1.
Without changing any program requirements currently in place (but disregarding the UW-S
foreign language requirement for the BA), what degree (BA or BS) should your graduates be
awarded?
On what do you base this decision? Please comment on required courses, experiences, knowledge, or
proficiencies gained beyond the UW-S General Education requirements.
2.
If they are not already in place for a particular major or concentration, what requirements do you
feel would need to be included to satisfy your expectations of what a BA or BS degree signifies?
3.
Do you feel a student’s selection of a minor would influence whether a BA or BS should be
awarded? I.e. if a student completed your XXXX minor, would this give them the ability to request a BA
or a BS degree? Alternately, if a student in your major or concentration completed a minor in XXXX,
would this give them the ability to request a BA or BS degree?
Business and Economics
1.
The Department believes that the appropriate degree for all of the majors offered by the department
is the BS degree.
2.
The Department believes that no additional requirements are necessary to obtain the BS degree for
the majors in our Department. In the case of all majors except for Economics, the students take an
additional math course at a level higher than required for general education, problem based course work
in accounting, economics, statistics, and finance. In addition many other courses have a research focus
using statistics such Marketing Research. In the case of the Economics major, the vast majority of the
courses required for the major involve quantitative analysis.
3.
The Department believes that the choice of a minor should not influence whether a BS or BA
degree is awarded in Business.
World Languages, Literature and Culture
1.
A. Our graduates should receive the BA.
B. Our programs (English literature and foreign languages) are in the humanities; the traditional degree
in the humanities is the BA.
C. Student Proficiencies:
1. Ability to read critically.
2. Ability to write critically.
3. Ability to think critically.
4. Ability to make cross-cultural connections.
5. Ability to communicate across cultures.
6. Ability to interact with various communities.
7. Ability to make comparisons of language and culture.
8. Ability to analyze language and literary texts.
9. Ability to serve other communities.
2. Requirements for a BA:
A strong foreign language component, as currently listed in the Catalog.
Requirements for a BS:
A strong science/math component.
3. Should a student’s minor influence whether a BA or BS be awarded? NO
If a student completed our minors, would this give them the ability to request a BA or a BS
degree? NO
If a student in our majors completed a minor in XXXX, would this give them the ability to request
a BA or BS degree? NO
Visual Arts
Visual Arts Majors not seeking a BFA degree should be awarded the BA degree.
Through required coursework and experiences inherent in the culture of the Visual Arts program, our
majors not only gain awareness of myriad manifestations of self and social expression in all cultures, but
are savvy to the importance of context and the presence of bias regarding any interpretation, analysis, or
evaluation of these forms of expression. Also, we believe the UW-S general education requirements
contribute positively to global-mindedness and pluralistic thinking.
While the Visual Arts department feels our expectations of what the BA degree signifies are satisfied by
our curriculum requirements, we would strongly encourage study abroad experiences and foreign
language proficiencies.
We also believe that a Visual Arts minor (coupled with UW-S general education requirements) would
push a student on the BA/BS fence to the BA side.
Math and Computer Sciences
1.
Without changing any program requirements currently in place (but disregarding the UW-S foreign
language requirement for the BA), what degree (BA or BS) should your graduates be awarded? BS. On
what do you base this decision? Programs are affiliated with sciences.
2.
If they are not already in place for a particular major or concentration, what requirements do you
feel would need to to be included to satisfy your expectations of what a BA or BS degree signifies?
Nothing needed.
3.
Do you feel a student’s selection of a minor would influence whether a BA or BS should be
awarded? No. I.e. if a student completed your XXXX minor, would this give them the ability to request a
BA or BS degree? No. Alternatively, if a student in your major or concentration completed a minor in
XXXX, would this give them the ability to request a BA or BS degree? No.
Communicating Arts
1. Stop thinking about the degrees in terms of credits, and think instead in terms of content;
2. Only offer the B.A. for ALL majors;
3. Create an inclusive bundle of coursework to distinguish the BA: e.g. Cultural Studies (art, film,
music, social theory, Literature, Foreign Language, Study Abroad);
4. If the campus decides to increase the number of credits for the BA, develop an equivalent number
of add’l credits (social & natural science) for the BS;
5. Communicating Arts would happily move to ONLY offer the BA, while retaining our current
curricular/credit requirements.
Natural Sciences
1.
Well, since we’re the Department of Natural Sciences, BS is appropriate. We take lots of science
courses, know science, and are able (at least we hope) to do science, learn more science, and
communicate it as well.
I think if you asked 1000 college graduates the difference between a BS and a BA, you’d get
probably 800 blank stares-( “huh? I don’t think there is a difference”); the other 200 would
probably think of a BA as being more humanities and BS more STEM oriented. However, the
differences would be small and, perhaps, trivial. As an employer, I wouldn’t care, I don’t think.
Apparently, in geology, the BS means you took more math than the BA; the rest of us saw little difference
between the two.
2.
3.
Interesting thought. If the BA is the “higher” degree, then perhaps a minor in an area of the
classic humanities (English, History, Art, Music, etc). However, I think if a student wanted to
display their knowledge, they would state their minor (BA in English with a chemistry minor, BS
in Biology with minors in Chemistry and English…) The more I think of it, the worse it sounds.
It would produce a hierarchy of these degrees. I don’t think one
Special Education Minor
1. The BA – our students need a liberal education which includes ‘science’ but more of the focus is on
social science areas – ASL is an integral part of what our students need to do and we think of that as more
of a BA type pedagogy….
