Academic Senate Minutes
Wednesday, February 23, 2005
(Approved)
Call to Order
Chairperson Lane Crothers called the meeting to
order at 7:00 p.m.
Roll Call
Senate Secretary Paul Borg called the roll and
declared a quorum.
Approval of Minutes of February 9, 2005
Motion XXXVI-42: By Senator Borg, seconded by Senator Mahoney, to
approve the Academic Senate Minutes of February 9, 2005. The minutes were
unanimously approved.
Educating
Dr. Joe Rives:
Each year,
the Director of Planning and Institutional Research comes to the Senate and
gives an update for Educating Illinois.
This is first report for Educating
Illinois 2003-2010. You, who were on the Senate last year, will remember
the structure of Educating Illinois.
The goals are the BOT goals for the institution expressed in their vision
statement and we as a campus community work together to get action statements
behind those goals. The first goal given high priority by the institution was
to recruit high-achieving and motivated students. The mean ACT score for new
freshman at ISU was just about 24, which very much eclipses the State of
The second goal that the BOT established for us was
to be the national leader in graduate and undergraduate education. This is data,
which I have presented to you before, is from the National Survey of Student
Engagement. Educating Illinois has a
goal that we will exceed the published criterion for all other national
doctoral, research-intensive universities. What we see is that we exceed
national comparisons in 8 of the 10 categories. The comparisons in which we do
not exceed our peers are in the levels of enriching educational experiences. A
common problem nationally is that students filling out the survey don’t know what
“enriching educational experiences” are. So that is part of the problem, but,
indeed, we need to get our students more engaged in learning inside and outside
of the classroom as a core value of
I also wanted to illustrate another way of looking
at national leadership in undergraduate and graduate education as the work that
you do with students, both inside and outside the classroom. To illustrate our
core value, I chose our participation in the Graduate Research Symposium. We
had a record number of participants last spring. The number of students seeking
awards for excellence in their instruction and research is also at a record
number.
The third goal that the Board of Trustees
established for us was to provide an educational environment. We have
maintained the percentage of small classes and the student-faculty ratio has
remained constant during these trying budget times. The great work that you
have done in raising the level of external grants and contracts brought in to
the institution resulted in a record $20.6 million for scholarship support.
That is really due to faculty and staff alike going out and seeking in record
number more external funding. Last year I reported that state and corporations
were not giving. The faculty and staff at ISU responded by being more
aggressive and seeking more revenue in more venues.
Value expectation is another goal that the Board of
Trustees established for us and there is just so many ways that you can think
of value. Some of the measures of academic quality are a proxy for value. We
have been recognized by the
Value expectations are also defined as promoting a
healthy, safe and environmentally sustainable campus. The example that always
strikes me is the request of $1 million for power replacement in Milner
Library. Milner Library opened in 1976 before the day of personal computers. At
that time, they could not even imagine the amount of energy that would be
needed. Value is also actions that the BOT took with the energy management and
utility infrastructure improvement plan. The BOT approved the northwest chiller
project, which is good news for residents in the Turner area of campus. This
project will also lay the foundation for air conditioning in Redbird Arena and
Horton Field House. Value is progressing on the Master Plan. As we know,
Schroeder has dramatically changed and will continue to change as the
renovation progresses. Our new
Our next goal was diversity. The data shows a mixed
message. Enrollment is up in terms of diversity; retention is down slightly.
There are several new initiatives going on on campus to increase the retention
of all students. The MASAI Mentoring Program is a new program and cosponsored
by the Division of Student Affairs and Academic Affairs specifically targeting
minority students. It is a program of transition into ISU and then in culturation
through peer mentoring for academic training. There are very good preliminary
results of this program in that students at midterm had a much higher GPA than
students not participating in the program. Diversity is also democracy. It is
hard to believe that it was in November that Milner Library helped 500 students
register to vote on campus and 2000 students waited in line, in some cases over
three hours, to vote.
