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ACADEMIC
SENATE MINUTES March 20,
2008 |
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11:30 A.M. - 1:00 P.M. ACADEMIC
SENATE CHAMBERS
Members Present: Altar, Alva, Arnold, Bedell, Bhattacharya, Bruschke, Buck, Carroll,
Dabirian, Drezner, Fidalgo, Fromson, Gass, Grewal, Guerin, Hewitt, Hickok, Kanel,
Kantardjieff, Klassen, Liverpool, McConnell, McMahan, Mead, Nyaggah, Oliver,
Pasternack, Randall, Rumberger, Sage, Shapiro, Smith, Spitzer, Stein, Taylor,
Walicki, Williams
Absent: Bullock, Burgtorf, Gordon, Green, Jarvis, Junn, Palmer, Rhoten, Spitzer,
Stang
I.
CALL TO ORDER
Chair Guerin called the
meeting to order at 11:34 a.m.
II.
URGENT BUSINESS
None.
III.
ANNOUNCEMENTS
Senator McMahan
distributed a flyer for and invited all to participate in the “Going for Gold
5K Run/1K Walk and Health Expo” to take place on Saturday April 12, 2008 as
part of the 50th Anniversary Celebration. For more information or to
register online, please visit www.Going4theGold.org.
Senator Hickok reported
that the Men’s Basketball team will play in the championships for the first
time in thirty years tonight at 6:30 p.m. (Eastern). The game will be shown on
KDOC.
Chair Guerin reminded
all that on Tuesday, from 11:00 a.m. to 12:30 p.m., the All-University Budget
Forum will take place. President Gordon and CFA President Nyaggah have sent
announcements about this event.
Senator Nyaggah stated
that Jack Bedell was elected chair of the Faculty Hearing Panel.
IV.
CONSENT CALENDAR
4.1
M/S/P
[Drezner/Bedell] to approve nominees to the following search committee as part
of the Consent Calendar. [Approved unanimously as amended]
SEARCH COM:
Associate Vice president – GRADUATE STUDIES & RESEARCH
Nominees: David
Cherin (HHD); Jochen Burgtorf (SOC SCI); Sheryl Fontaine (HUM);
Forthcoming
Maria Linder (CNSM);
Forthcoming Morteza Rahmatian (CBE)
V.
TIMES CERTAIN
Time
Certain
11:45
a.m.
Subject:
ASD 08-53 Statements of Opinion – Spring 2008
The Senate voted with
electronic transmitters to include the proposed eight statements of opinions
(see ASD 08-53) on the All-University ballot.
The following statement
was also approved (as friendly amendments) for inclusion on the ballot:
Friendly amendment [Bedell]: Add question V.: “CSUF should be a smoke free environment.”
·
Friendly amendment [Shapiro]: Change “smoke” to “smoking”
·
The following amendments
were also made to ASD 08-53:
Friendly amendment [Mead]: Change
question I.3 to read: “3. If student
ratings are to qualify as evidence in support
of faculty employment decisions, information concerning class size, time of
day, whether the course is required, and the
variability of scores must be considered.
Friendly amendment
[Buck]: In Question II, delete “To
increase student access and reduce student
time to graduate
(particularly when the state budget is tight)”. Keep “We should increase our course offerings during intersession.”
Time
Certain
12:00
noon
Subject:
Continued Discussion - Second Language Graduation Requirement Report (See ASD
08-43)
Radha
Bhattacharya and Bradley Starr, Co-Chairs, Ad Hoc Study Group on the Second
Language Graduation Requirement
Co-Chairs Bhattacharya
and Starr addressed questions from the body and the gallery about the process
and their findings.
It was M/S [Alva/Fidalgo] to revise UPS 410.107 Second Language
Graduation Requirement.
During discussion, the
following questions were asked of the Co-Chairs:
Senator Drezner: One of the concerns that was
expressed was that some “feel” that we will lose students to other campuses in
the requirement is implemented. How much consideration was given to this
concern when the study group crafted its recommendations?
Bhattacharya: It was
one of the issues. We have given some numbers based on the data that we had. It was not the only issue, but it was one
of them.
