Attendance: Catherine Axinn, Dominic Barbato, Lee Cibrowski, John Day, Howard Dewald, JoAnn Dugan, Andrew Escobedo, David Juedes, Hans Kruse, Jody Lamb, Christine Mattley,Brian McCarthy, David Mould, Chester Pach, Robert Staron, William Shambora, Katherine Tadlock, Wanda Weinberg, and Peter Wickman.
Excused: Joseph Bernt, Judith Edinger, Tim Heckman, Aimee Howley, Mike Prudich, Animesh Rathore, Josep Rota, and Yinjiao Xu.
Guest: Steve Howard
Convened: The meeting convened at 2:10 pm.
1. Approval of Minutes of the October meeting
The minutes from the October 12th,2007 meeting were approved.
2. Chair’s Report (David Juedes)
A. Committee Chairs/Thanks: David introduced the chairs of all the committees. He also thanked Hans for chairing the meeting in October.
B. Task force on the Centers of Excellence: David discussed the progress made during the meetings of the Task Force on Centers of Excellence inGraduate and Professional Education. David mentioned that the task force has been meeting regularly. David mentioned that he would keep the Graduate Council informed of the progress of this task force at subsequent meetings of the Graduate Council.
3. Remarks by Katie Tadlock
A. Enrollment Update: Katie informed members that based on preliminary numbers there is a2.87% increase in enrollment from last year. For fall quarter 2007, 520 new graduate students were admitted, 75% ofthem are Master’s students. She added that applications for fall 2008 also show an increase from this time lastyear.
B. Search for Vice President for Research & Creative Activity/Dean of Graduate College: Katie informed members that the search committee is reviewing applications. She said that airport interviews are slated for January 2008. She added that Baker and Associates, a search firm based in Atlantahas been hired to facilitate this search.
C. Thesis and Dissertation Services: The program continues to report significant growth. In fall of 2006, 50 documents were approved, and for fall 2007, 104 documents have already been approved thus far.
4. Old Business
A. Policy on Language Coursework and Transfer of Graduate Credit: Katie informed members that many students pursuing a Master’s degree in the Center of International Studies are required to study a secondary language in a related area. If that language course is taken at Ohio University, then students receive credit for that on their transcripts. These courses are cross-listed, so students receive graduate credit for them. However, there are some languages that are not taught at OU and are taken at other schools. These language courses are only offered as undergraduate classes in many schools, like Yale, where many of our OU students take these classes. Katie recommended revising the catalog language so that it reflects the reality of the situation. She added that it is a very limited revision of policy to cover an extremely specific set of needs.
In response to Howard’s question about the credit appearing on the transcript, Katie said that it will be noted with the graduate call number. Steve Howard informed members that the Center for International Studies only sends students to Ministry of Education approved programs and to the ones with those we have had long standing partnerships.
It was noted that this policy was discussed at length during last year’s Graduate Council. After additional discussion, this policy was approved and the appropriate wording will be placed in the Graduate Catalog.
B. IIP program status: Katie informed members that Marty Tuck convened a meeting in the summer to discuss the status of the IIP since the program was up for its seven year review. The discussion focused on the fact that since none of the recommendations made in the previous review were implemented, it was not the best idea to have it be reviewed again. One of the recommendations that came from that meeting was to suspend admission to the program temporarily. This would not have an impact on students currently pursuing the program.
Some of the problems with the program are that the students feel isolated, and that there is no funding for the program. Katie added that with the creation of the Graduate College, there will be a home for the program. There are about 20 students in the program at this point in time. Howard asked if the recommendations have not been implemented for five years then why is the program being suspended hastily. Hans added that he perceives it as a matter of quality control. He added that we knew five years ago that this program needs improvement and we have not been able to implement the recommendations, yet we have continued to admit students to the program. So, it is a good decision to suspend admissions and evaluate the program. Katie added that this is the fourth program in the last seven years to be suspended. JoAnn recommended informing applicants about the upcoming changes, since they have submitted their applications knowing the current status of the program.