Another goal that the BOT established for us was to
be the first choice of employers in recruiting our students. The data shows how
our students compare on national averages on licensure and certification exams.
Three-fourths of the time, our students do better. For the last two
administrations of the alumni survey, for those students responding, over
one-third are pursuing additional education after graduating from
Partnerships can also take the form of public
service and has many definitions. Examples include conferences. We had more
than 31 conferences that worked through our Conference Services Department. The
That is a look at Educating Illinois in the last year. We will continue to be a
successful institution if we remain committed to the core values because it is
our daily interactions with students, faculty and staff and in the enactment of
those core values that is truly Educating
Illinois. The institution will also be successful if it remains true to its
highest priorities that you have helped shape and form. Educating Illinois will only be successful, as well, if you hold us
accountable to reporting back to you.
There is a new Educating
Illinois web site. The old “Report Card” for Educating Illinois was
considered to dense and many just wanted to know the bottom line. The new
Report Card gives three years of data history and the performance indicators
for all the actions in Educating Illinois.
It should take you two minutes to read from top to bottom. Annual changes are
easily seen indicating whether goals moved in the desired direction, remain the
same or go in the opposite direction. This is available on the web at: http://www.educatingillinois.ilstu.edu.
Using the report card methodology, this is where we
stand this year. Approximately one-third of our goals are in the
achieved/maintained category. Next year, you should ask to have a bar graph
illustrating the direction the achieved category has taken. You should ask the same for the no change,
opposite direction and not started columns. This is a legacy that can build
over time for you as we look towards the institutional progress. I have also
developed a scoring rubric that gives every performance in Educating Illinois, all 138, two points possible. Two points means it’s
achieved, we’re done, or it’s ongoing. One point means we moved in the desired
direction. No points means no change from year to year. Negative points mean
that we went the wrong way. So, for each of the seven goals I just talked
about, all of the performance indicators are scored and summed. The scoring
methodology is really a tribute to Senator Rossman because it is an adaptation
of the balance score card methodology that he has been a strong proponent of.
It is, also, a great tribute to you, Chairperson Crothers, because you have
been the one saying, ‘keep it simple’.
Chairperson's Remarks
Senator
Crothers: I
wanted to extend my deep appreciation in thanks for everybody’s efforts last
week, whether it was participation in the NCA meeting, Founders Day, Board of
Trustees meeting, or any of the unbelievable number of other things that everybody
was asked to do.
Student Government Association President's Remarks
Noah Conrad,
Student Body Vice President: Josh Rinker, Student Body President, would like to
express his regrets for being unable to attend the Senate meeting. SGA elections
are next week. We would appreciate it if you would, not advocating for any
particular party, but just spread the word that elections will be taking place.
They are from Tuesday, March 1, at 12:00 noon through Thursday, March 3, at
12:00 noon. Whoever the new Student Body President is, Josh will bring that
individual to the next Academic Senate meeting.
Redbirds 4 Relief is also having continued success
as we strive towards the goal of $20,000. The goal set forth by this
organization is a dollar from every student, which would give us our grand
total. The kickoff is planned for next Monday from 10:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. in
the
As the off-campus senators have their 1,300 to 1,400
constituents, we are currently looking at a way to represent our on-campus
students in the same way. We are still working out the technicalities with
CISS. As soon as that is up and ready, we will be able to fully advocate and
hear the voice of all 19,500 on-campus students, in the same manner as the
off-campus students.
Administrators' Remarks
President Al Bowman: Absent
Provost John Presley: Absent
Vice President of Student Affairs
Dr. Helen Mamarchev: I will just expand a little bit on what Dr. Rives
talked about in terms of our long-range residence hall and dining plans. I am
happy to report that Wilkins Hall, which is closed this year for renovation, is
right on track with its renovation. A
couple of weeks ago, we opened our online registration process to current
students so that could sign up for where they would like to live on campus next
year. Within the first couple of days, Wilkins Hall was 80% full with our
current students and we have yet to open it up to the freshmen. We are
extremely pleased by the response of the students to this work and we will
continue to press forward. I think it is important to remember that the State Fire
Marshal has put a deadline of the year 2013 for all public universities to have
sprinklers in all residence halls. We continue to press forward in an effort to
meet that deadline.