Senator Shapiro: From what I’ve gathered,
there was a considerable amount of concern given to the need for students to be
competitive on a global basis. Was there any consideration of the fact that we,
here in
Starr: Yes. Everyone in the study group was supportive of second language
proficiency. What was debated was
the means of bringing it about. The
problem was that we were not sure that the requirement
in UPS 410.107 is the best means to pursue the goal of second language proficiency of because
the many side consequences that would occur. We document the consequences
pretty thoroughly in our report. We
thought the global awareness idea would be a better approach because, first, it would allow everyone to be included
without the difficult side effects for high unit majors. Secondly, we could take the description in UPS
410.107 of what second language proficiency is and [parallel] it to a global awareness requirement.
Bhattacharya: UPS
410.107 is now structured such that the requirement is required for the professions that actually need a
second language. There are some disciplines that need a second language, but they are currently exempt
from the requirement.
Senator Alva: On page 22, parts 3 and 4 [of
the study group’s report], there are overall conclusions and recommendations.
The second conclusion was that “the resources required for staffing course
sections, processing student transcripts and certification and providing
placement and proficiency tests are substantial.” Please comment on the table
at the bottom of page 13. It appears that there would be 38 additional sections
of language courses that would be needed to meet this requirement if it was
implemented in fall 2007. One of the things we should recognize is that that
number [38] is going to increase significantly in 2008, according to this
model. We would have had a new incoming class of transfer students in spring
2008, which would have meant that we would have to offer another 38 sections,
and there would be 492 students who would need the second and third semesters
of the course work. Did the committee consider how we would pay for this and
the impact on the Department of Modern Languages and Literature, in particular,
in terms of the redistribution of resources?
Bhattacharya: My understanding is that our committee was not asked to consider any
resource implications. But, if I may
speak for myself as a Senator and economist, I feel that this is a budget constraint. There are so many sections that are
going to be offered. MLL may not be the only department
affected, there may be some courses offered through other departments. Resource
implications are tremendous.
Starr: The data that we received show one place
where sacrifices would be made and that would be other Humanities departments. This is why the
double-counting issue became an important one, as well.
Alva: Page 16 shows
an impact on the Humanities discipline, has someone thought about what the impact would mean when you also
place on top of them at 10% [budget] cut? Does that begin to have an impact on staffing, faculty, and
resources to those departments?
Starr: We did not
look at specific impacts on departments, but it would seem that there would be
a real impact.
Senator Bedell: I did not find the section on
going to two years as objectionable as the report found it. If my memory is
correct, in the mid 1980’s, then Chancellor Reynolds, began putting together
workgroups on requirements for incoming CSU students (first time freshmen)
would come in with two years of high school foreign language. For at least 20
years, students in the
Bhattacharya: Upon admission freshmen have
already met the two year requirement, so transfer students should also be required to meet it. But, we were not
charged with trying to establish some
kind of equity between transfer and freshman students. We did mention in the
report that some of the resource
implications would be reduced with a 2-2 requirement as opposed to a 3-3 requirement. The problem with transfer
students is that they are more heavily centered in one college and do not have free units to take the
required language classes, so that is the angle we looked at.
Senator Taylor: I have some very strong
misgivings about the process. As I read the charge of the study group, hear
their answers to questions, and look at their recommendations, I see a huge
disconnect. They were told to study four areas of concern, which they did and
reported back on. But their recommendations seem to not be a part of their
charge. They weren’t charged to tell us whether or not they think we should
have a second language graduation requirement. They were charged with reporting
on the four areas of concern. Why did they put these conclusions in? Why these
recommendations? I’m curious about whether you had biases going in as you were
appointed to this group. I’m also curious about the nature of those
appointments. I find this all very troubling. If we do not want a second
language graduation requirement, I’m not sure the way we should get rid of it
is by appointing a study group that makes recommendations that it was not
charged in making.
