3
hours of credit (using course greensheets). Colleges should also develop a process for
systematic review of courses (to be determined within each college).
The Credit Hour Policy has been developed in C&R and will be going to the entire Academic
Senate shortly. WASC will be looking to make sure that whatever the policy is that SJSU is in
compliance.
It is expected that a review of all greensheets (all classes) will coincide with the Program Planning
cycle. The Program Planning guidelines are that all courses be reviewed every 5 years (unless it
is an accredited program and these programs follow the accreditation cycle). We might use the
program planning cycles in the process of accreditation (for the transparency aspect).
III. Pending
Review and approval of minutes (March 7, 2012)
Meeting adjourned: 1:10 pm
Gloria Edwards