MINUTES
Graduate School Administrative Board Meeting
Monday, May 19, 2008
3:30PM
1511 Greenville Centre
MEMBERS PRESENT: Ericson, Rick; Griffin, Linner; Hough, Monica; Kasperek, George; Knight, Sharon; Newton, Ron; Patterson, Belinda; Peel, Hettie; Pellicane, Patrick; Ries, Heather; Walker, Mary Ann (Mark Taggart); and West, Terry.
MEMBERS ABSENT: Alligood, Martha; Bland, Sharon; Eakins, Stan; Eastman, Brenda; Fonooni, Hamid; Holte, James; Kramar, John; Mott, Vivian; Rouse, Art; and Taggart, Mark.
AGENDA
1. Meeting was called to order by Dean Pellicane at 3:37pm.
2. No new GCC minutes were submitted.
3. GSAB minutes from 4/28/2008 have already been electronically approved.
4. Announcements
a. Financial aid issues
There are announced changes in policy by the Office of Financial Aid. These changes will be forwarded to the GSAB membership by Dr. Pellicane. One change, in particular, is that after the census date, there will be no more changes allowed in the student’s financial aid package. Thus, students will need to have the account up to date by that time.
Right now, the OFA staff is making many manual changes that are a real burden to them, and they can’t take care of all them. As course schedule changes occur, they are affecting OFA staff significantly.
With discussion, it was mentioned that this deadline will be difficult to adhere to –it is not enough time for the students who are making many adjustments with their schedule and their finances. Concern was voiced that the OFA is dictating guidelines without giving the students the flexibility they need. There is great frustration among the faculty that the issues are not being addressed by OFA.
Members of the GSAB are encouraged to be present at the next meeting scheduled with OFA .
Dr. Pellicane is trying to establish a committee and set up a dialogue with OFA on the issues and refine some of the presently-used procedures.
5. Course drop date
About 10% of enrolled graduate students drop their classes. Where are these students enrolled? Are those students who do this, the ones who have the remissions? How many students are distance education students? Data assembled by Dr. Patterson indicate that DE students are more likely to drop out at a rate of 6 to 7 times more that campus students.
Dr. Mageean is interested in changing the drop date; she is interested in moving it up earlier in the semester. A suggested time-interval to drop is “40% into the semester” as it is in the undergraduate program. How about having it more at mid-semester? Our sister institutions (UNC-CH and UNC-W) have “60% into the semester.” Compared to the undergraduate course drop deadline, there is still the sentiment that graduate students need more time before they drop a course.
It was mentioned that a lot of the professional schools have heavy course loads; this precipitates dropping courses. In addition, it is quite likely that many of the graduate students who are dropping classes are part-time students who are working; they realize that they cannot handle the heavy course load. It was stated that there are other issues such as the systematic errors that are associated with BANNER.
The following motion was considered by the GSAB: To consider a drop date that is 60% into the semester – i.e. the Friday of the 9th week of instruction [not including the breaks (spring and fall)]. The motion was passed unanimously. The motion was amended to have the drop date to be after the spring break. This recommendation will go to Dr. Mageean for her approval. Then it would go to the calendar committee, which does not meet until the fall. Therefore, the final approval of this recommendation will take some time. Dr. Mageean mentioned that others, as well as she, thinks that the “60% time interval into the semester” is still too long. However, the GSAB still agreed to adhere to the motion that was passed.
6. Policies for further discussion
a. Academic Integrity policy document
Faculty manual and undergraduate catalog verbiage that has commonality have been incorporated. Dr. West submitted a draft paragraph to be included in the document; it is an introductory paragraph that is to be inserted accordingly. Dr. Pellicane will incorporate all of the suggested changes into the final document, and then will submit it to the GSAB for electronic approval.
b. Scholastic Standards policy document
There is a question about some of the courses that have been excluded; there is a need to clarify this more. Some internships and clinical practicum(s) should be included. There are too many exceptions, and the term “regular coursework” is problematic; it needs to be defined. One alternative is to let the units define it. This could create a lot of concern by some units where these courses are included when determining the status of a student; do not want to “open the door” for students by listing all of the exceptions.
It is recommended to delete the “exceptions” and the word “regular.” Need to insert the cumulative GPA of 3.0. Recommend changing the wording in the first few sentences.
Dr. Mageean discussed some issues about assistantships. She will be visiting with the various units about this.
The meeting was adjourned at 5:05pm
Respectfully submitted,
R J Newton
Recorder
