Faculty Senate

Budgets & Fiscal Planning Committee

 

Committee Members:
            Thomas Shellhammer, Chair
            Jeff McCubbin
            Frank Bernieri
            Kate Peterson
            Rebecca Warner
            Gary Beach
            Nancy Heiligman
            Goran Jovanovic (ex-officio)

The Committee met eight times over the ’06-’07 academic year. It discussed Category I and Category II proposals related to the following academic program changes:

• Creation of Graduate Degrees in Applied Economics (returned with questions, ultimately rejected by Provost)
• Creation of Graduate Degrees in Economics (returned with questions, ultimately rejected by Provost)
• Creation of a Bachelor of Science in Accountancy (approved)
• Creation of a School of Civil and Construction Engineering (approved)
• Initiation of a New Instructional Program Leading to the Statewide MS or PhD in Medical Physics (returned with questions, then approved)
• Creation of a Bachelor of Science in Environmental Engineering (approved pending minor modifications)
• Creation of a School of Chemical, Biological, and Environmental Engineering (returned with questions, then approved)
• Name change from Outdoor Recreation Leadership and Tourism to Tourism and Outdoor Leadership (approved)
• Initiation of a New Instructional Program Leading to a Graduate Certificate in Water Conflict Management and Transformation (approved with suggestions for strengthening the budgetary aspects)

Category I & II reviews aside, the major effort put forth by the BFPC was developing guidelines defining “departments” versus “schools” versus “colleges” on the OSU campus.  We examined a wide range of factors that might differentiate a department from a school such as disciplinary alignment, budgetary alignment and size, but throughout our discussions, the BFPC did not uncover any consistent definition of a School, nor could we develop one of our own.  When we attempted to define a Department in terms of size or discipline we were unable to convincingly establish a rationale for minimum or maximum size or limits of disciplinary breadth/focus.  The general conclusion was that if the formation of a School ultimately benefited the University then OSU should pursue the endeavor.  We submitted our report to the Faculty Senate President on April 26, 2007.