The General Education Council met on Thursday, October 9, 2008 at 3:30 pm in room 224 of I.G. Greer Hall. Members present were: Dr. Mike Mayfield, Ms. Carter Hammett-McGarry, Dr. Pat Beaver, Dr. Rick Klima, Ms. Teresa Lee, Dr. Paulette Marty, Ms. Kelly McBride, Dr. Tom McLaughlin, Dr. Terri Mitchell, Dr. Georgia Rhoades, Dr. Lynn Moss Sanders, Dr. Johnny Waters, Mr. Zach Grier, Mr. Peter Rowe, Mr. Nick Rudisill, Ms. Lynne Waugh, Dr. Maria Provost, Dr. Leslie Sargent Jones, Dr. Pete Wachs, Dr. Dave Haney, and Ms. Tina Parlier. Members excused were: Dr. Tim Silver and Dr. Neva Specht.
Dr. Mayfield called the meeting to order at 3:35 pm.
OTHER BUSINESS
- Ms. Carter Hammett-McGarry introduced Dr. Maria Provost, the new Executive Director of Orientation and Advising.
- Dr. Mike Mayfield reminded those present of upcoming deadlines: October 15th- course proposals due for perspectives, designations, Wellness Literacy, and Quantitative Literacy; November 5th- proposals due for First Year Seminar; and December 19th- proposals due for Writing in the Discipline and Capstone.
MOTIONS
- Motion was made and seconded to approve the minutes of the September 11, 2008 General Education Council meeting.
VOTE 1 YES 13NO 0 ABSTAIN 1
- Dr. Georgia Rhoades spoke about her work with departments across campus regarding the Writing Across the Curriculum (WAC) program. She gives faculty handouts on the vertical model of writing skills and the guidelines from the WAC committee (handouts were distributed to Council members). She noted that when the General Education Task Force Final Report mentions writing, it is clear that those courses should have a cap of 22 students. The WAC committee wants to offer guidelines to help departments that want to work on adapting their current W designator courses.
She also noted that the implication of a vertical writing model is that there are particular courses that should be taken first, second… She would like to propose that ENG 2001 be a prerequisite for any course used to meet the requirements for junior writing in the discipline (WID).
Dr. Dave Haney said that Lesa Felker could do a blanket statement that any WID course have ENG 2001 as a prerequisite, rather than having every department and program submit their WID courses to AP&P to add the prerequisite.
Dr. Tom McLaughlin expressed concern that the WID course would become the gateway to the major and put students behind in starting on work in their major.
Ms. Lynne Waugh, concerned about scheduling problems, asked if a student had to have earned 30 hours prior to registering for ENG 2001 or 30 hours in progress. Ms. Tina Parlier said that it would be 30 hours in progress and Dr. Haney explained that a student would just need to have earned 30 hours prior to actually starting the class, not registering for it.
Dr. Paulette Marty asked if a WID course could be included in a theme. She said that some departments and programs are proposing courses required for their majors for the perspectives.
Dr. Johnny Waters asked if we are on the edge of starting to dictate to departments what the requirements should be for their majors. His department currently has a sophomore level WID course which acts as the gateway to the major.
Dr. Rhoades said that some departments are having trouble with the 22 student maximum enrollment recommended for a writing course and are finding creative ways to deal with that problem (i.e. large sections with a smaller lab). The campus will begin using the e-portfolio system in Fall 2010, but the English and Geography departments will be working with it in Spring 2009 as a pilot. The goal of that system is to have writing teachers at each level require their students to make a deposit into the e-portfolio system. She also mentioned that writing is not currently required in the Senior Capstone Experience, but it is strongly encouraged.
The Council approved an amendment to add to the WAC guidelines the recommendation of ENG 2001 as a prerequisite for any WID course.
VOTE 2YES 13NO 0ABSTAIN 1
The Council approved the WAC guidelines distributed to the council as amended.
VOTE 3YES 13NO 0ABSTAIN 1
- A proposal from the subcommittee on Information and Communication Technology (ICT) Literacy had been forwarded to the Council and was also distributed at the meeting.
Dr. Mayfield said that one of the big issues with this proposal is what we are trying to accomplish with the iSkills test. That will have an effect on how many students will need to take it. Dr. Haney said that the General Education requirements say every students needs to demonstrate ICT literacy. He asked if the iSkills test would be used as the actual General Education requirement or as an assessment tool. Dr. Pete Wachs said it sounds like an assessment tool, and if it is, we could do sampling to determine the information literacy level of students. However, when assessment is done outside of a class situation, we cannot be sure we are getting the students’ best efforts.
Dr. Rhoades asked if there were supporting materials that show how the faculty expected to integrate information literacy (IL) into their courses will be supported.
Dr. Marty said there is already so much expected to be accomplished in First Year Seminar classes, it would be difficult to add another assessment measure. Dr. Lynn Moss Sanders said that First Year Seminar is moving away from the modules covering various concepts that the old Freshman Seminar included.
Dr. Haney asked if faculty can have assignments in a course done in a different way to demonstrate ICT literacy. Dr. McLaughlin said it feels intrusive to have an outside test as part of your class and it is a lot to ask from courses which are already busy.
Dr. Waters said that we are on the verge of creating the worst of No Child Left Behind. He agrees that courses which are already doing a lot should not be forced to do more.
Dr. Wachs said that in writing courses, students have to show in their assignments that they know their way around the library. Since we will have the artifacts (assignments), could IL specialists assess the artifacts to determine the level of IL?
Dr. Rhoades said that no one has ever been told what needs to be included in ICT literacy. There is more to it than just IL, but faculty have not been trained on the rest.
