Academic Senate continues to eliminate inactive programs while Academic Prioritization process moves forward
Provost Gary Shapiro said the process of prioritizing all academic and service programs on campus is “right on target.”
Academic Prioritization, a comprehensive review of academic programs, is being conducted to determine how the university can better focus on advancing academic excellence and quality, according to the initiative’s website, ssl.cmich.edu/programprioritization/.
Shapiro said the program is something CMU should engage in consistently.
“This will give an opportunity for the university to make choices and use what are limited resources and ... spend our resources in a manner that best helps our students and best helps move our university forward,” he said.
Shapiro said all department heads have submitted their self-evaluations and are now being reviewed by advisory committees composed of faculty members in each college.
Each college’s dean will receive the reports from the advisory committees by the end of this month, and the deans will then submit their analysis of those reports to Shapiro.
Shapiro said he is waiting for reports from each dean before making any decisions.
“I’m not making any premature judgments that this needs to be strengthened or this program needs to be eliminated … if I had those, then there would be no need for the prioritization,” he said.
Salma Ghanem, dean of the College of Communication and Fine Arts, said the departments in her college did a very thorough job with their reports, but was unable to predict what the final outcome would be.
“I haven’t come up with any conclusions,” Ghanem said. “It’s a lot of work … It’s an opportunity to determine what programs might need more funds. It’s a good process.”
Phil Squattrito, professor of chemistry and Academic Senate president, said the Senate has not taken a position on Academic Prioritization, but had several questions when the program was first proposed.
Right now, a lot of the efforts are behind-the-scenes within the departments and colleges, and after the Provost has released his recommendations, the Academic Senate will have more input, Squattrito said.
“The next six months are going to be fairly interesting in terms of what actually happens,” he said.
Academic Senate has begun eliminating some programs at the suggestion of Claudia Douglass, interim vice provost of academic affairs, separate from the Academic Prioritization process, Squattrito said.
The difference between those eliminations and the Academic Prioritization process is the Academic Senate-eliminated programs were already inactive.
“You might call it housekeeping, which is very different than academic prioritization,” Squattrito said.
Squattrito said the prioritization is not a new concept for the university as departments have reviewed their programs periodically. This time, though, he said the review is more comprehensive.
“There has been a history of evaluating programs, and I don’t necessarily think that’s a bad thing,” he said.
