Title of Meeting Here Page 3 of 3
Minutes
/ October 15, 2015 / 9:00 – 10:30 a.m. / SSB 330CFacilitator
/ Lunden MacDonaldNote taker
/ Maggie SchaefferAttendees
/ Lunden MacDonald, Arlene Sgoutas, Cynthia Armenderiz, Mark Koester, Greg Sullivan, Winston Grady-Willis, Bridgette Coble, Jackie Maldonado, Liz Mendez-Shannon, Jessica Parker, Cindy CarlsonAgenda topics
[Time Allotted]
/SEED
/ Liz mendez-shannonDiscussion
· Equity in Excellence made a recommendation to the Provost to fund faculty participation in this national development program. Three MSU Denver faculty members were chosen to attend: Liz Méndez-Shannon, Sandra Posey, and Janelle Johnson. Liz Méndez-Shannon spoke to the group to explain how they are bringing what they learned back to campus.· Seeking Educational Equity and Diversity. What does multicultural identity mean? Look at content to have reflection and dialogue. Topics of each meeting learn off of each other. We learn about ourselves within this context. How does it impact my role at MSU Denver? Want to see what the impact is like. Last year, Equity in Excellence looked at how to get faculty involved. This was one way, to form an administrator group.
· They are in the process to of recruiting. In Social Work, we talk about racism and genderism all the time but what does that really mean in Higher Ed? When Liz went to the immersion experience, she realized she knew very little. It was a humbling experience. How do you handle oppression in Higher Ed?
Conclusions
Action items
/Person responsible
/Deadline
[Time Allotted]
/ALANA Proposal
/ Cynthia ArmenderizDiscussion
· We (the EiE committee) need clarification on what our role is. We are going to serve as a review group. Once ready to move forward, then it will move to VPs and Cabinet for approval. We must verify, but in this meeting we operated under the assumption that we were to move forward with a review of the ALANA proposal and deliver this to the Provost.· The name itself, African/African American, Latino/Latina, Asian/Asian American, and Native American/Indigenous Students, does not make it clear that we think it’s O.K. to do this; this is for students of color. For the SGA reviewers of the ALANA proposal, the phrase “center to support students of color at MSU Denver” is a concern. For example, not all Mexican-Americans are of color. We want to be sure there is plenty of space to create an environment of community. The proposal is for a center to provide space to students of color and promote race consciousness on campus. There’s a need on campus for this center. We should make the proposal more explicit. We didn’t include the student perspective. We should ask for clarity before it moves to VP and Cabinet.
· We should add national trends on student retention. How are our peer institutions doing? It would be stronger if we knew that. California State University, San Bernandino, sent 50 students to the HACU conference in Miami. They have a very strong multi-cultural lounge.
· In terms of admission, are students looking for schools that have a space on campus. It might be a factor in what students are looking for.
Conclusions
Action items
/Person responsible
/Deadline
· Email suggestions for ALANA to Cynthia Nunez and Lunden MacDonald[Time Allotted]
/NEw area of inquiry: english
/ cindy carlson and jessica parkerDiscussion
· This kind of data collection regarding disparities in how we’re serving students of different racial groups, is in the process of making a variety of changes. English already has a path, but wants to add things to make it more effective.· What did we learned from Math? Lindsey Packer sent an email with some of the outcomes after inquiries into Math. Invited CCA to tell us what they are doing. One outcome was that the department task force prepared a first day PowerPoint on how to succeed in a math class. It doesn’t have information on how many faculty participated. Redesigned department website to make it easier for students to get help. Met with TRiO. Hard for affiliates to do, as they don’t have office hours. We looked at completion data of a math course and broke down by ethnicity. Percentage gap equals course completion rate. Graduation gap greatest for African American and Latino students. We want everyone to be at a certain graduation rate in 6 years, we will close the gap by 5% per year. This is in alignment with the 2020 Strategic Plan. How do we use terminology so people understand the percentage gap better? Has to be a common language on how we express outcomes.
· English. English 1010 and 1020 expanded options and we now actually have 7 composition classes. 1008 and 1009 together called stretch. 1010, 1020, 1021 Honors version of 1020. The writing studio is new and has not yet been offered. Designed to help students who have done most of their education outside of the US. Very culturally bound. All courses are college level. We don’t do remediation. We have been collecting disaggregated data over the past several years. We have no control over the cut scores of ACT and Accuplacers. Nationally, students of color do less well at those tests. We have developed a writing sample. If they place below the Accuplacer cut-off, we place them into Stretch or 1010 with lab. We want to do away with Accuplacer.
· How were students placed in a developmental language course? We don’t do this. Students have the option of going to CCD, which has only happened once. When we first started doing this, nothing went into Banner. Currently 1140 scores for secondary placement in Banner. Some students identify in ways that are not choices, particularly Arab students. Given what the national data looks like, this is pretty typical.
· Where do students enroll? All students that take secondary placement are hand enrolled. Try to place with appropriate instructor, not just appropriate class. Not much choice left for classes during summer. We have legitimate rooming issues that is hurting our students. Late comers to SOAR have financial aid problems.
· Course completion rates. With Stretch and 1010 + lab, we have had good success and students are passing at a much higher rate. Completion rate for 1010 is 68% and for 1020 66%. White students are passing 75% of the time.
· Progression. We do this mostly with students who have gone through secondary placements. Focusing data collection on the students we have the most information on, which are students through secondary placement. Tracking students into 1020, when students do 1010 and 1020 close together, they do better. Just beginning to collect that data.
· Stretch faculty are carefully selected. In 1010, we have a huge range of instructors and students have a huge range of needs. Students are anxious about writing and anxious about technology. Some faculty are more culturally competent than others. Placement is about how you are going to be successful with this particular faculty. Doing intervention around gap.
· The English Department now has a mission statement. Our program sees diversity as a strength not a deficit. We have moved to the trans lingual model. National data shows how bad this model is. I’m not sure that this is what Jessica said—are we maybe talking about a national model of remediation here instead of the trans-lingual model? A vast majority of students sent to remediation won’t earn a degree.
· Stretch and Lab have more than doubled in the number of students enrolled. Changed rubric to more strongly reflect our commitment to lingual diversity. Do grade checks for all students 3 or 4 times during the semester. Any students that look like they won’t pass, they reach out to. Hand registration and placement on what’s going to make the student successful. Currently revising all of our first year syllabi. Linguistic diversity encoded into all classes.
· We have this wealth of data already collected. There are some unclear places, like the progression issue. What are all of the aspects providing good outcomes? We want to start the conversation and perhaps get a subcommittee from this group who might want to engage with moving forward and ask if we can work with English. This subcommittee to meet with Jessica and Cindy. Do you see area where you might want additional help from this group to conduct inquiry? We haven’t had time to look at 1020 data. Equity gap in 1020 does exist, but we haven’t looked into things like when are students of color taking 1020? 1020 is the place where we know the least about what’s happening.
· We have information about people who have taken secondary placement and they have a balance due hold. What kind of intervention is needed for students struggling with financial aid? We don’t have time to deal with who comes to freshman orientation. More students of color are in later freshmen orientations. Good solutions earlier in the summer could be huge.
· How have you dealt with departmental resistance? Many of the composition faculty are affiliated faculty. We are doing a series of meetings during the semester so they can give input for curriculum.
Conclusions
Action items
/Person responsible
/Deadline
· Lunden volunteered for the subcommittee.· We will table any decision on whether or not to pursue English as an area of inquiry until our next meeting.
· Next Meeting: November 19, 2015