Economics Department Meeting Minutes, UW-Whitewater, March 3, 2014

Present: Ahmad (Chair), Das, Ersal, Glosser, Guo, Heinrich, Marks, Tao, Teferra, and Welsch.

Meeting called to order at 3:41 pm in HH4306 by the Chair.

  1. Minutes from February 3rdmeeting were approved on a Heinrich/Welsch motion.
  1. Announcements
  2. Faculty are encouraged to fill in the Graduate Education Survey; link provided in email (Marks).
  3. Cathy Xuehas accepted the job offer and will be joining the department as a Health Economist next year.
  4. Advisory Board meeting to be held on 21st April – agenda items to be sent to Ahmad.
  1. Curriculum
  2. Econ 245: Math substitutes for Econ 245
  3. The math department has eliminated the Math 231 course and there is a new revamped Math 230 course in its stead. Transfer students will now get credit for Math 230 instead of Math 231.
  4. The Economics department will keep the status quo with respect to Math 230’s substitutability for Econ 245. This will mean that the department chair will only approve transfers on a case by case basis. Motion by Marks/Heinrich was approved unanimously.
  5. Econ 413: Econ 202 Prerequisites
  6. Ahmad requested a change in the pre-requisite for Econ 413 from: “ECON 201 and MATH 243 or MATH 250 or MATH 253” to “ECON 201 and ECON 202 and MATH 243 or MATH 250 or MATH 253”. Motionby Marks/Welsch passed unanimously.
  7. Econ 401: International Business Minor
  8. Econ 401 is a requirement in the International Business Minor. Since Econ 401 is being phased out, the department discussed the requirement to switch to Econ 406 and/or Econ 431.
  9. Online Economics BBA courses
  10. There was a request for more Economics courses to be offered online in the Online BBA program. Courses considered were Econ 353, 356, 360, 404, 471.
  1. Textbooks
  2. Econ 201 and 202: It is time to revisit the textbooks for the courses. Publishers will be contacted and a date set to review textbooks.
  3. Ahmad is in charge of organizing Econ 202, and Das is in charge of 201.
  1. Economics Capstone
  2. Economics section of the field GRE was considered as an assessment tool. After discussion, it was acknowledged that it could be used within the capstone course.
  3. On a motion by Welsch/Heinrich, the Capstone course will be added as a requirement for the Economics major, increasing the number of credits in the major from 24 to 27 credits. Motion approved unanimously.
  1. PQ Standards for Economics
  2. Ahmad announced some details of new AACSB standards for faculty qualifications. These expand on the current AQ/PQ standards and will be in place for the next AACSB accreditation process. They include the following categories: Scholarly Academic (SA), Practice Academic (PA), Scholarly Practitioners (SP) and Instructional Practitioners (IP).
  3. Based on this, faculty are encouraged to consider what PQ means for Economics faculty. This will be brought up for discussion at a future meeting.
  1. Impact of Research
  2. The department’s research committee is in the process of creating a grid to measure the impact and quality of research. Tabled till next meeting.
  1. New Business
  2. Russ Kashian featured in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Welsch/Heinrich motion to adjourn at 5:17 pm.

Respectfully Submitted,

Shreyasee Das

Shreyasee Das