Vice President of Finance and Planning
Steve Bragg: Absent
Committee Reports
Academic Affairs Committee
Senator
Reid: The committee discussed the
question of the 124 hour rule; that is, whether or not programs should be
limited to 124 hours, which allows students to complete their work within four
years. Over one-quarter of our programs have hours above 124; virtually all of
them are Teacher Education. The accreditation requirements are such that it is
very difficult, if not impossible, to meet the accreditation and General
Education requirements within the 124 hours. The University Curriculum
Committee has stated the procedures that they are going through to ensure that
these programs have those accreditation issues and that similar programs in the
state have a similar number of hours. We felt their argument was compelling.
The concern about students only being guaranteed their tuition for four years
has been allayed by a new procedure that has been proposed to the Provost. It would
allow students, if the first major they declare requires more than 124 hours, to
be guaranteed their original freshman tuition for five years. We will, in
addition, have recommendations for steps to be taken to perhaps reduce the overlap
between professional studies courses and courses with similar content within the department. The
committee then began looking into the enrollment management issue and will
continue this discussion. Approximately one out of eight to one of nine
students is a General Student. We have large numbers of seniors and juniors who
have no major and may never get into a major. This is a significant problem and
we will be looking into possible measures to be taken.
Senator Crothers: Is the five years already in the Truth and Tuition Policy from the State?
Steve Adams,
Enrollment Management and Academic
Services: Yes.
Senator Crothers: So, it is not a matter for the Provost. If your program takes longer
than four years, it goes the length of the program.
Senator Reid:
But it only applies to the first major that you declare.
Administrative Affairs and Budget Committee
Senator
Brockschmidt: The committee met with Bill
Cummins tonight and discussed the University ID process, which is an Advisory
Item on the Senate Agenda. We also discussed the Amplification Policy, as well
as the Flag Policy. We are hoping to bring those to the floor in the next
meeting or so.
Faculty Affairs Committee
Senator
Wylie: The committee had a speaker,
Josie Evola, Diversity and Affirmative Action. She discussed some of the things
her department is working concerning recruitment and retention.
Planning and Finance Committee
Senator
Plantholt: The committee met with Helen
Mamarchev and Brent Paterson from Student Affairs. They gave a presentation on
where the money for Student Affairs comes from and how it is spent. They talked
about their budgeting process, what kind of effects the cuts in the last few
years have had on them and their priorities for the future. This is part of the
continuing meetings with different vice presidents at the University that the
committee is having to gather information. We have one more of those meetings
scheduled and then we will work on making recommendations on University
priorities.
Rules Committee
Senator
Hammel: The committee met with Jan
Paterson, Dean of Students about the issue of the external committee
dissolution, potentially without Senate consent and we hope to bring this as an
information item at the next meeting. Essentially, the committee determined
that the request to dissolve the external committees, the Entertainment
Committee and the University Forum Committee, was done in an appropriate fashion.
In fact, they have been replaced with very active and very useful committees.
We also began our discussion of the request to potentially reduce the number of
faculty members on the Honors Council. After having some initial discussions
with the new director of Honors, they are not particularly interested in
reducing the number of faculty members on the council, but we will have some
recommendations about how we populate that committee.
Action Item:
02.11.05.01
Ombudsperson
Recommendations (Faculty Affairs Committee)
Senator Wylie:
We made the changes that were suggested. Some things were already in bold, so
the additional revisions are in larger bold. We would like to move this for
action.
