August 18, 2008
To:
Master’s Committee (Barbara Wildemuth, chair, Reagan Moore, Helen Tibbo,
Kathy Wisser, Lara Bailey, Evelyn Daniel, Rebecca Vargha, MSIS student, MSLS
student)
From: Dean José-Marie Griffiths
Re:
Master’s Committee charge
The Master’s Committee is a standing committee with primary responsibility to:
1. Monitor the curriculum, initiate changes as necessary, study proposals for change
submitted by others, and recommend action to the Faculty. Prepare curriculum change
forms to go to the Faculty, the SILS Administrative Board, and then to the Graduate
School.
2. Assure that the lists of advising specialties are up-to-date, accurate, and available to
students.
3. Review applications for admission to the Master’s and CAS programs and make
admission recommendations to the dean.
4. Prepare the fall and spring semester comprehensive examination questions and distribute
responses to the faculty for evaluation. Coordinate oral examinations for anyone who
does not pass.
5. Work with the Associate Dean for Academic Affairs on curriculum clean-up, removing
non-taught courses, regularizing special topics courses taught several times, making
recommendations on courses to be taught by adjuncts and doctoral students, and
developing a two-year schedule of when courses will be offered.
In addition, I would like this year’s Master Committee to work on the following:


Commmittee Composition and Charge. Consider revising the committee
membership to consist of an MSLS Coordinator, an MSIS Coordinator, and a CAS
Coordinator with responsibility for oversight and review of these programs, their
requirements and assessments. Review the current charge to the committee in the
Faculty Bylaws and consider whether revisions are needed. Make recommendations on
these matters to the faculty.
End of Program Evaluation. All prior SACS assessment data and reports need to be
collected in one place – possibly the Master’s Committee intranet space –
ils.unc.edu/committees/master’s. I understand the SACS assessment that should have


been carried out at the end of the 2008 semester was not done, please coordinate the
implementation of this assessment as early in the fall semester as possible. Please
resolve the issue of comprehensives and SACS assessment. There seems to be
sentiment among the faculty in favor of a portfolio. Review possible options and make
recommendations to the faculty.
Curriculum Task Force. A special task force has been appointed this year to focus on
the core requirements for both master’s programs and the undergraduate program with
the charge to make sure all faculty are knowledgeable about the content and that the
content is appropriate. Some change proposals are expected and are to be coordinated
through the master’s and undergraduate committees. The Master’s Committee might
consider the use of an annual curriculum task force with a varying charge depending on
the needs in a particular year. If the Committee makes this suggestion viable, please
make a recommendation to the faculty with a suggested charge for the 2009-2010 year.
Admissions. Consider a proposal for admissions in which each applicant’s folder is
reviewed by two people – the Associate Dean for Academic Affairs and one member of
the Master’s Committee with debatable decisions brought to the full committee. If this
suggestion or an alternative way of handling admissions has agreement from the
Committee, please make a recommendation to the faculty relative to the charge (see the
Curriculum Composition and Charge paragraph above).
A space has been set up for your committee use on ils.unc.edu/committees/masters. At a
minimum, please post your end-of-term and end-of-year reports in pdf format to this space.
Other documents generated by the committee of archival significance should also be posted to
this space.