5. NewBusiness:
A. Curriculum Committee: Chris informed members that the committee recommends approval of all four reviews (English, Linguistics, Mathematics andTelecommunications). She said that she has included the policy on expedited review in her handout (part of the packet for today) to apprise new members of it. She said that none of the programs come across as having any academic concerns. However, the erosion of infrastructure and resources seems to be the common theme for all of there views. She added that after the June meeting, Duncan was going to send a letter to the Provost outlining the common themes among all of the reviews from last year. David Juedes noted that it is important to keep the Provost informed about the state of graduate education.
The Graduate Council voted to approve the recommendations of the Curriculum Committee to approve all four program reviews.
B. EMBA:John informed members that they are redesigning the program to have a more integrative approach will enable the program to be more competitive in the market. In response to David Juedes’ question about the program being approved by UCC, Catherine said that since this is not a new program it does not need UCC approval. John added that admission to the program will be resumed once there are enough applicants.
C. Recruitment and Admissions Requirements Committees: Catherine informed members that Dean Irwin will be Aaron Wilson’s supervisor and Michael Braasch will continue as Aaron’s academic advisor, thus eliminating the potential for conflict of interest.
The Graduate Council voted to approve the recommendations of the Recruitment and AdmissionsRequirements Committee for this conflict of interest case.
D. Centers of Excellence Review Committee: The Task Force on Centers of Excellence is looking at the models followed by other universities and the criteria used by them. This is a working document at this point in time and will go through multiple revisions. David Mould said that initial deadline ofJanuary 28, 2008 for a self-study to be completed by all the departments does not seem to be feasible. This ties inwith the announcement of the creation of the University system of Ohio. David Mould said that he is happy that their view is not taking the snapshot approach, and that using data from the last five years is a better comprehensive approach. David Juedes said that the group is still working on the format for the self studies and the rubrics that will be used to evaluate programs. Hans said that it seems that the task force has to accomplish two goals, comparing the programs internally at the university level and evaluating them for the university system. Chris echoed the sentiment and said that oneset of metrics might not be able to accomplish this two-fold purpose. Catherine suggested recommending to the taskforce to identify two different ways of evaluating programs.
E. Graduate College: Katie informed members about the process thus far. She said that one of the items under discussion has been the designation of certain faculty as graduate faculty. She said that the Graduate College would be responsible for maintaining a list of those criteria that are created at the department or College level and making sure that the members of the thesis or dissertation committees for graduate students are graduate faculty. Andrew said that a Graduate Collegeis envisioned as performing more functions than currently performed by Graduate Studies. It would seek to centralize some activities for the sake of efficiency.
Howard said that not all departments want to create the designation of graduate faculty. Katie responded that departments would be expected to follow the guidelines and criteria they submitted to the Graduate College. David Juedes asked about any more Information Technology resources being available to minimize the use of paper. Catherine said that some documents still need a signature page. Katie said that the online appointment processis a good example of a paperless process. She added that it was very cumbersome to create it. But, more and more documents and forms are being made available online, so they can be signed and be made available as PDFs.
F. GERB: Katie said that the three proposals that were submitted for external review received positive feedback and that Sergio will share that discussion with the Provost. Catherine said that hearing the proposals made her cognizant of the high level of research activity being conducted at OU and it made her proud to be a member of the faculty here.
G. Graduate Student Senate: Members of the Graduate Student Senate presented and discussed Graduate Student Senate Resolution 0708-04. This resolution supports the graduate education and research priorities laid out in the report by the Graduate Priorities Implementation Team of Vision Ohio. The members of the Graduate Council received this resolution very favorably, and voted unanimously to endorse this resolution by the Graduate Student Senate. Chester said that this is a fairly modest request and if we can accomplish it, it will attract more graduate students and contribute towards graduate education at Ohio University. Dominic said that most of these recommendations were a part of the report on graduate priorities.
The meeting adjourned at 4:00 pm.
The next meeting is on January 11th, 2008 in the Governance Room of Walter Hall from 2 to 4 pm.