Motion XXXVI-43: By Senator Wylie to approve the revised ombudsperson recommendations
from the Faculty Affairs Committee. The policy identifies the Vice President of
Human Resources as the ombudsperson for the pilot year. There was no debate by
the Senate and the recommendations were unanimously approved.
Information Items:
04.09.03.06 Academic Progress Alert Grades (Academic Affairs Committee)
Senator Reid:
The Academic Affairs Committee received a document calling for the three-year
review of the Academic Progress Alert System. We felt, unanimously, that this
was a very positive addition to the University and I would like to ask Steve
Adams of Enrollment Management to tell you a little more about the program.
Dr. Adams:
This program was initiated in 1997 and took effect for the first time in the
fall of 1998. The Academic Progress Alert (APA) is geared to impact students in
100 level courses, not just new freshmen. It is certainly not a perfect system;
we have recognized that all along. But it is a part of the first year
experience and it does provide timely feedback for those students who are in
the 100 level classes. The level of faculty participation has increased
significantly. When it began in the fall of 1998, the level of participation by
the faculty was 82%. For the fall of 2004, the level of participation increased
to 93%. It has been since, along with the online grade submission, converted to
an electronic submission through the ICampus Portal. That was the pilot, in
fact, for submission of those grades, which took place for the first time after
the fall of 2004 term. The impact, in my opinion, is very difficult to access;
however, there are some figures which may be of interest. The grades assigned
in the fall of 1998 averaged 2.34. The grades assigned in the fall of 2004 have
increased to 2.67. The number and percentage of those students on probation has
decreased as well. I certainly believe that the studies that have been done
with regard to this program indicate that its continuation is valuable to the
University.
Senator Gamage:
What evidence do you have to say this increase in grades is due to the APA
grade reporting?
Dr. Adams:
It is certainly not a perfect system; the indicators that I cited were the only
indicators that we have as evidence to show that it has improved the
performance of students.
Senator Gamage:
I did look into the data for 1999. I found that about half of the faculty
members were not reporting the grades. I looked at the grade distribution for
faculty members reporting and the grade distribution for faculty members who
did not report to see if there was a difference in the distributions. I looked
at 22 large classes. Out of 22 classes, 15 classes had no difference at all in
the grade distribution. I looked at the average GPA for these classes. Four
classes had no difference at all. Two of those classes had negative effect,
meaning that the group that received the APA grade had a lower average GPA.
Only two of those classes had the positive effect. Right now, almost 100% of
faculty are reporting the grades, unlike in 1999, so there is no way to compare
them.
Dr. Adams: I
don’t believe that that data matches mine. In the fall of 1999, 76% of faculty
members submitted the grades for the APA.
Senator Gamage:
I looked at the classes where about half of the faculty members did not report
the grades. That way I could divide the groups into two groups and compare
them.
Senator Crothers: Are you willing to share that data with the AAC?
Senator Gamage:
Yes, I would be glad to. One other suggestion is that if you really want to see
if there is an affect, temporarily stop the APA and see if there a drop in the
distribution.
Senator Brockschmidt: When you were looking at the increases in passing rates, was it taken
into consideration the rising standards, not only of the University, but also
of the students who enter? Were the higher ACT scores and the rising quality of
students factored in as a separate variable?
Dr. Adams:
That was not taken into account. The grades were figured the same way each
year.
Senator Borg:
Have students been surveyed on whether they perceive this as helpful, especially
first year students?
Dr. Adams:
Not to my knowledge. However, the First Year Experience Committee has done a
number of focus groups with students and there is a possibility to do that. I
can suggest that to them.
Senator Crothers: The only concern that I have ever had with this is the default
assumption that unless you filled out the blank for attendance, their
attendance was fine. I did not want to signify that attendance was fine in
large classes when I did not know if it was. Has there been any adjustment to
the form?
Dr. Adams:
Not to my knowledge.
The item will come before the
Senate as an Action Item at the next Senate meeting.
