Minutes General Education Committee
Friday, November 07, 2003 4 to 5, Plains Room, Memorial Union, NDSU

Committee members attending the meeting were Virginia Clark Johnson, Orv Swenson, Grant Striemer, Marina Ioudina, Ranelle Ingalls, Justin Wageman, Bob Harrold, Larry Peterson, Doug Rymph and Brian Dougan

1. Brian Dougan agreed to serve as recorder for the meeting.
    
2. Minutes from October 31st Halloween meeting were approved unanimously.
    
3. Reminders to the committee included:
   The Gen Ed Focus Group, from the self-study committee will participate in two open forums on Tuesday, November 13, 2003 from 1:00 2:30 p.m. in the Meadow Lark Room and on Wednesday, November 19, 2003 from 1:00 to 2:30 p.m. in the Meadow Lark Room of the Memorial Union.
   The focus group’s draft is located at:
   http://www.ndsu.edu/ndsu/accreidation/generaleducationfocusgroup.htm
    
4. Larry recommended that we send Provost Schnell a memo requesting funding for General Education Assessment of $3300 to $3500 per year. The cost includes necessary administrative and organizational costs.
   A discussion followed concerning the time consumption involved being more efficient than with various other assessment tests. It was also agreed that the Academic Profile test from ETS presented by Dr. Slanger’s is very compatible with our outcomes. There were suggestions made about determining the best way to get a fair representation of student participation which included selecting participants by colleges or by random NAID numbers. It was agreed that there is no need to decide on operational details at this time.

   We reviewed the relevant questions:
   1. How well are students achieving Gen Ed outcomes?
   2. Can we use the results to improve the teaching of Gen Ed courses?

   We made it a point to remember that the money needed to do the assessment tests is an annual expense amounting to approximately $3300 per year.

   The bottom line as far as the tests are concerned is that they will provide immediate feedback as to how well students are achieving the Gen Ed outcomes.

   One suggestion we will try to pursue is to use the web-based formative assessment tool now available. The committee could suggest questions about each of the General Education Outcomes that faculty could add.

5. There were no student petitions to discuss this week.
    
6. Larry presented the fact that the Communications Department is in the process of creating some new courses for honors students and have submitted them to Academic Affairs, but prefers not to pass them on to the General Education Committee. The courses themselves have not changed, but the audience for the courses has changed. We have a precedent to refer to in our General Education rule #6, part ‘B’ which already pertains to similar situations in Physics, Chemistry and Math courses. Larry will communicate the Committee’s reaction to the department.
    
7. Larry also presented an HNES issue, where they want to offer a special section of HPER 217 for their majors only. Consensus was that the majors would benefit from such an environment and Larry wants to continue communication with Judy to be assured that all students are being treated equally. Larry will communicate the Committee’s reaction to the department.
    
8. The Social and Behavioral Sciences, Qualitative Reasoning and Wellness Subcommittee recommended that CDFS 242, Couples, Marriages and Families, which is a new course title be accepted as having met the standards for a five year review in the Wellness category with outcomes 4 and 6. The motion was approved unanimously.
    
9. The Science and Technology Subcommittee suggested that PLSC 210, Horticulture Science should be resubmitted by the instructor because it did not provide adequate evidence that the course met outcomes 5 and 6. The motion was approved unanimously without discussion.
    
10. There was no report from the Humanities subcommittee.
     
11. The meeting was adjourned at 4:56 p.m.