Starr: We didn’t mean to disturb, we just meant to do our job the best that we
could. [In response to the last
question], we did not appoint who was on the committee. In May, Jack Bedell
called the meeting and those present
became the committee. Whether there were biases or not was not a matter of our making. Secondly, I don’t think
that there were biases. I can assure you that there was no consensus at the beginning. I know that
there were at least four people who were very prominently for UPS 410.107. Others on the committee had
single issues. It was a very diverse group of people. I did not know how the committee would end
up with something coherent. There was no consensus until the end, and it took a long time to get
there.
With respect to the process, these issues are all
interconnected; it was very difficult to come up with four discreet recommendations. When we started to receive
very good information and data, we began
to realize that there were really significant issues that we felt a duty to bring
to the Senate about the requirement as a
whole. We would have been fulfilling our duty just to make four discreet recommendations. The implications to
the program as a whole were very significant. We undertook to do the best we could to inform the Senate
completely, not just about each of the four discreet things, but they’re all interconnected and
called for, we thought, a recommendation that we made.
The global awareness idea actually surfaced very early. We had
vote early on (that was unanimous), because
we were very concerned about what we were going to recommend.
We agree that foreign language proficiency is the future. The
question was just simply, is this the best way?
We felt a valid to say that we don’t think it’s the best way and that there
might be a better way. If the Senate
doesn’t agree, that’s fine, but given what we found out over a two-year period,
it seemed like our duty to bring
this material to the Senate and make the recommendation that we did.
Bhattacharya: ASD 06-67 says “report shall be received with recommendations, if any”,
so we don’t think we overstepped our bounds. We
were not eager to do more work than we were already
assigned. The recommendations came as a logical outcome before the four charges
that
were assigned to us. We did not want to overstep our bounds.
Bhattacharya: The issue of resources, we
thought, would follow as a logical charge of ours, but we were told that it was
not our charge, so we let that go. We were specifically told not to consider
that. We considered whatever came up logically, but when we were told not to
consider certain areas, we did not.
Senator Kanel: It appears that the globalization
competence is based more on the ideological since everyone’s talking about
practical issues. I do notice here that it says “the wisdom of having”, so
that, to me, implies that there probably were some ideological discussions
about that. Everybody keeps using the words “second language proficiency”, as
if two, even three years, makes somebody proficient. It’s scary to think that
this University feels that the purpose of this is that people are going to be
proficient after two or three years, as if that’s the reason you take it in
high school. Isn’t it due to creating an intellectual climate that prepares
students for the University? Did the study group talk about whether this really
creates second language proficiency? In other countries, they start learning
other languages in first grade. I wonder if you have ideological discussions
about that.
Bhattacharya: Yes.
Starr: It was brought to our attention that there is a lot of variation in
various university testing and course
descriptions defining what proficiency is. For competence, for example, some
universities would require a certain
number of semesters. To be honest, we did not really pursue that. Our recommendation was that the Board
come up with consistent use of that language to be used.
The idea behind global competency was that there are other forms
of international awareness that might be
more relevant to students or programs, along side our second language
proficiency. We searched for a
way that would take UPS 410.107, and pull it in with flexible options. With
global competency, all students could be
included and not exclude 40%, but some flexibility would be necessary. Either a student can meet the
requirements for second language proficiency, which is stipulated in UPS 410.107, or complete other approved coursework in
international awareness, or some
other method that could be made a part of the curriculum. This flexibility
would promote second language and
reward those that have that proficiency. A student who does have second language proficiency could get a certificate
for participating in that. This idea is just a way to create a 100% umbrella that has the flexibility, but
still pursues the goal of increased second language proficiency.
Kanel: That’s the
ideological aspect. It’s that global competency is just as good as second
language proficiency.
I don’t believe that second language proficiency exists after
two years, but if you’re saying that global awareness
is as good a goal as taking two years of foreign language, you think those are
equal in terms of being beneficial
to the students. That was my ideological question.
Starr: With some
programs, that might be the case, but for others it might not. It’s very
complicated. There is low
intermediate, mid intermediate, high intermediate; proficiency itself can mean
a wide range of things. So, I think the
term is meaningful if you understand that there is a wide range of measures.
