Arts
and Sciences Curriculum Committee meeting
February
13, 2007
Approved
Minutes
Committee
members attending: Steve Bayne,
Peter Bayers, Johanna Garvey, Olivia Harriott, Ray Poincelot, Vin
Rosivach
(Chair), Ron Salafia, Joan Weiss
The meeting was called to order
at 3:35 p.m.
1.
Approval
of the minutes of the meeting of December 5, 2006.
A.
Joan
Weiss moved to approve the minutes.
B.
Olivia
Harriott seconded.
C.
The
minutes were unanimously approved.
2.
New
course proposals:
A.
AH 113:
Art and Archaeology of Ancient Egypt:
Images for Eternity
1)
Joan
Weiss moved to approve the course proposal and Peter Bayers seconded.
2)
Vin
noted that the course had already been approved and taught as a
Saturday
course.
3)
The
course proposal was unanimously approved.
B.
AH 221:
The Arts of Ireland and the British Isles, 500-1000
1)
Olivia
Harriott moved to approve the course proposal and Joan Weiss seconded.
2)
Vin
noted that the proposal was to include a letter of support from
Catholic
Studies, but the letter has not been forwarded to him.
None the less he thought the missing
letter is not necessary for our approval.
3)
The
course proposal was unanimously approved.
C.
AY 210:
International Research Practicum
1)
Ron
Salafia moved to approve the course proposal and Olivia Harriott
seconded.
2)
Discussion:
Peter noted that the department
meeting
minutes do not indicated whether there was a vote in the department to
approve
the course.
Vin said we can make approval
dependent on
confirmation that the department did vote to approve the course.
Joan noted that there must be
some
prerequisites for 200 level courses, but this course is listed as
having no
prerequisites.
Vin said that the course either
must be down
numbered or it must be given a prerequisite.
Ron wondered whether there were
enough
concerns to table the discussion of the proposal, but Vin said when he
gets
back to the department, he could make sure they make the appropriate
revisions.
3)
The
course proposal was unanimously approved pending clarification of the
course
number and departmental approval.
D.
BI 71:
Identity and the Human Genome
1)
Joan
Weiss moved to approve the course proposal and Ron Salafia seconded.
2)
Discussion:
Vin noted that since this course
will not be
replacing another course and the proposal doesn't make clear how it
will be
accommodated within the department's existing schedule of courses, he
raised
the issue with Phyllis Braun (Chair of Biology). She
said that Olivia Harriot will have to rotate between
teaching this class and labs, but that she expects new hires to teach
labs and as
a result Olivia will have more time to teach this new course.
3)
The
course proposal was unanimously approved.
E.
BI
76/CH 76: Environmental Science
1)
Ron
Salafia moved to approve the course proposal and Peter Bayers seconded.
2)
Discussion:
Vin reminded us that we got Biology's proposal with our packet of
proposals and
Chemistry's arrived over the weekend, but he saw no reason this should
hold up
the proposal.
3)
The
course proposal was unanimously approved.
F.
BI 313:
Comparative Physiology
1)
Olivia
Harriot moved to approve the course proposal and Peter Bayers seconded.
2)
The
course proposal was unanimously approved.
G.
EN 274:
American Literature and the Environment
1)
Ron
Salafia moved to approve the course proposal and Olivia Harriot
seconded.
2)
Discussion:
Vin said it was nitpicking, but the proposal makes clear how the
English
department schedule will be affected when Peter Bayers teaches this
course (the
number of times he teaches EN 271 will be reduced from twice to once a
year),
but it does not make clear how the schedule will be affected when
Elizabeth
Petrino teaches this course. Vin
said he would make sure the English department makes the appropriate
revisions.
3)
The
course proposal was unanimously approved pending clarification of the
place of
the course in Prof. Petrino's scedule.
H.
IL 297:
United Nations Security Council Crisis Simulation
1)
Ron
Salafia moved to approve the course proposal and Peter Bayers seconded.
2)
Discussion:
Vin noted that again with this
course
proposal there is a problem with the numbering—although the course is
listed as a 200 level course, there are no prerequisites listed. He said he will make sure the
department makes the appropriate revisions.
Joan said she did not see the
Politics
course number for the cross listed course, but Vin thought that it was
the
Politics department's responsibility for assigning a number and we did
not need
to worry about that.
3)
The
course proposal was unanimously approved pending clarification of the
course's
number.
I.
PH
275: Bergson
1)
Steve
Bayne moved to approve the course proposal and Olivia Harriot seconded.
2)
The
course proposal was unanimously approved.
J.
PO
290: Special Topics in Politics
1)
Joan
Weiss moved to approve the course proposal and Ron Salafia seconded.
2)
The
course proposal was unanimously approved.
K.
PO 390:
Politics Seminar
1)
Joan
Weiss moved to approve the course proposal and Ron Salafia seconded.
2)
The
course proposal was unanimously approved.
L.
RS 255:
Second Temple Judaism and the Dead Sea Scrolls
1)
Ron
Salafia moved to approve the course proposal and Peter Bayers seconded.
2)
Discussion:
The electronic copy did not have
answers to
questions 9-11, but Vin had received them from Frank Hannafey (Chair of
Religious Studies) and he read them aloud to the committee.
