Graduate Council Meeting Minutes
Coastal Carolina University
September 14, 2005
Members Present: Elsa Crites, Emory Helms, Joe Winslow, Susan Libes, Eric Wright, Dennis Rauch, Mark Mitchell, Brenda Sawyer, Dennis Wiseman
Guest: Deborah Vrooman
The meeting was called to order at 11:30 AM by Dr. Dennis Wiseman in the Dawsey Conference Room in the E.M. Singleton Building
The first item of business was the approval of the Graduate Council minutes from the May 4, 2005, Council meeting. After minor editorial changes to the minutes, the minutes were approved.
Dr. Wiseman announced that the Council had received one item of course-related academic business, this from the College of Natural and Applied Sciences.
College of Natural and Applied Sciences
Recommendation for New Course
CMWS 615 Advanced Experimental Designs and Analyses. (3) (Prereq: CMWS 610) An advanced graduate course in the design and statistical analyses of experiments building on materials covered in CMWS 610 and focusing on categorical data, use of null models and simulation, Bayesian approaches, meta-analyses and additional analytic techniques.
Rationale: To expand on graduate students' understanding and experiences with experimental design and statistical analyses and provide a venue for students to incorporate course information into thesis proposals and final analyses of thesis data.
Discussion: The Council had limited discussion on the recommendation for the approval of CMWS 615. The course was proposed as an elective available to students in their programs of study and did not reflect any changes in the requirements of the actual degree program. After discussion, the course was approved as submitted.
Proposal for International Student Admission to Graduate Study at Coastal Carolina University
International applicants applying to enter into graduate study must meet the university's general admission requirement plus the additional requirements that follow:
Unlike American applicants, international applicants may only be admitted as degreeseeking students. Once enrolled, international students must take at least nine credit hours each semester to maintain full-time status as required by the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
Rationale: As graduate study expands at the University it is anticipated that international students will be interested in seeking access to and completing Coastal Carolina graduate degrees. In anticipation of this, a standard for proficiency in the English language at the graduate level is needed.
Discussion: The need to have stated expectations that pertain to international students was supported by the Council members. However, there also was interest in being more informed as to what other institutions have adopted as their expectations. Questions related to whether or not the TOEFL exam was written, oral, or both were asked. After some discussion, the Council decided to take this item up at its next meeting and requested that Dr. Wiseman obtain information from other institutions for review. Reviewing expectations in this area from the College of Charleston, Winthrop University, UNC Wilmington, and the University of South Carolina was recommended.
Request for Waiver of Graduate Assistant Tuition Remission Expectation in Grant Proposal
Dr. Wiseman introduced the request for waiver of the graduate assistant tuition remission expectation by referring Council members to the draft form attached. Reviewing the form brought about a number of observations pertaining to the current policies and procedures that Coastal has in place related to graduate assistants. Dr. Wiseman indicated that Dr. Libes and Dr. Wright were working on possible changes to the current policies and procedures and language used and would be presenting this information to the Council. Based on this information, the Council decided to wait on identifying a process for requesting a waiver to the current expectation of requesting tuition remission until the policies and procedures related to graduate assistants could be reviewed in their entirety.
Announcements
Dr. Wiseman distributed information on graduate studies at Coastal that had been presented at the President's retreat in the summer. He provided an overview of the information including enrollments, majors, and courses. He also noted that, since the handout had been put together, the College of Education had terminated four programs as follows:
Master of Arts in Teaching (MAT) in Spanish Master of Arts in Teaching (MAT) in French
Master of Education in Secondary Education with a concentration in Spanish Master of Science in Instructional Technology
The termination of programs received a great deal of discussion. The rationale for termination presented related to the College's accreditation through the National Council for Accreditation of Teacher Education (NCATE). The specific issue at hand was concern over programs of low enrollment with respect to the MAT and M.Ed. programs and over completely meeting standards with respect to the M.S. program. After much discussion, the Council recommended the following:
When a graduate program is being recommended for termination, the process of termination follows the same process for program approval. This would mean that a recommendation for termination should be reviewed by the Graduate Council before any action for termination takes place.
After this discussion, Dr. Wiseman provided the members an update on the progress of the proposal for the Master of Business Administration (MBA). The proposal is scheduled for its first review at CHE on September 29. If successful, it will be reviewed again in October and November. If successful throughout these reviews, the degree program will receive its final approval at the November meeting of CHE.
There being no further items of business or discussion, the Council adjourned at 12:25 PM.