COUNCIL FOR TEACHING AND LEARNING

Minutes for March 16, 2001

I. PRELIMINARIES

A. Attending: Belzer (Chair), Dean, Enos, Hjelm, Kunicki, Kruger,

McKnight

Excused/Absent: Das, Fisher, House, Jones, Nitse, Paulson, Pehrsson, Reynolds,

Sato, Wabrek

II. BUSINESS

A. Organizational Plans for the Center

Following the meeting last week with Dr. Lawson, the Center Task Force, including Phil

Nitse, Jan House and Cathi Kunicki, met to generate possible plans on the organization of

the Center for consideration by the Council. On recommendation by Dr. Lawson, Dr. Egger

was invited to attend this Council meeting to provide input and substantive feedback on the

plans.

The Center Task Force summarized two plans, indicating that other additions such as Idaho

Falls, outreach (centers already in existence in Applied Technology), assessment, and faculty

development (including international exchanges) might also be considered.

The two plans for the Center differed in the extent to which the Center was linked to other

existing units on campus, such as the Academic Skills Center, First Year Seminar, etc. The

Center Task Force did not present a job description for the Center Director position, under

the assumption that we first needed to make a recommendation on the organizational structure

for the position before a job description could be written.

Egger indicated that he did not want to impose his views or those of the administration on the

Council. Egger pointed out that the second plan for the organization of the Center was larger

and would therefore likely be more influential on campus, while reducing administrative cost

and overlap between a number of units across campus.

Some discussion involved the student side of the plans, which was called the Learning Resource

Center (LRC). In addition, the Academic Skills Center was viewed as being more than just

developmental.

Several Council members acknowledged the problem with adding too many administrators

when the question was raised regarding the number of new hires anticipated. The hiring of a

Student Support Director (current Academic Skills Center) and Center Director were discussed.

It was generally agreed that it would not be possible to also hire a Faculty Development

Director (at the same level as the Student Support Director and below the Center Director).

A reason cited for the lack of symmetry on faculty and student sides was that there were more

layers on student side because there were more students than faculty. It was generally agreed

that symmetry was not important.

Kruger indicated that there was a need to find a way to do the time consuming tasks, so that

the Center Director would be free to devote enough time to faculty development issues too. The

concern about work load for a new Center Director that supervised both the student and faculty

units resulted in general agreement on the importance of having a Student Support Director that

could unify units on the student side in such a way that the Center Director could focus on the

faculty as well as the student sides. Egger emphasized the need for ISU to provide places for

faculty to get help on issues related to teaching and learning, indicating that it was the right thing

to do.

Kruger suggested that it would be important to hire a Center Director that was ìin the knowî and

could better help faculty meet their needs for professional development on teaching and learning.

Questions were raised regarding the growth and connection between the ITRC and the Center.

Egger indicated that it made sense to link the Center to a strong ITRC, which already existed on

campus. Likewise, it was suggested that the link between the Center and Institutional Research

might involve the collection and summary of data related to teaching and learning.

Some discussion followed on assessment. The question was raised on how the Center would

be involved in Assessment. Dean commented on the interviews that she and Kunicki had been

conducting with faculty using the Assessment Handbook. Dean indicated that the

accreditation-driven process has been difficult for many faculty using the handbook. She

suggested that many faculty had indicated, ìtell us what to doî and that "what we are being

asked to do was too vague". The guidelines from accrediting agencies allow a lot of latitude

for different situations at different institutions. Discussion suggested that there was probably a

disconnect between faculty and the Office of Institutional Research in terms of what was

expected and that perhaps there was a language problem. The term, a bottom-up assessment,

was utilized to indicate that faculty could determine the criteria to meet and show how to improve.

The statement was made that we must do assessment but that faculty could determine how

invested they would be in the assessment for their programs. There was general agreement that

this was both hard and time consuming for faculty to create. Egger emphasized the importance

of giving faculty an important role to play in assessment without being fully responsible for the

assessment. Hjelm suggested that it might be problematic to have a Center Director work with

faculty on issues related to teaching and learning, as well as assessment.

It was also agreed that it was not common to place faculty and student units together in the

same center. Kunicki suggested that because of his vast experience and expertise, it would be

helpful to ask Tinto for advice on the organizational structure of the Center. Dean asked whether

or not the Council had time to do this. Belzer indicated that she would follow up and determine

what kind of time-line we needed to follow. It was generally agreed that we needed to write a

flexible job description that was well delineated to meet the needs of ISU but that we should also

ask candidates for the position to prioritize how they would do their job.

Meeting adjourned at 3:50PM