Senator Pasternack: I want to follow up on
Senator Bedell’s comments. He makes a good point about the requirement for
transfer students and freshman students. Our system-wide general education
budget committee is in fact going to consider the issue of whether or not there
should be a two-year requirement in foreign language for transfer students. I
will point out, however, that there are inconsistencies throughout our
curriculum. I don’t know if the GE Advisory committee will recommend any kind
of changes in the Executive Order, but I think it we were going to move to have
consistency, we would probably want to do it at the system-wide basis, not at
the campus level.
Last week, the
statewide Academic Senate passed a resolution in support of international
experience and global perspectives in CSU education.
Dr. Jan Eyring (Chair, Dept. of MLL): I sent an email message
to the Senators last night with comments. On page 9, lines 348-357 (of report),
there is discussion of the impact of community college classes if this
requirement is passed and also concerns that counselors aren’t going to be able
to keep the policies straight, which will be confusing. We know that any new
innovation that there will be some changes and effects; was there any
discussion about looking at the effects as a temporary issue? Maybe the report
could have mentioned that once the requirement was implemented and word got out
to community colleges and high school, this issue would take care of itself.
Why didn’t this appear in the report?
Starr: With regard to community colleges, the overwhelming response of
counselors was that students would go
elsewhere. That does not mean that at no transfer students would come if the
requirement was implemented, but
that there would be losses. They were pretty adamant about that. The vast overwhelming majority was very clear in their
responses to the survey. That data is in the appendices of our report. Likewise, community college administrators in the
Humanities were unanimously negative
about it, indicating that enrollments would suffer. So, getting the word out
was not the problem. The word was out
there and these were the responses that we received.
Regarding the community colleges being confused about our
requirement, I think you must be referring
to one passage in the report that said when the students get the message that
the requirement exists, but that
there are exemptions, that there will be
a tendency for students not to make that fine distinction.
That was something that we were told, so we reported it.
Eyring: Regarding
your statement that not many would come to Fullerton, I think on page 8, the report talked about CSUF losing 4% of
enrollment, but this figure is vague because it includes the ones that “may or may not” come to CSUF. I
heard from Dolores Vura that there were a number of positive comments about the requirement submitted by
students who took the survey. I don’t know if those
details were included in the report, which felt like it had a negative spin on
the requirement.
Starr: With respect to the data you are referring to, 936 completed the questionnaire.
The question was “What impact
would this [requirement] have on your decision to come to CSUF?” 16% said that they would consider going elsewhere, 4%
said that they would definitely have not come here, and an additional 13% said that they were not
sure what they would have done. That is a third of the students. Again, no one thought that on opening day, we would have
no students. The question is how
many are you willing to risk? This self-reported material suggests that are 33%
of students whose decision would be in
play. We reported specific numbers in our report.
With respect to your other comment, it was exhilarating to read
the comments of the students that are involved
in second languages. There were over 20 pages of comments, roughly 50% of the
surveyed students. But there were a
lot of students that were on the other side, and those that were in the middle; they thought it was a great idea,
but had drawbacks. That is where we stood.
Eyring: I question
the number of sections that would be needed at CSUF. Page 13, lines 491-509 of the report indicate that 100 would be
needed. When we interviewed the Chair of Foreign Languages at
Sacramento State University, it was true that many Spanish
classes were open, but a large number of students
took classes that were half full (uncommonly taught languages like Chinese or
German). So, they just filled up
what already existed and that reduced the numbers also. American Sign Language was mentioned in this document. That
is also an option that was chosen my many of those students. I think those numbers (number of sections
needed) are exaggerated and that will have implications for the
budget; it won’t be as expensive as the report seems to indicate.
Bhattacharya: We did
take into account ASL transcripts on line 452 on page 12. I do agree that the title for that table should have been
“Summary of Section for MLL/ASL Classes” because students can take ASL to meet the language
requirement. But, I think ASL is a very small percentage.
About the numbers being grossly exaggerated, if you follow the
calculations on page 12, everything possible
that we get information on has been reviewed (i.e. study abroad, ASL, AP
scores, etc.). This is self-reported
information. Some students reported that they would pass the speaking and
reading exams. The numbers were taken
as is and doesn’t reflect the amount of students that might not pass the exams. These are the minimum
number of sections, not a grossly exaggerated number.
