The Academic Senate approved the entire Hartshorne-Stecker Amendment to the general education program at Tuesday’s meeting.

Senators voted to delete Section 11, which requires that courses have a “reasonable and realistic plan for using authentic assessment to monitor and report student learning objectives for the subgroup.”

Foreign languages and literatures professor James Jones said to do this type of evaluation for every UP class each semester is not realistic.

“This is not a realistic burden to place upon people teaching UP classes,” he said.

Associate physical education and sport professor Tracy Olrich said assessment is needed, but in a different way than described in Section 11.

“Assessment should happen at a different level than individual courses,” he said. “We should select courses based on what works well in the UP.”

Some senators said they had concerns about the implications of removing the section.

“I do believe our accrediting body will require an assessment of courses in the UP,” said Provost Julia Wallace. “So I think deleting the section entirely will create some difficulties.”

Bill Dailey, assistant professor of speech communication and dramatic arts, explained the logic behind Section 11.

“The overarching purpose is that people learn that they are responsible for the outcomes in the syllabus,” he said.

The amendment does not include limits on the number of courses in the University Program. Some of the main ideas of the document include selecting UP courses that “broadly represent their discipline,” “match the goals of a liberal education” and “expose students to the analytical methods and the world view of the discipline.”

The Hartshorne-Stecker Amendment is one piece of the revision of the whole general education program. The Senate is hosting a special meeting Dec. 9 to continue discussing general education. The discussion will begin with the writing intensive course component of the program.

Faculty concerns

English language and literature professor Maureen Eke said she had concerns about the number of vacant positions in her department.

“There are 10 vacant positions,” said Gary Shapiro, dean of the College of Humanities and Social and Behavioral Sciences. “We’re searching to fill six of them, so there are four vacant positions. The intent is to search for those other positions next year, but I can’t say for sure we’ll fill them all.”

Eke also had concerns about the conditions in Anspach Hall.

“In some rooms the ceiling is uncovered, there is water dripping – the students are worried about it,” she said.

Shapiro said all building concerns should be directed to the building coordinator. There is a plan to replace all water pipes in Anspach Hall.

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