Vin noted, however, that it is
still not
made explicit who will teach the course and how this will affect the
Religious
Studies department's schedule, but it looks like Angela Harkins (the
course
proposer) is a new hire and she will be the one teaching the course. Vin said he will make sure that the
department makes this clear.
3)
The
course proposal was unanimously approved pending clarification that the
department can add this course because of a new hire.
M. TA
121:
American Women Playwrights
1)
Ron
Salafia moved to approve the course proposal and Olivia Harriot
seconded.
2)
Discussion:
The department minutes included
with the
proposal were the excerpt for AH 221 rather than TA 121.
Vin had received the correct
excerpt from
the department minutes and read them aloud to the committee.
Peter noted that it is stated in
the
proposal that the course would be cross listed with the English
department, but
that the English department had not discussed this.
3)
The
course proposal was unanimously approved.
N.
CH 375:
1)
Ron
Salafia moved to approve the course proposal and Olivia Harriot
seconded.
2)
Discussion:
Vin noted that this is simply Chemistry's cross listing of BI 375,
which was
approved by the committee last semester.
3)
The
course proposal was unanimously approved.
O.
Vin
noted that the new course proposal form lays out what a department is
supposed
to do when considering and proposing a new course, but some of the
items in
procedure step 3, especially item d., as reflected in their minutes,
are sometimes
not discussed by the departments.
Somewhere along the line we need to remind departments to make
sure they
specifically discuss these items when considering new courses.
That said, he also thought we
should thank
our colleagues for doing so well with these proposals.
3.
Report
of the subcommittee on the cross listing of courses—Peter Bayers and
Ron
Salafia reporting. (Note: the order of discussion has been reordered
from the
distributed agenda)
A.
Ron
Salafia said that the the subcommittee deliberated three questions and
that the
answers fell out pretty easily.
Question 1: Whether
or not A&SCC should have any role in the cross
listing of courses?
NO. The
department knows its business best.
If the course is okayed as a course by A&SCC, we've already
done our
job.
Question 2: Whether
or not cross-listed courses can
"double-count" toward core?
NO. This
would be detrimental to the whole purpose of the core. This needs to be
stated
in The Journal of Record.
Question 3:
Should
the A&SCC have any regular oversight over courses that are assigned
to a
given minor that is offered outside of a specific department (such as
the
Program in Environment, [formerly Environmental Studies])
NO. The
advisory faculty of a given minor knows best whether a course belongs
in that
minor. However, courses must be reviewed
by this advisory committee. While the faculty ultimately has control
over the
curriculum, the Dean is responsible for making sure that a given course
has
been reviewed by the committee.
If there are any problematic
curricular
issues pertaining to the minor, the Dean or faculty member can address
this
problem through the A&SCC.
B.
Discussion:
Three main issues arose during the discussion of the report:
1)
The
need to be clear about the definition of
cross listing.
2)
The
rules that need to be followed with cross listing.
The problem with the committee's answer to question one is
that when a course is cross listed, then it is given a new number in
the
catalog. This means that a new
course is being created and new courses need to be brought to the
committee for
approval.
3)
There
was general agreement with the committee's responses to questions two
and
three.
With regard to question two,
however, this
raised a further question concerning the appropriate language that
should be
proposed for the journal of record.
C.
Resolutions:
Three main resolutions were agreed on:
1)
Our
subcommittee is charged with revisiting the definition of and the rules
for
cross listing.
2)
Our
subcommittee is charged with coming up with proposed language for the
journal
of record.
3)
We no longer
need to pursue any further consideration of question three.
4.
New
courses to be taught by faculty yet to be hired.
A.
The
concern is over our committee's proposed policy on Special Topics
courses
(Dated May 7, 2002). That proposal
was originally drafted by Jim Simon, Vin Rosivach, and David Wolfsdorf. More specifically the concern is over
the first paragraph of that document.
The paragraph reads:
"The A&S dean and your
A&S
Curriculum Committee have spent the last year discussing alternatives
to the traditional "dean's approval" for courses being taught for the
first time. There may be
merit in such courses for newly hired professors whose specialty course
is not
listed in the current catalog. But the dean and curriculum committee
feel the
dean should not be approving courses if the courses have not first been
approved by the affected department."
B.
The
question is whether this paragraph should be understood to require that
newly
hired faculty can only teach a new course that is not listed in the
current
catalog if it is taught as a Special Topics course?
In other words, should this paragraph be understood to
eliminate the dean's authority to allow a newly hired faculty member to
teach a
course that is not listed in the current catalog with the proviso that
the
course has first been reviewed by the department?
C.
Discussion:
1)
Vin
told us that while he believes the paragraph should be understood to
continue
to allow for the option of deans approval for new courses proposed by
newly
hired faculty, Jim Simon believes that the policy as a whole eliminates
dean's
approval as an option.
2)
Ray
Poincelot told us that Tim Snyder thinks that Vin's interpretation is
the
correct one.
3)
After
some further discussion everyone agreed that we want to continue to
allow for
the option of dean's approval for one time new course offerings by
newly hired
faculty.
4)
Vin
said he will rewrite the first paragraph of the Special Topics Courses
proposal
and we will discuss the new language at the next meeting.
5.
Vin
noted that at the next meeting we will have continued discussion about
service
learning.
6.
Ron
Salafia moved to adjourn and Peter Bayers seconded.
The motion was approved unanimously.
7.
Meeting
adjourned at 4:35
Respectfully submitted by,
Steven M. Bayne