02.10.05.01
Distance
Education Recommendations and Philosophy Statement (Academic Affairs Committee)
Senator Reid: As
you can read in our cover letter, the concern of the committee was to balance
the need for the development of distance education with a philosophy, policy
and standards that ensure these courses will enhance the nature and objectives
of the courses and conform to the University’s mission. We were presented first
with the recommendations from the University Curriculum Committee. Those went
to the Academic Affairs Committee back in 2001 and they came out with a report
in February 2002. At the same time, the
Galen Crow, Distance Education Executive Director: I think one of the interesting facts about distance
education on this campus is that despite the fact that there are no particular
incentives to provide totally online courses, the growth of distance education
has been quite remarkable. We have gone from in 1999, I believe, 17 totally
online courses to last year when we had 60 totally online courses. Totally
online courses are the ones that do not require rooms on campus; the courses
are virtually entirely online. We started working on this four years ago and
part of the impetus to provide some oversight and guidance was that we were
actually looking towards the NCA visit. At the time, we felt that the NCA was
going to be very concerned about how we provided oversight for distance
education on campus. The recommendations strike a balance between the interests
of the institutions and faculty and students. Where the recommendations finally
fall is that it is really up to departments and colleges to define their own
strategic goals for distance education in that the institution as a whole has
no strategic interest necessarily in promoting growth of distance education.
Colleges and departments would define for themselves what those strategic aims
are and are best able to define the content and quality of those courses.
Senator Reid:
The UCC changed the definition of distance education. I want to emphasize that
this is a work in progress. We understand that some of these proposals are
going to be controversial and we are bringing them to the Senate as our sense
of the committee, but we want reaction back on these. The committee decided to
change in the UCC recommendations that if an existing course is changed to a
distance ed format, that there needs to be some oversight as to whether or not
that course is maintaining the nature of the course and achieving the goals and
objectives. This is in section A.2a. So, we have suggested that such courses
would not stop with the department, but would go to the college curriculum committee,
which would just determine the question of whether or not the goals are being
maintained and met. I would add that our concerns for at least one course at
the University where large numbers of students be required to take it online.
Many students do not want to do so and feel that the quality is not what it
should be. We want to make sure that such courses are looked into. We
understand at a time like this when there are economic concerns that there is
going to be a real temptation to switch to online and, perhaps in some cases,
reduce the work. In many cases, online courses increase the amount of work, but
it is possible to put something online with less oversight and have just the
opposite.
The UCC also recommended that
any new distance education courses that are being transferred be evaluated
according to the NCA distance education guidelines, which take into account
both quality and outreach to communities. The other recommendations have to do
with the scheduling process. The sixth recommendation is that the Provost help
create a mechanism for formative evaluation of ISU’s distance offerings. Right
now, they may be seen in the curriculum process, but there is no mechanism for
the overall offerings in a regular process, so we added every five years and we
put in a number of documents that we feel should be taken into account.
As for the recommendations
from
In action 3, the essential
recommendation is that an ad hoc committee be appointed by the University from
relevant constituencies and be empowered to develop templates, standards and
policies. The AAC added “to be used by departments, colleges and the University
in the evaluation of proposed distance education courses”. This is critical. If
we are going to guide the development of distance education, we have to have
not just a philosophy, but specific standards. We also suggested some standards
that reflect the values of our committee, “that distance education courses will
not replace courses that are taught in the classroom nor will the technology
replace in-class meanings of a course unless a strong case has been made that
they will improve the learning for the majority of students.” This is precisely
a means for dealing with the pressures that might be put upon us when we have
fewer and fewer professors. It also responds to the problem that some
professors are replacing their Friday courses with online Power Point
presentations, which we felt was not necessarily justified. The actions also
include a recommendation that the University designate the outreach fees to be allocated
to an account utilized for outreach or distance students.
