Regular Meeting of the Faculty Senate
Minutes
February 26, 2013
Meeting called to order at 12:30pm.
- The motion is made to approve the minutes from the January 29, 2013 meeting. Motion approved. Voice vote.
- The following courses were put forward by Wayne Glasker, on behalf of the APC committee, for approval:
- Exploring Careers in Biology (1 credit course). I don’t have the course number information as I didn’t have access to the handout. The course is intended to be different than the internship course, giving students experience in the different types of careers in the field of Biology. The question is raised if this will become a major requirement. Dr. Glasker believes that this will become a requirement for the majors; it will not be an elective. Course is approved. Voice vote.
- Applied Linguistics in the Spanish Language. The course will be taught in Spanish, geared towards majors and master degree students. Course is approved. Voice vote.
- Dean Lindenmeyer speaks about online education in an effort to clarify recent developments within the Rutgers system. She admits that she can really only provide an update on where the administration is currently. There is a meeting scheduled for Friday 3/1 with the other deans, the chancellor and the New Brunswick representatives who are pushing for the increase in online education with the new Pearson contract. The Dean announces that the only program that will be offered as fully online will be the MALS graduate program. She feels it is important to mention that the other campuses are taking some of our students through their online programs and it was also important to include at least one online program in competition with the other campuses through the new Pearson contract. Stuart Charmé announces that the MALS program will be moving forward with the implementation of the online program through this contract. This will be, for the time being, the only fully online program. The campus will continue to offer online courses as it has been. There is no plan, from the Dean’s point of view, in offering a plethora of new online courses. However, she promotes the use of online courses in creating convenient curriculum packages for the students. She clarifies that if online courses will be beneficial to a particular department, then she will support the implementation. She does not encourage a new revenue stream through online programs at this time. There is some continued discussion regarding the contract with Pearson. Part of the reason for offering at least one program online through the Pearson contract is that our campus becomes in direct competition with the other campuses. So if we chose not to offer the MALS program, the Newark or NB campus would have the opportunity to do so. There is some brief discussion over some of the benefits and drawbacks of online courses in general. There is some discussion over the push for the contract with Pearson. It is noted that the contract offers two major benefits; a national marketing program and coaching and support for students. Janet Golden speaks on behalf of the union and expresses the union concerns with the Pearson contract. They include the rights to intellectual property, academic freedom within the online course environment, financial compensation for new course development, appropriate course sizes. She makes it clear that the union does not oppose online courses, but that they are opposed to some of the language that appears in the contract. They would like to see language edited for the development of courses and appropriate compensation for faculty time commitments. Dean Lindenmeyer concludes with expressing the fact that she believes RU-Camden to be vastly underfunded to become revenue drive by online courses. But she does believe that teaching will need more ways in getting information to students in the future and. She makes it a point that she believes that the Digital Studies Center will become an integral part of the strong development in technological advances going forward, and that may include offering more online options.
- Stuart Charmé announces that the next General Education Requirements forum will be held on March 4th.
Meeting is adjourned at 1:16pm.
Present: A. Lees, L. Bernstein, A. Samokhvalov, D. Lun, C. Fitter, C. Giaudrone, J. Still, J. Gerver, R. Jimenez, J. Siegel, J. Hippolyte, W. Glasker
Absent: S. Kotchoni, B. Saidel, R. Steven, J. Smith, W. Fitzgerald, C. Singley, A. Espiritu, M. Amdur, A. Belander, K. Epstein, L. Thomas, H. Jacobowitz, H. Li, M. Yates, M. Fortner, R. van der Wel, I. Roseman, M. Chevrier, C. Dell Clark, J. Mavelis, K. Hohing