February 24, 2021

Attendees:  Jerry Lin, Brett Welch, Carly Cox, Jeff Dyson, Joseph Kruger, Theresa Hefner-Babb, Awais Saleem, Jeffery Forret, Dorothy Sisk, David Short, Xianchang Li

Approval of Minutes

#462 – January 20, 2021

Motion to accept minutes from Jeff Dyson, second from Joseph Kruger.  Motion passed.

Old Business

• Recertification of expired graduate courses, recertification of expired graduate courses from other institutions for transfer credit
• University-level policy regarding application of credits from Master’s degree toward D.E. or Ph.D., “double counting” courses
• Thesis/Dissertation course grading scale – letter grades or S/U
• Academic suspension appeals – do we need to set a standard for the types of cases that can appeal, and is it appropriate to expel students with non-recoverable GPAs?
• Minimum admission standards for LU Graduate Program

Old business items tabled for March meeting.

New Business

• Ongoing and periodic process for review of stacked course syllabi – Planning & Assessment has provided initial inspection of stacked course review. According to Dr. Hefner-Babb, this has been communicated to departments/colleges and there is some correction already underway. SACS review committee needs to see that we are reviewing stacked courses and that we do have a process for this. Spring 2021 syllabi have been reviewed by Planning & Assessment and corrections are underway. This committee has plans to provide routine review of stacked course syllabi. We need to review Fall and Spring 2020 stacked course syllabi. We will create another spreadsheet like those created by Dr. Hefner-Babb using the syllabi guidelines approved by this body. Syllabi not demonstrating adequate rigor can be returned to the course instructor for corrections and review again.  Council M.E.M.bers can review syllabi from Spring/Fall 2020 for their respective colleges. Jeffrey Forret – what are the stacked course syllabi guidelines to use for review? In addition to the spreadsheet for review, will also include SACS standard 9.6 and guidelines previously approved by this council. Joseph Kruger – many of these courses have the same name but different sections for graduate/undergraduate. Do they have to be different? David Short – not required on his end. Jerry Lin – suggests naming graduate level courses as “Advanced” to indicate added level for graduate courses. Joseph Kruger – what is the timeline for Spring/Fall 2020 stacked course syllabi review? Will spreadsheets show recommendations from Dr. Hefner-Babb? Jerry Lin – before March meeting, syllabi spreadsheet and guidelines will appear in share folder and meet again in May 2021 to discuss findings. No, council M.E.M.bers need to review and provide yes/no, but do not need to recommend specific changes. Instead communicate to faculty M.E.M.ber what is missing from the syllabi. Xianchang Li – what about syllabi for Spring 2021? Theresa Hefner-Babb – Spring 2021 syllabi have been reviewed and updates have been requested, many are in process now.

• Review of graduate faculty renewal – additional review needed for those that did not submit applications for Fall 2020 review. Motion to accept all except Williams and Reading from Brett Welch, second from Awais Saleem, motion passed. Awais Saleem – received update on Heather Reading RE graduate faculty application, she is now approved.

College of Business

The School of Accounting and Information Systems – council approved previous request to change CIP code and program title at January meeting, however department would like to request another change to the program title.  The change would be from “Master of Professional Accounting” to “Master of Science in Professional Accounting.”  Motion to accept from Joseph Kruger, second from Jeffrey Forret, motion passed.

Dual M.B.A./M.S.N - the previously approved dual degree plan contained outdated Nursing courses that have since been changed.  All Nursing course changes had also been previously approved.  This has been corrected and the updated degree plan needs to be approved so DegreeWorks can be updated. Motion to accept from Jeff Dyson, second from Welch, motion passed.

College of Engineering

Industrial Engineering – requesting course changes described below

Planning & Assessment has reviewed these courses already.  INEN 5354 and INEN 5369 are updates from the stacked course review for Spring 2021. Motion to accept from Jeffrey Forret, second from Xianchang Li, motion passed.

Meeting adjourned at 1:45 pm

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