Subcommittee on Core Curriculum Minutes 2015-01-16

Call to Order

The meeting was called to order by Julia Metzker at 1:00 p.m. in Arts & Sciences 2-51.

Attendance

Voting Members Present: Roberta Gorham, Mary Magoulick, Julia Metzker, Patrick Simmons, Amy Sumpter, Dana Wood
Regrets: Nancy Beasley, Ruth Carter, Cara Meade, Joe Mocnik, Brandon Samples, Sheryl Winn
Non-Voting Member Present: Kay Anderson

Because there was no quorum present, the committee only shared announcements and discussion items.

Minutes

The minutes from the November 7th meeting will be approved next week. The committee did not meet on November 14th, November 21st, or December 5th.

Information Items

The number for MATH 1114 Trigonometry & Analytic Geometry, an Area A Math course, has been changed to MATH 1112. This was completed to comply with the University System’s common course numbering.

Last semester, Julia Metzker distributed the November 14th report on SoCC’s activities that she submitted to the Executive Committee of University Senate.

SoCC’s bylaw changes were on the November 14th agenda and will be voted on at the next Senate meeting.

At the last Executive Committee meeting, the Provost approved a pilot of the diversity overlay for the Spring 2015 semester.

Kay distributed a draft form for minor modifications to core courses for review.

Kay reported that one of the colleges recently requested to teach the 4th hour for the GC2Y class online. This was prompted by a scheduling error in which the 4th hour was not listed prior to registration. Based on the discussion held at SoCC regarding the importance of face-to-face and interactive content in this unique course, that request was denied. Kay asked the committee to confirm that this interpretation of SoCC’s beliefs regarding the 4th hour was correct. The committee agreed.

Kay Anderson reported that the University System is currently starting a new initiative (INGRESS) that would include all system schools in e-Core. This will be implemented in two phases over the next year. Georgia College has asked to be in the second implementation group. At this time we have received virtually no information about how this system will actually work. Our current understanding is that it will facilitate our students’ access to online core courses at other institutions and other students’ access to our online core courses; however, factors such as varying registration dates, the fact that we offer online core courses predominately in the summer, and the complexities of implementing such a system across schools suggest that the overall impact on our registration, classes, or students will likely be minimal.

The core survey was released to the faculty last term. There were 64 complete responses to date.
Some of the initial themes were an impression that our core is not distinctive, that the 1Y and 2Y courses were good efforts to create distinctiveness but that they may not have been implemented fully, and that the restrictions (or perceived restrictions) of the system limited our ability to fulfil our liberal arts mission. Some also suggested that we ask students for their impression and responses. Next week we will put together a team to review the survey and write a report, and another team to draft a student survey.

Next week we will have two courses up for review: GC2Y 2000 Mathematics in the House of Wisdom as an Area B2 Section and GC2Y 2000 The Sexual Sublime in Music, Literature, and Film as an Area B2 Section (contingent on receiving outcomes).

Next Meeting

The committee’s next meeting will be Friday, January 23, 2015, at 1:00 p.m. in Arts & Sciences 2-51.

Adjournment

The committee adjourned at 2:17 p.m.