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Faculty Senate debates course description proposal |
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Thursday, 20 March 2008 |
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by BRITTANY PENLAND
Intern News Reporter
With class registration drawing near, the Student Government Association proposed the idea of adding online course descriptions to the Faculty Senate.
The motion would require professors to submit a two to three paragraph summary of their class, a past syllabus, grading and attendance policies, and textbook prices, if possible, to the online course catalog.
“This is an issue that has been raised in the past couple of years and students have the desire for more information for registration purposes concerning course descriptions,” SGA Director of Academic Affairs Janison A. Dillon said.
Faculty Senate said slight modifications should be made before the senate can pass the motion.
“I can sum my courses up in one paragraph and three sentences will do it. So, saying that I have to put
up two paragraphs seems to me pedantic,” member of the Faculty Senate Campus Planning
Committee Patrick Rardin said. “It strikes me at what this motion is going to achieve.”
Chair of the Faculty Senate Martha Marking suggested SGA rephrase the current motion to state
placing course descriptions online as voluntary for professors rather than required before senate can
pass it.
“I personally have no problem with the suggestion. Providing a copy of my most recent syllabi for each
course is a good idea and it’s an easy thing for faculty to do - just submit a copy electronically,” chair
of the Faculty Senate Budget Committee Mark Strazicich said. “My syllabus, personally, is very
detailed and provides an enormous amount of information as far as I’m concerned. It’s useful
information.”
Dillon said the Registrar’s Office will purchase new software to create a course description catalog
accessible through the university Web site.
“I think it would be really great if professors had the opportunity to have past syllabi and descriptions
linked through the [Appalachian State] Web site so that students could click a link to them. I don’t
know that requiring it is the way to go at least at this point for sure, but I think it would be nice, and I
think a lot of people would take advantage of it,” vice chair of the Faculty Senate Eric Marland said.
SGA President Forrest Gilliam said the motion hopes to better inform students and give insight as to
what professors have done in the past.
“The only way right now students have to find out anything in the classroom is through word of mouth
or ratemyprofessor.com. [With] ratemyprofessor.com there is no accountability to the things people
say,” Gilliam said.
According to the Faculty Senate agenda, the goal for SGA is to pass the motion before fall 2008 class
registration.
“I think we need to work on a solution to [the motion], get this done and figure out a way to get the
information to students so that they know what they are getting into,” Gilliam said. “It isn’t requiring
much more extra effort on the part of faculty. Sending a syllabus that you have had before, putting it on
a file, e-mailing it in does not seem to be overly difficult.”
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