January 28, 1999
I. PRELIMINARIES
A. Attending: Mullin, Belzer, Nitse, Das, Pehrsson, Thackray, Wabrek, Westphal, Bain.Excused:Bosworth, Sirotnak, Enos, Dejesus, HjelmB. Minutes. MSC to approve CTL Minutes previously distributed) for 12/02/98
A. Update on Faculty Senate Ad Hoc Task Force: Mullin reported that the Task Force would be meeting with Dr. Jonathan Lawson on February 8,1999.
B. Update on Goal 9 Assessment: Mullin reported that the Committee met on January 15, 1999 and would be meeting again on February 1, 1999. Committee members are A. Christelow, T. Engebretsen, J. Jones, J. Kilpatrick, A. Mullin B. Pehrsson, B. Swanson, R. Hatzenbuehler and B. Bain. Course syllabi and exams have been distributed to the committee members and the committee will attempt to identify commonalities across the courses as a starting point for identifying assessment objectives. Pehrsson added that the committee hopes to develop a plan that will make sense for evaluating other general education goals. He further added that the committee's intent is to help the people involved with Goal 9 to put their best foot forward. The Task Force plans to submit a report to the State Board of Education in the Fall, 1999.
C. CLT Newsletter: Bain reported that in a meeting with R. Hatzenbuehler and J. Jones that the CLT Newsletter was assessed to be a labor intensive activity that was not worth the effort. J. Jones suggested that he wants to develop a web site for the OIR and that the CTL could use this site to inform people of events, etc. No objections were expressed to discontinuing the CLT Newsletter.
D. Discussion Groups: Two discussion groups are planned for Spring Semester. One is "Focus on Learning in Student Evaluations" (Co-facilitators D. Sorensen and B. Bain) and the other is "Academic Freedom Versus Curriculum Dictation" (Co-facilitators B. Pehrsson and B. Bain). A flier that is to be distributed to faculty was circulated and suggestions for revision were obtained from members. The flier will be distributed on Friday, January 29,1999. The suggestion was made that student input might be useful on the student evaluation discussion group.
E. Mission Statement for CTL: Belzer distributed a working draft of the Mission statement developed by a subcommittee consisting of Belzer, Nitse and Das. The committee identified five objectives for the CTL: 1) Provide various kinds of professional development and recognition for faculty; 2) Conduct and assist faculty, departments, colleges, and the university in curriculum and program development and evaluation; 3) Consult and conduct assessment in collaboration with faculty, departments, colleges, and the university; 4) Hold discussion groups each semester on topics related to teaching and leaning that are of interest to faculty; and 5) Provide faculty with resources on issues related to teaching and learning. The Council discussed the draft and several suggestions were made. Clarification is needed as to whether the Center for Teaching and Learning exits or has it been subsumed by the Office of Institutional Research. Discussion also included the following items. The Council might be involved in the orientation of new faculty. Business has an orientation for new faculty and it has been successful. Objective 4 might become part of objective 1. Objective 2 might be rewritten as "Assist and promote in implementation of program development and evaluation". The subcommittee was commended for developing the draft of a mission statement and objectives. Council members suggested that the working draft be discussedwith Dr, Jonathan Lawson at the February 8~ meeting. Belzer and Mullin will rework the draft, send it to 3. Jones for his input and review it with Dr. Lawson,
F. Applegrams: K. Bosworth sent a written report to the meeting regarding his ideas for an Applegrams web site. He suggested that it link off the main page to subpages organized by department and a link to an achieve. He reported that the applegram web site is feasible and would have minimum costs. Discussion of the Council involved having faculty add e-mail addresses to their syllabi so that students could send the applegrams. Anne will talk with Ken and ask him to follow-up on this topic at the next meeting.
G. Other Business: Pehrsson suggested that at a future meeting the council consider a name change to the Council for Learning. Members also suggested that a list serve be set up for the Council. Bain will work with a student to develop this and distribute future agendas and minutes via the list serve. For the next meeting agenda and minutes will be distributed by e-mail and a copy will be mailed to members.
Approved:March 18, 1999
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