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College of Arts
& Sciences Call to Order, 3:33 PM Approval of Minutes, November 3, 1999 meeting President's Report The College has been awarded $1 million in funding for a new building at the Law School, through a joint effort of the Arizona and Oregon Congressional delegations, to house a Crime Victims’ Institute. The College has also received a $1 million grant for a Lewis and Clark bicentennial building to be located on the main campus. Architectural and engineering studies have begun. The building will see additional uses such as lectures and conferences, even during the bicentennial. We hope to build a "true and proper conference center," possibly with a major auditorium. Work continues on subsequent federal grants, possibly up to a total of $10 million. The College trustees, as well as Senators Smith and Wyden, have all helped in these efforts. The Center for Social Sciences is an unrelated project, and will not be affected by these efforts. Regarding assessment: No, it will not go away. We do have to be as thoughtful as possible about developing a credible accreditation process. We need to satisfy government agencies that would otherwise be happy to step in and measure our educational outcomes. We also need to satisfy parents. We need to create a process that is our own. Dean's Report Remaining meetings this academic year will be Miller 105. Thanks to those who participated in the recent Academic Fair. After the Fair the Deans discussed the event with their chairs and passed their comments on to the Academic Council and to the Admissions Office. The Task Force on Information Literacy is up and running. Its members are Jim Kopp, Bret Ingerman and Professors Gernot Blume, Robert Goldman, Robert Owens and Richard Rohrbaugh. The Murdock Trust has invited us to submit a full proposal due February 15, which provides expert consultants in the area of utilization of in information literacy to facilitate learning and instruction. Trinh Tran will work with Dean Atkinson to coordinate the grant proposal, in consultation with the Task Force and faculty committees. At this year's first meeting of the Committee on Promotion and Tenure, someone raised the issue of students influencing other students during course and instructor evaluation sessions. The Committee recommended that the dean intervene. A reminder about the need for silence has been added to the instructions that student proctors read when administering the evaluations. Regarding our Academic Integrity Policy: We are featured in the Templeton Guide to Colleges as one of 35 schools with exemplary academic integrity policies. No cases have been brought to the Honor Board so far this year, but please remember that this is the time of year when incidents can occur. Discussion:
Reports of Standing Committees Committee on Admissions, Awards & Academic Standing, Deborah Lycan AAAS is working in three areas at present: 1. Changes in selection processes for Rogers, Pamplin, and Cheney awards. A new timetable gives students more time to prepare applications, and committees more time to evaluate applications. A culture of late applications has developed, with committee chairs reviewing reasons for lateness. This situation was problematic. Applying is a choice, not an assignment. Accepting late applications is unlike the "real world," and makes the process cumbersome. New language has been developed to state that all late applications will be returned to students. Students are now responsible for insuring that all recommendations are received by the deadline. Faculty will give these to students in sealed and signed envelopes. Also, the committee is looking at the method by which class standing is determined for application purposes. The current method, using credit hours as the indicator of class standing, has worked against applicants. Any change in procedure will be for this purpose only. Question/Comment: Haven't there been problems when students are overseas? Reply: There will be an exception made for overseas students. 2. Dean's List and Latin Honors The new Latin honors requirement (GPA 3.7) has produced a situation where students can graduate with honors without ever having been on the Dean's list (GPA 3.75). The committee proposes changing the Dean's list threshold to 3.7. 3. Academic Performance Language in College Catalog [see handout provided at meeting]. Language on the relationship between academic performance and course grading was dropped from the catalog when we changed from quarters to semesters. The committee believes it would be useful to add new language to the catalog, and is seeking e-mail comments on the proposed language. A handout summarizing the proposed language was distributed. Discussion: Comments were made regarding the relative merits of "extended" vs. "brief" language on performance and grades. It was noted that definitions vary across departments and instructors. "Consent of instructor" provision for continuing in a subject after receiving a D grade may be problematic. There may be no faculty consensus on what constitutes appropriate performance-grade relationship. Statistically, the average grade at Lewis and Clark is B. Having written guidelines is beneficial in providing a foundation for conversations with students. Dean Atkinson assumes this matter has been entered as a resolution for debate and approval at our next CAS faculty meeting; meanwhile e-mail comments are encouraged. Curriculum Committee, Jack Hart The committee has reviewed the academic calendar for the next four years. As an experiment, during the 2000-2001 year Fall semester exams will be done in four days. The next four years are easy to accomplish within the desired time frame; the following two years will be more difficult. Thanks to Bob Owens for developing these calendars. Dell Smith presented the 10-year academic calendars, 2001-2010. A ten year sequence is required to go through a full cycle. Fall semesters 2004, 2005, 2009 will have no fall break. All years except 2002, 2003, 2008 have 17-week summers; those three years have 16 week summers but a longer winter break. Committee on Educational Technology, Harry Schleef Patrick Ryle has been selected as our new Director of Media Services, and will begin work on Monday, 12/6. Committee on the Library, Jim Grant Regarding copyright issues: Current legal standards are more generous than they used to be, and consider instructor intent. A group is at work to develop a revised policy on fair use of copyrighted material. Meeting Adjourned: 4:50 p.m.
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