To: Anna Rominger, Interim Vice Chancellor of Academic Affairs

George Bodmer, Chair, Faculty Organization

From: Vesna Kilibarda and Mary Ann Fischer, Co-Chairs, General Education and Assessment Committee

Committee Members: Jack Bloom, Subir Bandyopadhyay, SpencerCortwright, Linda Delunas, Karen Evans, Earl Jones, Gianluca DiMuzio, Tim Sutherland/Lynn Scott, Sheila Marie Trzcinka, RobertaWollons; Advisors: Dorothy Ige and Robin Hass Birky

Date: May 3, 2006

Re: Summary of work completed February 25-May 3, 2006

The IU Northwest Principles of General Education were revised during January and February and were accepted by a vote of the Faculty Organization at its meeting on March 24, 2006. The committee has met three times since our February 25 report. We worked specifically on Principle 1, Foundations of Learning and Communication. Our committee is proposing some very substantive changes to general education as it is currently practiced at IU Northwest. The first set of changes is detailed in Table 1 of the attached documents. As shown in the table, we propose to add several required foundation courses:

S121 Public Speaking;

P150 Elementary Logic

A science course with a lab

A106 Introduction to Computing (or “Test-out” alternative)

In addition, we propose adding intensive level work beyond the foundation courses in each Principle 1 domain. We believe, and the literature suggests, that in order to assure expertise and skill, students should be required to complete courses beyond the foundation level. We propose using as a model the Intensive Writing (IW) requirement that currently exists in the College of Arts and Sciences (COAS). We have attached descriptions of the proposed IW requirement for IU Northwest as well as a similar model for intensive work in the domain of learning technologies.

Table 2 summarizes our working plan for the outcomes, implementation steps, and assessment methods for each of the seven foundation domains encompassed by Principle 1. These proposed changes would of course need to be approved by the Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs and the Faculty Organization.

Thanks to funding made available to the committee by your office, we have completed several steps that support the committee’s work. In March 2006, three of our members attended the “General Education and Outcomes That Matter in Changing Worlds” conference sponsored by the American Association of Colleges and Universities. During the Fall of 2006, we will share with the committee and the campus some of the ideas and approaches discussed at this conference.

Two funding opportunities were announced to IU Northwest faculty. The first funding opportunity was designated to cover travel expenses to professional conferences in which faculty would attend general education sessions. We made four awards under this program. The second funding opportunity was designated for the development of new and innovative curricular or non-curricular activities which would implement the new general education principles. We received 7 applications for the course development stipends and will be announcing the awards shortly.

In collaboration with IU Northwest faculty, this summer we will refine the outcomes for Principle 1 and develop the criteria for intensive level work in each domain. We will draft assessment plans for each domain during the summer using Oncourse to promote collaboration. In addition, we hope to explore the possibility of creating clusters of foundation courses (learning communities) in order to improve student success in general education courses. We expect to present the proposed curriculum changes to the Faculty Organization at its September meeting. By October 1, 2006 we will develop a suggested design for assessing the Principle 1 outcomes.

We would like to request that you share the attached proposals with the Deans and ask them to send feedback to committee chairs by July 1, 2006.

We think we have the opportunity to make some interesting and innovative changes to general education at IU Northwest, and we thank you for your continued support.

Attachments:

Table 1. Proposed Framework for required foundation courses and intensive requirements

Table 2. Proposed outcomes for Principle 1

Intensive Writing requirement (draft)

Intensive Learning Technologies requirement (draft)