Dr. Crow:
The outreach fee is a little obscure. Students who are in extension courses or
an internet course and are in no “residential” courses, that student would not
pay general student fees. Instead, they would pay an outreach fee. That
outreach fee is supposed to be exactly the same as the amount of the general
student fees. It turns out that occasionally when student fees have been
increased, inadvertently, those fees are not increased. The intention always
had been that those fees were to be used for purposes of providing services to
those students remote from campus; currently, those fees just into the general
fee fund and not used for that purpose.
Senator Reid:
Our committee added another recommendation that not only the University, but
the departments, review their distance education courses every five years. We
feel, as a committee, that this is a very exciting domain to develop. We hope
that we can use it in a way that won’t threaten the small college atmosphere of
the University and the quality of education within the University. The
philosophy draft reads, “The development and maintenance of distance education
courses at ISU should be supported, but only to the extent that its use is
pedagogically appropriate and conforms to the NCA guidelines. The primary purpose
of distance education is to serve students who do not have access to
traditional on-campus classes. Distance education should be used to target
on-campus students only if they provide educational opportunities that cannot
be provided in the classroom.”
Senator Jerich:
I would like to pose an inquiry from the financial perspective. When distance
education was launched here, there was a facility which provided audio and
video. Do you have a sense of how many courses are using A/V transmission from
site to site as compared to perhaps
Dr. Crow:
The State, a number of years ago, divided this up into regions to provide
distance learning across the state and produced what is called compressed video
or interactive television. That is essentially a room-based technology and room-to-room
requires dedicated telecommunication lines. It is a relatively expensive
technology and labor intensive to manage. The way the State developed it, they
didn’t require standards from region to region, so distance education was ok
within the region as long as you did not cross from region to another, which
further complicated the issue of distance learning. So, one of the
recommendations that we had regionally was to investigate ways to move out of
compressed video technology. We had
about five or six rooms operating on campus capable of this technology. The technology
was funded by the State, but the State provided no program funds. We made
recommendations to move into internet protocol video, meaning that if there is
going to be video, it would stream over the internet instead of these dedicated
telecommunication lines with the compressed video technology. We purchased some
equipment with external campus funds and we experimented with that. Right now,
Campus Technology Support Service has that equipment and some of our distance
education courses are using that equipment. This equipment is very flexible and
cost efficient. Some courses use this equipment, some use
Senator Riegle:
On the next to last page, the second bullet from the top, you talk about
maintaining high quality so as to discourage students from taking online
courses to get a better grade. Quality may not be the same as difficulty. You could
have a high quality course that was easy. You might want to consider phrasing
that differently. Also, it is not clear to me if you want to evaluate these
courses to see if they are still distance courses or if they are still quality
courses? I don’t see the need for a review just because they are distance
education courses. I could see the need for review of every course or I could see
the need for review to see if they are using technology appropriately. There
needs to a more instructionally-centered philosophy to the evaluation.
Senator Reid:
Would you be comfortable with a statement that said, ‘review on whether they
are using technology appropriately in terms of the goals of the course’?
Senator Riegle:
I will leave that up to the committee. In the distance ed philosophy statement,
the primary purpose of distance education is to serve students who do not have
access to traditional on-campus classes. Actually, that is not the same as the
next statements which talk about providing educational opportunities that
cannot be provided in the classroom. That seems to me to be philosophically
sound. The statement about serving students who do not have access is not
necessary. Most of my distance education students are here at ISU. I am trying
to provide an educational opportunity experience for any student no matter
where they are. To the bigger point, this entire report seems to be a negative,
suspicious kind of thing. We have this thing that is growing and we think we
have pressures from the administration to use distance education to produce
revenue, etc, so we will try to develop certain kinds of safeguards. Some of
those things are real; however, there is another dimension to this and that is
that many of our students prefer to learn this way and many of the national
surveys support this perspective. This report, in addition to those negative
kinds of statements, should include some positive aspects where we should
investigate, as a University, the opportunities to convert courses that would
be better done in a distance education aspect.
