October 26, 2020- Agenda & Minutes

Time:  10:30am
Location: Zoom invite sent to committee members. If anyone else would like to attend, please email Jen for details.
Items to be considered on this agenda are due by 10/12/2020

When available, the meeting minutes will be indicated within bold brackets [ ] and are in draft form until they are approved by the committee.

Relevant Links: Undergraduate Council Meeting Minutes/ Graduate Council Meeting Minutes

I. Call to Order [10:35AM]

II. Approval of the September 28, 2020 Meeting Minutes [Approved]

III. Announcements/Discussion

IV. Old Business

• College Requirements for the BA Degree Update [The Registrar’s Office has stated that DegreeWorks can handle 7 or 8 credits for the Natural Science requirement in the College Requirements for the BA Degree section. Please notify Jen if you would like to add a footnote for your program in order to reduce the natural science credit requirement to 7 credits.]
• BAM Policy Update [Jen notified the committee that the maximum of 90 credits for admission into the BAM has been lifted, changes to tuition charging has not been made, and while a specific statement about programs being able to have more stringent requirements will be added, as long as the BAM catalog entry states the requirements, the program’s requirements are valid.]
• Grading Update [As a follow up to last month’s discussion, departments are allowed to not award students with certain grades (i.e. BIOL does not award C- grades and this is permissible).]
• Curriculum Submissions Update
  • Course descriptions in syllabi [Each syllabus needs to have a course description.]
  • Robust justifications and syllabi attachments (including the “what” and the “why”), and syllabi attachments when helpful for supporting modifications (although always needed for new courses).
• Crosslisting Culture [Where possible, let’s work on making crosslisting courses between departments few and far between. Instead, offer one course and direct students and program catalog entries to that one course. This does not apply to within-department undergrad and grad crosslists (i.e. CHEM 400 crosslisted with CHEM 600) Contact Jen if you’d like to discuss further.]
• Program Outcomes* [New for the 2021-2022 catalog, we are encouraged to add program outcomes, which can now be placed in CIM. This will feed into the Digital diplomas that will be part of the catalog in 2022. Digital Diplomas are diplomas that employers can quickly access and see program outcomes.]

V. New Business – Undergraduate

New Courses

• CHEM 471: Solid State Chemistry [Email vote pending update to syllabus.]
• FRSC 450: Practical Forensic Skeletal Biology [Approved with the addition of a stronger justification.]

Modified Courses

• BIOL 103: Introductory Biology I [Tabled by department.]
• BIOL 106: Introductory Biology II Laboratory [Tabled by department.]
• BIOL 107: Intro Biology II Lecture [Tabled by department.]
• GGS 309: Introduction to Meteorology and Climate [Approved with the addition of the word “geography” in the course description.]
• GGS 354: Data Analysis and Global Change Detection Techniques [Approved with clarification about exactly what action is taking place re: IT 104.]

Modified Programs

• Chemistry, BS [Approved]
• Geology, BS [Approved]

VI. New Business – Graduate

Modified Courses

• ASTR 798: Research Project 
• [Approved, will need to add more to the justification.]
• GGS 507: Geographic Approaches for Sustainable Development [Approved]
• GGS 516: Geography of Latin America [Approved]
• GGS 517: Geography of China [Approved]
• GGS 526: Geography of Eastern Europe and Russia [Approved]
• GGS 540: Health Geography [Approved]
• GGS 544: Military Geography [Approved]
• GGS 615 Economic Geography [Approved]
• PHYS 510: Computational Physics I [Approved]
• PHYS 513: Applied Electromagnetic Theory [Approved]
• PHYS 613: Computational Physics II [Approved]
• PHYS 620: Continuum Mechanics [Approved]
• PHYS 694: Applied Mechanics of Solids [Approved]
• PHYS 798: Research Project [Approved, will need to add more to the justification.]

Modified Programs

• Climate Dynamics, PhD [Approved]
• Geology, BS/Earth Systems Science, Accelerated MS* [Approved pending clarification to “e.g 12 credits…” sentence. The update has been completed.]
• Mechanical Engineering, BS/Applied and Engineering Physics, Accelerated MS* [Approved pending addition of course suggestions sections.]

Adjournment [1:01pm]

*= item was added after the agenda was announced