Faculty Senate

Baccalaureate Core Committee

Members present: Pat Muir (co-chair), Jay Noller (co-chair), Vicki Tolar Burton (ex-officio), George Caldwell, Denise Lach, John Bailey (new member)

Members absent: David Bernell (excused), Margie Haak, Cheryl Middleton.

New member, John Bailey, was introduced and welcomed to the Committee.

Minutes:
The minutes from 10/12/06 were reviewed by the committee and approved.

Old Business
General Reviews from ‘05-06 Academic Year and Summer:
Committee approved process to e-mail individual reviews to committee members with a discussion (if needed) and approval made in next meeting

Eng 362 – Approved.  Pat Muir will submit approval
Span 333 – Withdrawn.  The Department decided to withdraw the request due to the issues raised by the BCC.
             
Category Reviews (Contemporary Global Issues) from ‘05-06 Academic Year:
ANTH 487 - Withdrawn.  The department will submit a Request for Removal from the Bacc Core.  Co-chairs will sign.

Student members:  If committee members know of students who might be interested in serving on the BCC, they should forward names to Pat Muir who will help students apply to ASOSU for the assignment.

New Business
General Reviews 2006-2007 Academic Year
Geo 330 – Delayed. Committee will review during next meeting. 

Miscellaneous

• STS Category Review: notification of the review has been sent to relevant Department Heads. Because some work is being done on the web site to which faculty submit syllabi, notice to faculty will be delayed.  We decided that the due date for faculty members will reflect at least 60 days for response, so we may need to change the due date (earlier decided as January 15, 2007).  When the web site is ready, professors will be notified that it is time to submit syllabi for review. 
• Curriculum Council’s proposed deadlines for submission of Category I and Category II proposals (minimum times required final approval after submission of proposals to the appropriate first-stage reviewer).  We agreed with all proposed deadlines except recommend that the deadline for courses that are WIC or DPD be changed from the recommended 10 weeks to 12 weeks, to allow for their additional layer of review.  Pat Muir will communicate this recommendation to John Lee, Chair of Curriculum Council.
• Pat Muir and Jay Noller will be added to the review team for the review of ANTH 330.  It was agreed earlier that the BCC would provide increased scrutiny for reviews of the largest synthesis classes.  This scrutiny may include, but not be limited to, multiple reviewers looking at syllabi, face-to-face conversations with instructors, and attendance at class(es). 
• GEO 300 is both a STS and CGI synthesis course, so even though it was reviewed last year we will ask Vickie Nunnemaker to check when the last STS review of the course was conducted.  If it hasn’t been reviewed within the last five years, we’ll add it to our list for this year.
• BCC support for Sociology conversion of upper division BCC courses from 3 to 4 credits: After some discussion, the committee decided that the BCC supports departments’ efforts to increase the quality of the curriculum.  If this (and other conversions in the CLA) creates difficulties for students looking for 3-credit synthesis courses, the BCC will solicit new bacc core courses, maybe even providing incentives (i.e., streamlined processing) to increase the number.  The BCC agrees that it is quite reasonable to have synthesis courses offered for 4 credits.  Pat Muir will communicate the BCC’s sentiments to John Lee, Chair of the Curriculum Council.
• New WIC concept for College of Business: Jim Coakley and Vicki Tolar-Burton described a proposed model (still under discussion) for implementing WIC in the College of Business.  WIC methods and assignments would be integrated into multiple classes and students would be required to complete three WIC assignments in different classes.  They will not receive the WIC credit until they have completed all three courses and received at least a C- on the papers.  The BCC is very supportive of this model and others that integrate better writing skills into courses. 

Next Meeting:
Thursday, December 7, 10:00 am to 12:00 pm (or as needed), 109 Gilkey. 

Minutes submitted by Denise Lach