Senator Reid:
Since the recommendations were originally proposed in that spirit of
exploration, I agree with you and that we can better express the excitement of
exploring. I think that we have to be careful, however, since the evidence
seems to show that your average student is not going to do better in these
courses. That is why we wish to have some of the caveats in here.
Senator Borg:
I hear in both statements and in the discussion occasionally an equivalence
between an online course and a distance education course. Am I correct in that
all online courses might be distance education courses but not the reverse?
Dr. Crow:
The only courses that we are tracking are those that are virtually 100% online,
primarily over the internet.
Senator Borg:
With this definition proposed, you say instruction may employ electronically mediated methods.
Dr. Crow:
Perhaps “may” should be revised. We certainly wouldn’t include correspondence
courses in that; however, some might argue that a student in an extension
course in which a faculty member literally goes to the remote location and
meets with the students. Those students are remote from the campus. They need
the same library access. They need the same access to advising and placement
services that students on campus need and we still put those students in a
category not as distance students. But I would argue that we should be
sensitive to the fact that those students have exactly the same needs.
Senator Reid:
Do you wish then to eliminate any notion of a distance education course that is
not electronically mediated?
Senator Borg:
No, but I think that if we are still including the older, traditional ways of
doing it, somewhere we need to make that distinction.
Senator Crothers: Speaking to the budget question in action 5, has this gone through
PAC and the fee supporting areas to dedicate a fee to this purpose?
Dr. Crow:
That request has gone to the Vice President for Finance and Planning on several
occasions. My understanding is that this is one of those things that pretty
much everybody who looks at this agrees that this is what should happen. To my
knowledge, it has not gone to
Senator Crothers: It seems that the Senate is being asked to support dedicating a fee
and I would encourage the committee to look at that question. I would like to
make sure that the people who actually control the money have talked about it
and agree that it is a good idea.
Senator Hammel:
Do we have a policy for determining credit hours for distance education?
Dr. Crow: We
do not. I would certainly argue that that would be within the purview of the
department or college.
Senator Crothers: That is inside the curriculum committee processes. I believe that we
have provided the Academic Affairs Committee with a number of things to
consider. If there are other items, please send an e-mail to Senator Reid.
Senator Reid:
We will take your comments into consideration, try to consult on the economic
implications of action 5 and bring this back to you.
02.10.05.02
Withdrawal
from Course Policy Revisions (Academic Affairs Committee)
Steve Adams, Associate Vice President for Enrollment
Management and Academic Services:
This request is a request for a change in procedure in the Withdrawal Policy
for dropping a course or courses. It originated with Carolyn Bartlett, who
retired as the Registrar at the end of 2003. It came out of the Registration
Advisory Committee. I think the intention here was to eliminate inconsistencies
for course withdrawal after the tenth day of classes through the end of the
eighth week. There were several instances cited that some faculty members
required students to go to department office for the signed form. Some faculty
members required the student to see the faculty member during office hours. The
intention now is to basically do away with the form during that period of time.
This would convert this withdrawal process to an electronic process. When a
student withdraws, there would be no signature of a faculty member or
chairperson required under the new procedure. Instead, the ICampus Portal would
enable a student to do this online. The faculty member and department chair
could easily gain access to the class list through the portal and review the
list of those students who withdrew after the tenth day of class through the
end of the eighth week. After that period of time, the student would go to the
office of the University Registrar. The Registrar would contact the faculty
member for a grade at that time.
Senator Reid:
We agreed with this change and our committee made only one slight wording
change to clarify.
Senator Adams:
Would the policy also hold for half semester courses?
Dr. Adams:
Yes, on a compressed timeline.
Senator Seelinger: There is the aspect of a faculty member being informed when a student
withdraws from a course. You say that you can review the list online, but is
there an active mechanism to inform the faculty member of a withdrawal?
Dr. Adams:
Not under this procedure. The only thing that I can suggest is that I could
have the Registrar at periodic times notify the faculty members, if that would
be the sense of the Senate.
