BASIC SKILLS ADVISORY COMMITTEE MEETING (BSAC)

AGENDA

FRIDAY March 12, 2010, Baltic Room

Attendees: Len Schreibstein, Irene Serna, Ann-Marie Wasserbauer, Rebecca Wong, Michelle Francis, Judy Colson, Susan Sherrill, Inge Bond, Celine Pinet, Cheryl Miller, Helen Pivk, Linda Gibson

1.  Reviewed February 19 meeting minutes: Irene requested an addition to the minutes: At that meeting “Irene indicated that she would request funds for the PAL program. She was directed to present the proposal at the 3/12/10 meeting.”

Follow-up: Len talked to Juan Cruz, the support person for the Basic Skills Initiative in the Chancellor’s office, who reiterated that Basic Skills Initiative money cannot be used for any WSCH producing activity. Only the parts of a position that are non-instructional can be paid for with BSI funds.

2.  Updates and discussion of issues:

  1. Student Services and other campus changes for 2010-2011 (Linda/Celine)
  2. Assessment Center update (Linda); Linda reports that the new assessment center is moving along; purchase orders and work orders have been given to Mike Renzi; basic skills will pay for wiring and carrels. There will be 13 stations; the center will probably get hand-me-down computers from CR4 and CR5. Placement tests will continue to be paper and pencil tests for now; Jeremy Sias, Educational Testing Specialist, will be located in Tutorial much of the day.
  3. Tutorial Services update (Linda/Len/Susan Sherrill): The Tutorial Task Force will continue meeting through spring semester; training for tutors took place in Jan ’10; more trainings are scheduled throughout the semester

Judy would like to see some increased oversight of tutor training; also, recommended that departments have input to tutor training

Len brought up the issue of insuring quality of tutoring. One issue that will need to be resolved in the future is what constitutes adequate faculty supervision to claim apportionment for tutoring. Since Martin Jue retired, the college has not claimed apportionment.

Irene Serna wanted it to be noted in the minutes that she would be willing to spend up to 15 hours per week located in Tutorial to both supervise the PAL program and to be available for “on-site supervision.”

Ann-Marie has an ESL tutorial course; Tutorial also has curriculum for tutor training.

BSAC members recommended some faculty supervision and evaluation of tutors as well as Tutorial as a whole.

BSAC’s current role is to make recommendations for Tutorial (in conjunction with the Tutorial Task Force). All BSAC members are invited to future Task Force meetings.

  1. We discussed whether there could be replication of the Math Learning Community in other departments (Gretchen/Len)-Gretchen reported that this has been very successful in the Math Department. Len would like to look at a model to adapt to other departments; ESL and Reading reported that they have had to reduce Adjunct faculty; Rebecca suggested we set-up a “basic skills” cross-disciplinary learning community. It was suggested that the learning community might meet on the same Fridays as BSAC meetings; the staff development group was asked to move forward with plans for such a learning community.

3.  Discussion of grant request proposals

  1. EOPS PAL program; learning assistance to EOPS students enrolled in Math 902, 902P, 103, 106, and 10; initial tutoring is one-on-one and then groups are formed as participant’s schedules and course assignments allow.

There was discussion that if basic skills dollars pays for this tutoring, though EOPS students would have priority, other students who are not EOPS participants should also be allowed to participate. However, the majority of students should be EOPS participants so that the cohesiveness of a learning community is maintained. It was suggested that the PAL program could become a model for other math learning communities that might be created in the future. The committee approved a recommendation to fund this project for the spring beginning March 15.

  1. DESP Learning Disability evaluations/assessments for basic skills students. Proposal would limit this assessment to 10 students without documentation previously identifying a learning disability. The committee approved a recommendation to fund this project for the spring
  2. Ann-Marie requested funds from basic skills to pay for a meeting of West Valley ESL members and ESL department chairs from other colleges in Santa Clara county; She requested $250.00 for lunch and/or meeting costs. The committee approved a recommendation to fund this project.

(NOTE: Dave Fishbaugh subsequently concurred with all of the above committee recommendations; funding will be provided.)

4.  Discussion about noting advisories and recommend preparations in the schedule and/or catalog. BSAC members supported payment of reasonable costs for input of information from Curricunet to Datatel; we discussed the need to discuss the project with the Division Chair Council. (Cheryl/Len)

5.  Update from sub-committees

a.  Data and Recoding (Inge/Len/Gretchen)

b.  Staff Development (Cheryl/Michelle/Rebecca/Judy)

c.  Career Programs Liaison Group (Susan Sherrill/Katherine/Tiina)

d.  Information Dissemination (Cheryl/Inge/Susan Schulter)

Continuation of discussion on best method(s) to disseminate information in a timely manner about training and conferences and BSAC/BSI activities and accomplishments. The committee will continue their work on this.

6.  Status of college grant proposals including Land Corporation Grant requests (Celine/Linda)

Title III not yet submitted but will be; TRIO has been submitted but we won’t hear the results until summer.

7.  Other Business

Inge is working w/Stan Benkowski to track students who have completed basic skills math courses into Math 106.

First Year Experience—Linda indicated that there was a 100% persistence rate from fall ’09 to spring ’10 and a 74% persistence rate from fall ’08 to fall ’09.

8.  Future Meeting Schedule: April 9 and May 14 (both in the Baltic Room)