Curriculum Committee ("CC") Minutes for 17 April 1996

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Attending:  Arora, Fleming, Fujimura, Goyal, Mamrak, Ogden, Supowit,
            Wang, Weide, Yeack
	    
* Discussion of proposed changes to CIS 737 (cross-listed course on
  cognitive science)
  
  Leon reported that the Cog Sci folks want to change 737 so it is sometimes
  a 2-cr-hr course, sometimes a 3-cr-hr course, and sometimes a 5-cr-hr
  course, depending on the instructor.  CC expressed concerns about
  any 5-cr-hr graduate course, and about the wisdom of merging two different
  courses (the proposed 2/3-cr-hr versions and the 5-cr-hr version) under
  a single number.  Leon will report our concerns to the other departments
  involved and return to CC later this quarter.
  
* Discussion of proposed changes to the faculty loads algorithm to use
  credit hours, not courses, as the unit of faculty responsibility
  
  It seems clear that there is no perfect way of assessing teaching
  responsibilities by a formula.  The problem CC discussed was to find
  some method that doesn't systematically penalize those who teach courses
  with lots of lab assignments and in which the students frequently come
  to see the instructor one-on-one.  Right now these courses generally
  count the same as courses that are entirely "book learning" without
  lab assignments; students get extra credit for doing the labs, but
  faculty get no extra credit for the work increment associated with them
  (except in a few special cases such as 560 and 758).
  
  CC discussed the issues with the following conclusions but no official
  recommendation:
   - Under the current algorithm, an instructor is credited with
     4/3 courses if the course meets 4 times a week.  Faculty with experience
     teaching introductory-level courses with scheduled labs (i.e., courses
     worth 4 credit hours that actually meet 4 times a week, once as a "closed
     lab") argued that this is quite a sensible arrangment for pedagogical
     reasons.
   - Perhaps a reasonable thing to do is simply to start scheduling closed
     labs for 100- and 200-level courses that give lab credit.  This would
     give faculty teaching those courses 4/3 units of teaching credit.
     Furthermore, this extra scheduled time in the classroom would not be
     an "end run" of the intent of the algorithm, since the faculty teaching
     these courses indeed would be spending more time in the classroom.
   - Course coordinators should make every effort to ensure that scheduled
     lab times do NOT turn into extra lectures.  Students should be in a
     lab setting and should be working on lab assignments.  The instructor
     should be present to actively assist with problems that might otherwise
     be relegated to consultants or to office hours. 
   - It seems inappropriate to schedule closed labs for upper-level and
     graduate courses.  CC noted that students generally are (should be)
     able to attack lab problems on their own by this point.  Furthermore,
     upper division courses that have a significant amount of additional
     work required to maintain lab assignments, etc., usually have GTAs
     assigned to assist the instructor with this.
     
  
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Next meeting: 8 May 1996, 3:30 PM, in DL 298.


Respectfully submitted,

	Bruce W. Weide, CC Chair