AAAS - Admissions, Awards and Academic Standing Committee

Minutes

December 9, 1998
 

Present: Chair Kurt Fosso, Kevin Holloway, Barbara Balko, Deborah Lycan, Michael Ford, Michael Sexton, Dell Smith, Glendi Gaddis, Shannon Benfield-Blankenship, Kristi Williams, Sharon Barnes (secretary)

Absent: Greg Caldwell, Dale Holloway, and Alicia Gilbert

Chair Kurt Fosso opened the meeting at 3:10. The minutes of November 11, 1998 were approved with corrections.
 

Subcommittee Reports

Kurt Fosso reported that the Academic Standing Subcommittee would meet December 18 and January 7. Ed Florance needs to be replaced after the December 18 meeting. Members are Kevin Holloway, Kurt Fosso, Ed Florance, and Kristi Williams.

Barbara Balko reported that the Petitions and Waivers Subcommittee would meet next week. She said a couple of SOAN courses have been petitioned to fulfill the transnational area cultures requirement. Recommendation is for the department chair to put those courses through the Curriculum Committee so they will be officially approved as transnational area cultures courses. The subcommittee must meet to consider warning, continued warning, probation, and continuing probation cases so the students can be notified before spring semester begins.

Deborah Lycan said there are two subcommittees for Honors and Awards and each has four faculty and one student. The internal awards committee of Cheney, Pamplin Corp. and Mary Stuart Rogers fellowships will meet some time February 16-26. Members are Annie Dawid, Phyllis Yes, Janet Davidson, Alicia Gilbert and Deborah. The other subcommittee for the Neeley and Trustee scholarships is composed of Deborah, Annie Dawid, Paulette Bierzychudek, Janet Davidson and Shannon Benfield-Blankenship. Deborah will be meeting with Hope Brown next week to review the letters which will be mailed January 11.

Kristi Williams expressed concerned for students who are overseas getting invited. Financial Aid Director Glendi Gaddis said discussion needs to occur about how to get information to those students. Communication has been by e-mail and the Financial Aid office has worked with the Overseas office in faxing information. They will meet Monday to finalize the time frame, so they can notify all students next week before the students leave.
 

Latin Honors

Dell Smith said he would draft the wording for Latin Honors for the Commencement program and run it by the AAAS Committee. Michael Sexton suggested giving students wording for their resumes about anticipated Latin honors. It was decided not to recognize Latin Honors at the Honors Convocation. Latin Honors students are mostly the students who get recognized for other honors as well.
 

Fall Matriculation

Discussion about changing the web pages ensued. Michael Sexton said that he was just at a meeting about changing the college's web pages, and there will be another meeting December 17 or 18. Michael said a search will be conducted to hire a person who will be responsible specifically for designing the web pages and that both IT and publications will be involved in the design.

Deborah Lycan asked about targeting specific groups of students by Admissions. Michael Sexton said the Enrollment Management Committee would be determining targeting as well as other things. Glendi Gaddis said there are Faculty members on every subcommittee of the Enrollment Management Committee. Kurt Fosso said at the last AAAS meeting the issue was brought up about the target group of students. Instead of targeting students we are losing, we might want to look at another group. Is this entirely an SAT-GPA issue, or are potential capabilities in college considered? Kevin Holloway said that the SAT is a better indicator than GPA.
 

First-Year Advising

Kristi Williams distributed an assessment survey given to all Freshmen. She said they are trying to get an overall feeling about what first year students feel about advising their first semester. The survey was kept to one page. Registrar Dell Smith said they wanted to get a global look to get some idea about what students perceive about the advising process. There is not much detail unless they get comments (which are minimal) -- just baseline data. Kristi and Dell will do the analysis and distribute the results. Deborah Lycan is concerned with the qualitative and quantitative data. There is a delicate balance in the interpretation of data. How is the information going to be quantified? The students were given the option of turning in the survey if they wanted to. There should be enough of a sample from those that were turned in. Kevin asked what is a sufficient sample? There are over 420 in the population.

Michael Ford said it would be interesting to see what the faculty of this committee would do with the survey.
 

AAAS Staffing for Spring Semester

Barbara Balko will chair the AAAS Committee Spring 1999. A replacement in the Arts and Humanities is needed for Kurt Fosso.
 

Possible Topics for Spring 1999

• Michael Ford said there is a national questionnaire, which contains enrollment management retention data. It will generate some very helpful data for advisers as well as students, and will help in making advising assignments as well as having motivational and attitudinal data of students. The test is given in the summer as a student self-analysis. Deborah Lycan asked who would be responsible for it, the student or the parent? Michael Ford said it is good baseline data for early intervention and gives a probability scale for leaving the institution. Results are sent in and evaluated -- they are not evaluated on site. Shannon Benfield-Blankenship said he felt students who apply and are accepted should then be given the form in such a way so that the students will want to know more about themselves and what they want to be. Michael Ford said the investment is $12 a student. It comes complete with manuals for advisers.
• Deborah asked who is responsible for student enthusiasm -- the student or faculty? This would help to get a perspective of how much time they spend. Is the adviser responding to students? Glendi asked at what point does the student change to their major adviser? Students need to be educated about what an advisor role is. Kevin said there are institutions that have advising as a course. Kristi said the advisor could have advisees as a class.
• Financial Aid issue about students who fall below standard. Kurt talked to the CAS Dean Jane Atkinson. There are other committees who can take care of this issue.
• Shannon said look at class size ratio. What is the ratio for students in classes in their major area? The advertised ratio is 15:1. There's up to 40 in many classes. Give information on the average size of the first year class. Glendi told of the survey question asked, if the student had the choice to make again, would they? 20% responded they would.

 
Meeting was adjourned at 4:15.