General Education Review Committee
Minutes
Present: Steve Bennett,
Margo Byerly, Amy Carr, Jongnam Choi, Paige Goodwin, Buzz Hoon,
Members Absent: Dale Adkins,
Lori Baker-Sperry, Martha Barclay, Judi Dallinger, Annette Glotfelty, Kathleen
O’Donnell-Brown
I. Approval of Minutes
Minutes of the
Minutes of the
II. Announcements
Aimee Shouse and John Miller
have been asked by the Executive Committee of the Faculty Senate to meet and
discuss the FLGI recommendation to the Faculty Senate.
Martin Maskarinec
distributed a handout suggesting a possible catalog description of General
Education if a Foreign Language/Global Issues requirement is adopted.
III. Fine Arts Requirement
John Miller (seconded by
IV.
W Subcommittee Report
MOTION 1 (J. Miller, T.
Pfafman): Discontinue the ‘W’ suffix as well as the current two course
requirements. J. Miller believes that writing in all general
education courses is explicitly implicitly required
within the goals of General Education.
Further, given the 180/280 sequence as well as WID requirements, writing
across the curriculum is in place. In
addition, the ‘W’ requirement has become an advising and logistical
problem. Finally, the presence of the
‘W’ requirement may give both students and faculty the incorrect impression
that writing will only be emphasized within courses that have a ‘W’ suffix. P. Rippey concurred, noting that the ‘W’
requirement was initially approved to encourage writing in courses that had not
traditionally incorporated writing.
Available evidence suggests this goal has not been achieved; writing
still primarily occurs within courses that have always emphasized writing.
B. Hoon notes that according
to the GERC survey conducted during the 2005-2006 academic year, the majority
of faculty support the ‘W’ requirement. D. Lane is concerned that while the ‘W’
requirement may not have achieved all of its objectives, it has contributed to
a culture of writing. If eliminated,
will that culture disappear? B. Thompson
believes that without a ‘W’ requirement, departments will have to assume some
of the responsibility for maintaining that culture (in other words, departments
and faculty will have to decide the value of writing within a particular
course). P. Rippey believes the writing
requirement has not been the single most important factor in the development of
a writing culture – rather, there is a culture of writing because faculty believe writing has heuristic value. T. Pfafman questions whether the perceived
inadequacies of the ‘W’ requirement are less related to the specifics of the
requirement and more a reflection of shortcomings in faculty
training/implementation/communication.
A. Carr stressed that in the
absence of a ‘W’ requirement, there must be some
expectation of writing (even if it’s a flexible expectation). Individual faculty cannot do whatever they
want. If the course if is a Gen Ed
course, writing must be involved.
However, P. Rippey noted that writing is a value, and values cannot be
mandated from the top down. In reality,
the people responsible for the curriculum (and what is in the curriculum) are
faculty. Faculty must believe there is
value to writing. If they do, writing
will be part of the curriculum. Motion 1, to eliminate the W
designation and the corresponding 2 course requirement was passed (10 in
favor, 4 not in favor, 1 abstention)
MOTION 2 (J. Miller, A.
Carr): Make writing an expectation in all General Education coursesGen
Ed, (unless
exempted by CGE);
The motion was made
with the expectation that there needed to be clarification of clearly
specify what the expectation of writing in Gen Ed will be.
P. Rippey noted that writing
is already an expectation in General Education.
There is no need to pass a motion reaffirming that expectation. While J. Miller believes that passing this
motion will reintroduce a new ‘W’ requirement, J. Schmidt believes that voting
down this motion communicates an implicit message that writing is not a part of
Gen Ed. J. Miller withdrew the motion.
S. Meier argued the first
step in any revision of writing within the General Education curriculum must be
a re-education of faculty regarding the expectation of writing in Gen Ed. A. Carr agreed, noting that we must begin by
communicating guidelines regarding the nature of expected writing. J. Schmidt
concurred, noting that the ‘W’ subcommittee, in recommending the dissolution of
the writing requirement, believed that specific guidelines regarding writing
would be developed.
MOTION 3 (A. Carr,
The meeting adjourned at
Respectfully submitted,
Paige Goodwin