GRADUATE COUNCIL MINUTES FOR 16 March 2011
Present: Steve Beck, Byron Burnham, Richard Cutler, Shelley Lindauer, Bart Smith, Paul
Johnson, Tara Nelson, Cami Jones, John Elsweiler, Scott DeBerard, Dennis Hassan, Glenn
McEvoy, Keith Grant-Davie, Gene Schupp
Excused: Frank Caliendo
Visitor: Laura Holley
INFORMATION:
1. Commencement
Commencement will be held Friday, May 6th. Lunch will be provided prior to lineup in the fieldhouse. Line-up begins at 12:30pm. The processional will begin at
1:00pm and the ceremony will start at 1:30pm in the Spectrum. Next meeting
the two faculty marshals will be selected.
2. Search committee update
Richard Cutler let the council know that they had about 40 applicants, and 20
very well qualified candidates. There will be nine people who will be interviewed
via the internet. Richard was very pleased at how good some of the candidates
are. Skype interviews will take place the next two days. The committee will come
up with a shorter list and bring those candidates to campus. That is when the
names of the candidates will become public. Campus interviews should be mid
to late April.
3. Graduate survey
The suggestions from last month were taken to Joan Kleinke. Most of the new
items were added to the survey.
4. Dissertation fellowship selection committee
April 1st is the deadline for the dissertation fellowship for next year. Shelley asked
for two volunteers. Scott Deberard and Paul Johnson will serve on the
committee. There are eight dissertation fellowships available. The committee
should be able to get together the 2nd week of April.
5. Review of Guidelines for Requests for Distance Education Graduate
Degree Programs (handout)
This Guidelines for Requests for Distance Education Graduate Degree Programs
was formulated by Grad Council in 1997 in response to a proposal that came
forward to offer an EdD off campus. Currently there is no known policy of
permitting the EdD at a distance. By default this needs to be approved by the
Grad Council for historical purposes.
This past year the Council approved the redefining of the doctoral residency
requirement. With this new doctoral residency requirement the School of TEAL
made the assumption that the PhD could be offered distantly. Grad School has
also had a number of requests from students to switch from the EdD to the PhD.
The Council did have some concerns and questions about the difference
between an EdD and PhD and also about offering a PhD distantly. Currently the
EdD does require the same amount of research and dissertation requirements as
the PhD degree. It is considered a professional degree, not a research degree.
Some of the concerns from the Council were that they had heard that it is hard
to engage students over the phone or internet to be motivated to do research.
Also is having better distant resources, i.e. internet, email, skype, enough of a
rationale to offer a PhD distantly. Some Council members agreed that it wasn’t
as efficient to speak with a student by phone or email as it is to have the student
there in their office with them. Also is there a higher level of wanting to do the
work and the research if the student is surrounded by other students and a
campus community.
Action needs to be taken by the Council next month to decide whether to allow
the EdD and PhD to be offered through distance delivery.
ACTION:
1. Public Abstract start date
The Council chose Fall 2011 as the start date.
2. International grace semester
The Grad School is proposing to establish a grace semester for international
students. A course that is three credits, no tuition, and no grade has been
proposed. If international students need to use University facilities they can pay
the fees associated with the five-credit tuition amount. This course is not
repeatable, and if more time is required after the grace semester then the
student will need to enroll for three credit hours and pay full the full tuition
amount. No grad assistantships will be available during this grace semester.
Richard Cutler motioned for approval and it was seconded by Keith GrantDavie. Vote for approval was unanimous.
DISCUSSION:
1. Final defense report (handout)
Dean Burnham presented a handout that was titled Narrative Report from the
Graduate Faculty Representative at the Oral Defense of the Thesis or
Dissertation. He asked if this form would be beneficial to give out and have the
chair of the defense fill out and submit to the Grad School. The Council
wondered what the Grad School would do with the information. Instead of filling
out a report, the Council would like to see more guidelines of what the chair of
the defense should do as well as anything that would clarify what should happen
at a defense. The Council indicated that the committee should be more
prepared on how to hold a defense. The Council thought that the Grad School
may not ever get substance from the report. Shelley indicated that she is
drafting a faculty edition of the Compass. The Grad Council was encouraged
by that and would like to see this information available in the general catalog, if
possible.
EXTRA:
Scott Deberard has had feedback from faculty and students who have not been
happy with the TA workshop. Keith Grant-Davie and Richard Cutler indicated that their
departments hold their own workshops in addition to the required TA workshop. Grad
School has had the same negative feedback and there will be a survey going out to all
the students who took the workshop this year. Previous students have indicated that
they didn’t like the online version of the workshop and that they would like to see some
more face-to-face meetings. This year was a hybrid of online and face-to-face
meetings. Grad School did pull course evaluations from last year and they are ready to
send the survey out to the students. Any specific feedback from faculty and students
would be extremely helpful. Dean Burnham indicated that it would be fine for Scott to
email his faculty for specific changes to the workshop. TA’s vary from large classes to
smaller lab sizes and it may be that the workshop needs to be more customized for that.
Other suggestions were to have it discipline oriented or have two or three days of
general TA workshop and then have it lead into disciplinary specifics.
Gene Schupp asked what was decided last month with reducing the number of PhD
credits required. Dean Burnham indicated that the Grad School would entertain
proposals from departments instead of blanketing the number across the university. The
College of Engineering decided not to pursue it because SGS had indicated that the
tuition awards would be prorated. SGS didn’t want to give preference to certain
colleges for requiring fewer credits. Discussion took place about running some
hypothetical scenarios to see if fewer required credits would actually cost less in the
long run. Bart Smith and Richard Cutler will look into it further. It could potentially be a
help with recruiting if students don’t have to take so many required credits.