Senator Reid:
I think faculty would like to know who has dropped the course.
Senator Smith:
Just presuming that we are all now able to use ICampus, I would imagine that if
ever a question arose, we could just check there.
Senator Reid:
If you have 300 students in your class, it might be a problem. Also, some
faculty do not use computers.
Senator Crothers: It does sound to me that Senate at least desires a conversation about
whether an active mechanism would be useful.
Motion XXXVI-44: By Senator Reid, seconded by Senator Darnell, to move the revised
Withdrawal from Course Policy to action. The Senate voted approval of the
motion with the exception of one no vote from Senator Jerich.
Motion XXXVI-45: By Senator Reid to approve the Withdrawal from Course Policy.
Senator Hammel:
This is probably not a friendly amendment, but I will pose it; that is, that we
will notify faculty of withdrawals from classes by appropriate means, hard copy
or e-mail, unless it becomes financially prohibitive to do so.
Dr. Adams: I
am not sure of what the definition is for financially prohibitive, but I would
say that it would be a pain to notify all faculty.
Senator Reid:
I would accept the friendly amendment with the condition of when it would be
carried out.
Senator Crothers: That would be contrary to the original friendly amendment. I do not
accept that addition to the friendly amendment. If you wish to offer your own
friendly amendment, you can do so.
Senator Evernden: Next year, it is going to be required of students to have computers. I
think it would be silly to tie a policy around the fact that faculty are not
using computers when students are required to do so.
Senator Holland:
Don’t we have the ability to flag the withdrawals so that notification
immediately goes to the faculty by e-mail?
Dr. Adams: I
do believe that that is a matter of resources. As far as programming is
concerned, it is very difficult to get some of the programs that we want done
now. That would be adding yet another problem to the entire situation.
Senator Jerich:
I have a wonderment about what percentage of students are we talking about
would be involved within this withdrawal process.
Senator Crothers: I don’t see that as germane to this debate. That is well beyond the
question. To clarify where we are, you have before you the policy now moved to
an action item with its two main points, plus a third point regarding
appropriate mechanisms of notification. I am not sure what the point of the
financial concern was in terms of the matter, so if you can clarify that for me,
we can decide whether or not that is potentially a friendly amendment.
Senator Reid:
Let’s say we were to pass it as amended without any financial restriction and
the University comes back to us and says that we really can’t afford to do
this, what exactly would happen?
Senator Crothers: Among the many reasons I resisted moving this to action was these
kinds of questions. The President might reject this policy as it stands now
with the friendly amendment on exactly those grounds. The President is not here
tonight so we don’t know that. So unless we wish to table this until further
review, we will not get those questions answered.
Senator Reid:
I see no problem with tabling it until the next meeting.
Motion XXXVI-46: By Senator Borg, seconded by Senator Mahoney, to table the proposal as
amended until it can be further considered. Without debate, the Senate unanimously
voted to table the policy.
Advisory Item:
02.10.05.03
Social
Security Number/University ID Process (Administrative Affairs Committee)
Senator Brockschmidt: Basically, what you have before you is a policy that
the University is going to institute for the replacement of social security
numbers with university ID numbers. Some basics concerns from our committee
were the memorization of the numbers. The new numbers will be on the ID cards.
There was also the point of graduating seniors who might need to access something
after they leave and if they would use their social security number or a new
ID. There would be a change over where they would give their social security
number and then their new ID number would be used even after they left. If
there are any questions on this, you can e-mail Senator Drew at amdrew@ilstu.edu. If she can’t answer your
questions, she will forward them to Bill Cummins, who came and spoke to us
about this tonight.
Communications:
Senator Borg: On behalf of the Self-Study
Reaccreditation Steering Team, I would like to thank the Senate for its
participation, for many of you, participation in multiple venues, last Monday
through Wednesday. We were very pleased with the response by the site visit team
and look forward to the written draft of their recommendations.
Adjournment