2. Specifically related to our minors, a BS degree would need to be more scientifically based with more
mathematics and statistical research included.
3. No – the BA/BS should be a major driven issue – not the minor – major could limit the kinds of
minors accepted with that major – other ways to make the major and minor both ‘fit’ into either BA or
BS…
Music
1. Our graduates should be awarded the BA degree as liberal arts majors in music. That is the most
natural fit and what is commonly done in the majority of other schools that offer a liberal arts degree in
Music, as opposed to the comprehensive degree programs of Performance and Music Education, neither
of which takes a minor due to the heavy number of credits required in the comprehensive majors). For
required courses in the BA beyond general ed. and other required courses, sensible would be additional
courses in related fields such as literature, art, theatre, or foreign language.
2. I think there should be some additional credits required beyond the general ed. and specific major
courses — courses that broaden one’s knowledge in closely-related areas to their major field (such as
literature, art, theatre, or foreign language). Perhaps each major field could suggest courses that qualify?
3. Perhaps, though that really complicates the picture. It would be easier if the MAJOR dictated whether
it was a BS or BA.
Psychology
1.) In general, we felt that the Psychology curriculum (without considering the general education credits)
aligns itself more with a BS--we have a heavy focus on empirical research (2 courses), math (1 course)
and life sciences (1 course).
However, we do not think that the major alone defines the degree--but rather the degree (BA vs. BS)
should be awarded based on area of depth. Thus, a student could choose to get a BA because of extra
work done in the Humanities (including, but not limited to, History, Philosophy, Art, Literature, Foreign
Language, etc) or a BS because of extra work done in the natural sciences and math (Biology, Chemistry,
Physics, Computer Science, etc).
We acknowledge and value the importance of the liberal education training our students receive that that
should influence the degree awarded.
2.) There was some debate on this. Some of us feel that we meet the BS requirements as it is. Others of us
felt that it was important to add in more natural sciences/math that would compliment our curriculum.
(For example, require students to take more Biology or a Computer Science class.)
3.) No, because we think it should in general reflect their general education training that is outside of the
major. That is, the minor shouldn't allow for "double dipping" of credits between the BA/BS distinction
and the minor coursework.
Social Work
1.) Social Work graduates should receive the BS (we sometimes call it the BSW).
Social work curricula are heavy on social sciences, require math and science as well, and focus on both
direct and indirect service provision preparation. We think that, given these circumstances, our majors
are better served by a BS, with its emphasis on sciences and social sciences, rather than a BS with an
emphasis on language arts and fine arts of various kinds.
2.) Our ideal of a BS would require an emphasis, not just on math and science, but also on the social
sciences like psychology, sociology, economics, political science and so forth.
3.) No. Most of the social work students, as they are enrolled in a comprehensive major, pulling strongly
within the major from the social science and other liberal arts disciplines, do not have to have a minor as
well.
Legal Studies
The members of the Legal Studies Program met today and discussed the BS/BA memo circulated to us by
you and Eleni. I had responded individually to Eleni to state my belief that all UW-Superior students
should graduate with a BA degree, which, I believe, requires one year of study of a language not one’s
native language. I repeated this view today.
While this is contradicted in the BA/BS committee’s report, my own preliminary study persuades me that
requiring a non-native language remains the main distinction between earning a BS and a BA degree at
most schools. The BS is the default degree. It may be that we should add requirements so that students
could graduate with “distinction in science,” but then the same option might be open to students wishing
to graduate with “distinction in Humanities” in that all students would graduate with a BA. We noted that
the distinctions between the “sciences” and “Humanities” are to considerable extent artificial, though they
may indeed define different methodological orientations.
This discussion opened at least two larger discussions, the question of whether language in fact brings
about global awareness and where we would find the credits to add a language requirement. I will leave
the first question to one side. There are four credit areas out of which new requirements can be carved:
the major, the minor, elective credits and the general education curriculum. The focus of the committee’s
report seems to suggest that language requirements should be carved out of the major/minor requirements.
We believe that this is untenable. The typical major is 36 credits, and the typical minor is 24 credits. We
do not believe that we can take six credits out of either. The History program has a 33-credit major,
though they require their majors to complete the University requirement for the BA degree, namely, one
year of language study. In essence, they have encroached upon the electives area in a procedure we once
called requiring “co-requisites,” that is, courses required to complete a major or minor outside of the
credits offered within the given major or minor. Coreqs have been discouraged for some time at our
University. This is one reason why I myself believe that any language requirement should be made at the
University level so as neither to disadvantage given programs nor return to requiring co-reqs.
If there was a strong inclination in our discussion, it was that a language requirement be taken from the
gened curriculum, though this prompted further discussion. We noted the incomplete decision-making
and implementation process that accompanied the requirement voted on last year by the Faculty Senate
that each freshman student take a first-year seminar. We do not know out of which credit area this
requirement will be carved. It is likely that no one knows. We fear that the gened curriculum is in the
position of the proverbial frog placed in cool water that over time starts to boil. It’s cooked before it
knows it is in trouble. We think the gened curriculum may be in that position. We recognize all the
cross-currents of good-faith curricular design, program self-preservation, border wars and turf battles that
attended the process of gened reform five years ago. These are not waters one enters lightly, but we feel
strongly that a possible language requirement cannot be taken from program, that is, major/minor, credits.
I have written this report largely from my own point of view. I have distributed it to my colleagues, who
made no objections but are not responsible for all the views expressed here.