College Curriculum Meeting
Minutes
Thursday November 20th, 2008
Alumni Room, Brookhaven Gym
Ammerman Campus
In attendance:
Tina Good, Maria Kranidis, Marc Fellenz, Dawn Tracy-Hanley, Jill
Thornton, Joseph Gatti, Scott Mandia, Karen Wolf, Candice Foley,
Kathy Burger, Tom O’Brian, Louise Johnston, Claire Rubman
Also in attendance:
Leanne Warshauer, Steven McIntosh, Mike Boecherer, Amy
Warenda Czura, Wenxin Li, Cynthia Eaton, Sean Tvelia, Art
Lundahl, Ernst Star, Robin Hill, Steve Brodsky, Steven O’Sullivan,
Allen Jacobs,
The meeting was called to order at 3.45pm.
I. September minutes were approved.
II. Chair Good welcomed the “Distance Education Committee”
members and the “Academic Standards Committee”
members. The meeting was set up with a view to
articulating a relationship between the 3 committees.
Steve O’Sullivan addressed standards issues regarding hybrid
courses. Hybrid courses and asynchronous courses were
discussed in relation to modalities and popularity. Steve
suggested that a comprehensive list of courses be generated
since one does not currently exist. He discussed the definition of
a hybrid course and referred to the language in the contract that
details a 50:50 split between traditional on campus time and
online time. He also discussed the difficulties associated with
classroom space and scheduling.
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Chair Good raised questions regarding the roles and
responsibilities of each Committee on issues relating to hybrid
and online courses to ensure a balance between standards and
academic freedom. She articulated the goal of the meeting to
understand the issues, define the overlaps and goals.
Sean Tvelia spoke on behalf of the Distance Education
Committee. He discussed major changes:
1 Establish guidelines for technological efficiency.
2 Clarify the role of the Distance Education Committee with
regard to the relative merits of an application and its
corresponding modality.
Scott Mandia asked for clarification on the motivation for a hybrid
course.
Sean Tvelia clarified that hybrid courses require the students
have a face-to-face class meeting at least one time.
Chair Good again asked for clarity on the overlap between the
Academic Standards Committee and the Distance Education
Committee.
Art Lundahl confirmed that there were no preemptive statements
and that the Academic Standards Committee had been silent. He
said that throughout the college there have been far better minds
than ours to determine distance education policies.
Sean Tvelia confirmed that when a course is approved the
Distance Education Committee decides the appropriate vehicle
and it is approved as modality specific.
The 3 Committees discussed who decides if the online
environment is an appropriate vehicle and concluded that the
Distance Education Committee has been making that decision.
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Chair Good discussed that the resolutions from the Academic
Standards Committee and the Curriculum Committee go to
Governance and their communications are formalized. A
formalized process between Governance and the Distance
Education Committee should also be developed.
Steve O’Sullivan discussed these issues using the hybrid course
as an example. He explained that if the Distance Education
Committee had a hypothetical problem with a proposal then it
would be returned to the relevant department for discussion. It
was suggested that this may be a potential violation of academic
standards.
Cynthia Eaton asked who the proposer could complain to. The
process that is currently in place was described as:
1 The department that the course emanated from
2 The Distance Education Committee
It was noted that there is no appeal process.
Steve O’Sullivan asked how potential problems impact the 3
Committees – Curriculum, Academic Standards and Distance
Education.
Steve Brodsky addressed the issue by asking for clarification on
the specific nature of the problem.
Steve O’Sullivan suggested that there are no “clean edged
borders” for relationships between the Distance Education
Committee and other committees. He asked for clarification on
the limits of the authority for the Distance Education Committee.
Art Lundahl mentioned that there has been a proliferation of
online classes and he raised concerns about the authenticity of
academic standards. For example, he discussed a testing site or
environment to legitimize the authenticity of the student taking
the course.
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Chair Good referred to the contract which she said clearly
articulated the issue:
1 Establish guidelines to determine technical proficiency
2 Make recommendations for appropriate online delivery
3 Ensure that Distance Education procedures are followed
properly and fairly (course proposals).
To ensure that no violations of the contract occur and to ensure
that all proposals are treated fairly the Committee had 6 elected
representatives, 3 administrators, 1 coordinator and 1 union
representative.
Chair Good clarified that these measures are only in place to
assess the appropriateness of online delivery. She discussed that
academic appropriateness might overlap with academic
standards.
Sean Tvelia discussed the communication issue and the value of
input. He talked about course management systems (CMS).
When asked what rights the Faculty has to reject or accept CMS,
he responded that the Committee does not want to impinge on
the freedom to use CMS.
Scott Mandia suggested that the Distance Education Committee
should post minutes and agendas in keeping with the protocols
for the Academic Standards and Curriculum Committees.
Sean Tvelia agreed.
Cynthia Eaton suggested that every department should have its
own Distance Education Committee and that departments should
have guidelines.
Art Lundahl raised the issue of the establishment of a prerequisite
waiver process for online students. It was agreed that this
process is in place on all 3 Campuses. Art Lundahl articulated
that the DEC is a Committee and that if it sees a need for the
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Academic Standards or Curriculum Committee then it should
bring them in for that expertise.
Chair Good suggested that the Distance Education Committee
should think about sending a liaison to both the Academic
Standards and the Curriculum Committees. She asked about the
relationship between the Curriculum Committee and the Distance
Education Committee. She reminded all 3 Committees that when
courses are made available as distance education options that
there are requirements for reporting those courses.
She discussed the relationship with the State Education
Department and Middle States. She emphasized that the
Curriculum Committee has expertise and is aware of what is
required at the State level. She emphasized that those
conversations are not currently taking place.
Scott Mandia suggested a new format for programs like night
programs, but not curriculum programs. He alluded to the 15
credit change as major revision and mentioned that this is a
substantive change for Middle States. It was discussed that there
has been a problem tracking this in the past.
There was a suggestion that a student’s online course load could
be tracked rather than how many courses are offered by the
College.
Chair Good reminded the Committees that the goal was not to
limit the number of courses but to record them for SUNY.
The Committees discussed who issues the degrees and proposals
and who tracks each. Specific issues were discussed such as the
English program and the 50% limit.
Steve Macintosh reminded the Committees that the DEC is not
the place where decisions are made. It was mentioned that in the
past the distance education approval was on the original form for
the Curriculum Committee.
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It was suggested the course proposal process should be discussed
since there was ambiguity about whether the Curriculum
Committee should receive the proposal before the Distance
Education Committee.
Chair Good suggested that a course should be approved as a
distance education course based on its academic merit then sent
to the Distance Education Committee for approval. This was
discussed in relation to the special topics process where the
department approves a course and it is sent to the Curriculum
Committee if it is to become a permanent course.
Labor issues were discussed including the number of students in
an online course, the impact on face to face class numbers and
the implications for Faculty.
Cynthia Eaton suggested that the Curriculum Committee approve
courses pending DEC approval. The DEC would decide if a course
could be taught using a specific modality and if it was an
academically sound decision.
There was a discussion about course content and which course
management system should be used. An example was given of
COL 101, its related issues and subsequent problems.
Discussion continued about the appropriate modality for each
course, the purview of the Curriculum Committee which approves
courses not delivery modes and labor issues.
Discussion returned to the timeline for proposals and who should
make final decisions about courses.
There was consensus that the Curriculum Committee should
approve courses and the Distance Education Committee should
approve the modality.
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It was agreed that more discussion was needed to clarify issues
and bring resolution.
III. Adjournment
The meeting was adjourned at 5pm.
Respectfully submitted,
Claire N. Rubman
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