Dr. Haney said that he is currently teaching an Honors First Year Seminar and needs his students to have these skills. The ICT proposal mixes up program assessment with what students have to do. Parts 2 and 4 of the proposal deal with pre- and post- assessment. Maybe the parts of the proposal need to be separated.
Ms. Kelly McBride said that the iSkills test is available at and it deals with 7 areas of IL. The big question for her as a librarian is how she is supposed to know what a student can or cannot do.
Ms. Hammett-McGarry said that if the university is interested in using the test, we could run a pilot using local high school students prior to investing a lot of money for all students to take it.
Dr. Wachs said the test could perform a gatekeeping function, not letting students register for classes until they have taken it.
Dr. Mayfield said the test has been tested on a group of computer science students and they thought it was useful.
Dr. Waters expressed concern about using an exam external to Appalachian. If students need to either pass the test or complete a course in order to graduate, how can we make this a requirement if the course has been neither proposed nor developed?
Dr. McLaughlin said that, from a programmatic perspective, he does not want to teach from the iSkills test.
Dr. Leslie Sargent Jones said she was troubled about outsourcing a requirement for graduation from the university.
Dr. Haney said that the Council could postpone consideration of the proposal until a representative of the subcommittee could be present to answer questions and the Council can ask for more information, including a separation of the assessment of ICT literacy and ICT literacy as a General Education requirement.
Ms. Waugh said that if the test is supposed to be delivered to students prior to entry, it may end up being another thing to do at Phase 1 Orientation. She also pointed out that the First Connections website is rolled out to incoming students in February, so the Orientation and Advising offices will need to know all the steps students will need to take prior to that time. She also reminded the committee that the College of Business uses a computer skills test.
It was suggested that the Council ask the subcommittee to spell out what faculty in the First Year Seminar and the different levels of writing courses will need to know.
Dr. Haney said that he is worried about the implementation timeline. Dr. Mayfield said there was no hard deadline for implementation from the task force; this portion of the curriculum was left as unfinished business.
Dr. Haney reminded the Council that the new ICT literacy requirement is not equivalent to the C designator in the old Core Curriculum.
The General Education Council approved a motion to return the Information and Communication Technology Literacy proposal to the subcommittee.
VOTE 4YES 14NO 0ABSTAIN 0
- The Council discussed the guidelines for the Historical Studies designation. The faculty coordinating committee chose to keep the guidelines from the General Education Task Force Final Report. Dr. Jim Barnes, representing the FCC, said they thought the guidelines were a good effort to incorporate what historians think is important. Dr. Mayfield said they endorse the historical perspective without protecting turf. Dr. Haney said the guidelines are meant to assess course design, not student outcomes.
The Council approved the guidelines for the Historical Studies designation.
VOTE 5YES 14NO 0ABSTAIN 0
- The Council discussed the guidelines for the Fine Arts designation. Ms. Teresa Lee said that the 5 items listed in the proposed guidelines are taken from the Task Force Final Report guidelines, but the members of the faculty coordinating committee felt that they needed to add a quantitative element. She said a faculty member can use an artistic assignment to teach other content, but the FCC wants to ensure the primary focus of courses receiving this designation is fine arts.
Dr. Haney said that if faculty members know there is a requirement, they will demonstrate on their syllabus how their course meets it.
Dr. Marty expressed concern with consistency with the rest of the curriculum. No other components have a percentage of course content specified. She asked if a statement similar to that in the proposed Literary Studies designation guidelines would be acceptable.
The suggested new guidelines for the Fine Arts designation are:
- A fine arts course will focus primarily on works of art, rather than using the fine arts to study some other subject.
- [Students will] Develop interpretive skills and aesthetic discernment by closely examining individual works of art.
- [Students will] Analyze the relationship between specific works of art and their historical, cultural, and/or artistic contexts.
- [Students will] Analyze the structural components and composition of various works of art.
- [Students will] Examine the creative process as exemplified by the distinct processes of various artists.
- [Students will] Create artistic products and/or attend live performances or visual art exhibitions.
The Council approved a motion to amend the wording of the guidelines for the Fine Arts designation.
VOTE 6YES 14NO 0ABSTAIN 0
- The Council approved the guidelines for the Fine Arts designation as amended.
VOTE 7YES 14NO 0ABSTAIN 0
- The Council discussed the guidelines for the Literary Studies designation.
Ms. Hammett-McGarry asked what is meant by “trained in literary studies” in item 6 of the proposed guidelines. Dr. McLaughlin said the faculty coordinating committee is trying to include faculty in many different departments. Dr. Haney said it is implicit elsewhere in the guidelines that the faculty should be qualified. Dr. McLaughlin said the faculty coordinating committee would be approving courses, not people; there needs to be a staff of people qualified to teach the courses.
The Council approved a motion to amend the wording of the guidelines for the Literary Studies designation, removing item 6.
VOTE 8YES 14NO 0ABSTAIN 0
The guidelines for the Literary Studies designation, as amended, are:
- A literature course will focus primarily on a body of literature, rather than using literature to study some other subject.
- The primary methodology of literature courses will be interpretation and analysis.
- The subject matter of literature courses will be primarily literary texts.
- Student work in literature courses will help students appreciate and interpret the content, the rhetoric, and/or the aesthetics of literary texts.
- In literature courses, the study of historical, social, political, and cultural contexts will be focused primarily on the understanding of literature.
The Council approved the guidelines for the Literary Studies designation as amended.
VOTE 9YES 14NO 0ABSTAIN 0
ADJOURNMENT
The committee voted to adjourn at 5:00 pm.
VOTE 10YES 14NO 0ABSTAIN 0