Dr. Lee Gilbert: It seems to me that the
analysis of the number of sections needed is flawed for the following reasons:
The numbers of students were taken from surveys of the 2006 and 2007 cohorts as
to how much foreign language they had studied while they were in community college.
And based upon those numbers, you projected how many classes we needed to serve
the students. The problem with that analysis is that the students in those two
cohorts had absolutely no motivation, other than self interest, to take foreign
language at the community college because they subject to the SLR. It doesn’t
tell us anything about how much foreign language they would have studied, had
they been subject to the SLR. And to use that data then to project the number
of sections that we need seems to be rather flawed. It is simply a faulty
analysis of the numbers because they had no reason, while they were at the
community college, other than self interest, to take foreign languages. Most
certainly, if they had known they were going to be subject to the second
language requirement, I am quite sure that a very large number would have taken
foreign language at the community college.
Professor Cheryl Zimmerman (Dept. of MLL): My concern about this document has to do with various objectivity
issues. I would like to call your attention to the Social Science research that
was investigated. I know that it was your mandate to investigate the value of a
second language requirement or knowing a second language, but in fact, there
are references here and there that don’t show this issue well. I will refer you
to page 8, to the reference of the Wake Forest University business study. As it
says in the ad hoc document, it was a study of alumni, deans, and recruiters.
The conclusion was that the least desirable factor was to know a second
language. In fact, the way the study reads has separate studies for the deans,
alumni, and recruiters. The only group that was asked about the second language
was the recruiters. There were 100 recruiters that were surveyed online and
there was no follow-up interview. These 100 recruiters were given 20 factors to
rank, and they ranked facility of a foreign language as last. There was not
much information about who the recruiters were. Number 19 was “strong
international perspective”, which wouldn’t go for with our global awareness
position. Number 18 was “broad foundation in liberal arts”. At number 11 was
the “ability to work in a culturally diverse environment”. This group rated
“fit with the corporate culture” and “ability to drive results” at the top. I
suggest that you look at this document carefully to see how recruiters, people
who hire our students, would view second language proficiency.
The meeting adjourned
with an unexhausted speaker’s list on this topic.
VI.
STATEWIDE ACADEMIC SENATE REPORT
No report was given.
VII.
CHAIR’S REPORT
Chair Guerin reported
the following:
·
The transmittal for UPS
210.000 was approved by the President on March 12, 2008.
·
Per the recommendation of Vice
President Smith, Revised UPS 450.300 Summer Session and Revised UPS 411.104
Policy on Online Instruction were removed from the Academic Senate agenda as
items of New Business.
·
Continued discussion of ASD
08-08 Consolidated International Education Policy will take place at the Senate
meeting on April 17, 2008.
·
Vice President Hagan will give
this Fiscal State of the University report at next Senate meeting (March 27,
2008). Budget-related questions can be sent to him or Chair Guerin prior to the
meeting.
·
Faculty members are encouraged
to complete the online committee interest form at https://netcert.fullerton.edu/ASCommitteeService/Logon.aspx .
·
39
new faculty members have been hired.
VIII.
UNFINISHED BUSINESS
Item 8.1 was not
discussed due to lack of time.
8.1 ASD 07-183 Revised UPS 103.004
Computing Facilities Use Policy [ITC]
IX.
NEW BUSINESS
Items 9.1, 9.2, and 9.5
were not discussed due to lack of time.
9.1 ASD 08-44 Revised UPS 106.100 The President’s Medallion [Senate
Executive Committee]
9.2 ASD 08-45 Revised UPS 410.103 Curriculum Guidelines and Procedures:
Programs [UCC]
9.3 ASD 08-57 Revised UPS 450.300 Summer Session Policy [EEC] (Removed from agenda; See Chair’s Report)
9.4 ASD 08-55 Revised UPS 411.104 Policy on Online Instruction [ASC] (Removed from agenda; See Chair’s Report)
9.5 ASD 08-56 Revised UPS 240.200 Policy on Amorous Relationships
Between Faculty, Staff, & Students [FAC]
X.
ADJOURNED
The meeting was adjourned at 1:00 p.m.