Philosophy (and Religious Studies)
Instructional (category 1 in the matrix):
 If student engagement means service learning and such, then philosophy and religious
studies should be recognized for what they do with students as the disciplines they are, not
expected to duplicate the instructional activities of some other disciplines.
 The UN-GA and ECU give high priority to globalizing our students. The Religious Studies
study abroad programs are the most successful at ECU.
 Our courses are graduation requirements for nineteen degree programs. They are the
primary source of our students' understanding of religion, ethics and critical thinking.
 According to the UNC, ECU’s primary mission is undergraduate education. Philosophy
and Religious studies are as central to undergraduate education at ECU as any other
programs at ECU.
 Our SCH’s per faculty member meet the UNC-GA requirement. We manage this while
enabling high faculty research productivity in comparison with our designated peers.
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Scholarly (category 2 of the matrix)
 In response to the initial PPC evaluations, we compared ourselves to our peers, as
designated by the UNC and ECU. We published 60% more books and articles than our ten
peers. Our scholarly productivity should be scored at the top!
 Scholarly productivity is not a function of grants in a discipline in which there are few
external grants and those that there are are small and do not generate overhead dollars.
Against our peers, philosophy is highly productive in research.
 Philosophy and Religious Studies are central to ECU’s published strategic planning goals
and mission, addressing 18 or more university goals.
 Philosophy and Religious Studies are central to UNC-GA’s strategic plan as well as ECU’s
plan, both of which focus on global understanding, ethics and critical thinking. Philosophy
is the discipline whose scholarship directly addresses the foundations of ethics and of
critical thinking. Religious Studies directly address an area of life one must understand to
even begin to have a measure of global understanding.
Service (category 3 of the matrix)
 We urge you to count service relative to its weight in a given department. Service is 20%
of the philosophy department's mission.
 Philosophy is highly active in internal service. This is putting our service energy where it
is most appropriate. Some disciplines are by nature oriented towards direct community
activity. Others prepare student to be good citizens. Philosophy is a discipline that
primarily works with students on campus rather than with people in the community. It is
reasonable that the rankings reflect these differences between disciplines.
 Philosophy majors do better on the law school exam (LSAT) than all but four other
majors (of 100 majors). On average, philosophy majors earn 20% more than other majors
20 years after graduation. Philosophy prepares people to be successful no matter what jobs
the take during their lives.
 Since students do not get exposed to philosophy or religious studies in high school.
Student demand is a function of exposure to philosophy at ECU. Exposure is a function of
number of faculty. Despite this, while we have no more philosophers and only three more
religious studies faculty than in 1990, we have 300% more majors.
 The philosophy department does not duplicate what other departments do. Philosophy
directly addresses the foundations of ethics and of critical thinking. Religious studies
directly addresses religion, the single most significant cultural phenomenon today.
 Religious Studies is central to achieving the Global Strategic Objective.