Advising Coordinating Committee


Thursday, April 6, 2006

11:00 a.m. - EC 107

ATTENDING:

Advising & Transfer Services: John Mortensen (conducting), Becki Broadbent, Stephanie Hamblin, Lisa Hancock, Wade Oliver, Deborah Reece, Renee Tuke

College of Agriculture: Lisa Allen, Emily Hoffman, Juanita Hunting, Betty Murri, Cathy Myers-Roche, Tami Spackman

College of Business: Ruth Harrison, Joslyn Heiniger, Isobel Roskelley

College of Education & Human Services: Tressa Haderlie, Melanie Jones, Marilyn Kruse, Darcie Peterson, Karen Ranson, Mary Lou Reynolds, Sylvia Robinson, Denise Taylor

College of Engineering: Kathy Bayn, Joan Smith

College of Humanities, Arts & Social Sciences:

College of Natural Resources: Maureen Wagner

College of Science: Liz Heffernan, Janalee Johnson, Peter Kolesar, Karalee Ransom, Linda Skabelund

Disability Resource Center: Christine Lord

Distance Education: Blanding (Mark Bradford), Brigham City (Amanda Peterson) , Logan (Vince Lafferty, DeeDee Leonard), Moab (Sam Sturman), Uintah Basin

Intensive English: Margaret Garr

Registrar’s Office: Heidi Beck, Bill Jensen, Roland Squire

Excused: Michelle Bogdan, Dawn Black, Susan Haddock, Cathy Myers-Roche, Darcie Peterson, Eric Worthen, Price, Tooele

MINUTES

1. UAOA Conference

“Keeping It All Together” is the theme for the 2006 UAOA Conference to be held at The Park City Marriott on May 24-25. The Keynote address on Wednesday will be given by Salt Lake Tribute humor columnist Robert Kirby, and by Dr. Les Jones, professor of psychology at Southern Utah University, will speak on Thursday, May 25. Registration for both days is $85 which is due by May 5, 2006. Additional details about the conference can be found in the brochure which was distributed or by contacting Wade Oliver at wade.oliver@usu.edu.

2. Articulation Update

All course-by-course articulation tables must be returned to Tracy Jones by April 21. A discussion was held regarding how courses may articulate to a course or to an attribute. For example, numerous BYU classes currently show up on the articulation tables as being equivalent to English 2010 at USU. This is problematic because students who may two or more of the BYU classes will show up in Banner as having repeated a course and will lose the credits associated with each additional course. The English Department may want to rearticulate the BYU courses to equate them to the CL2 attribute (the new coding for the sophomore Communications Literacy requirement). This change would allow students to still meet the General Education requirement for English 2010 without punishing them for taking more than one similar course. Departments should look at AP and other articulations to determine what is the most appropriate way to articulate the courses.

3. Articulation with Southern Virginia University

The attached articulation table has been approved with the exception of the Breadth Creative Arts, for which we are still seeking some clarification, Until the officially approved version is printed in the Advisor Handbook, be careful when advising students. Credits not included in the Handbook will be considered on an individual basis. Some concern was expressed over courses that have been articulated from schools outside of our top 17 feeder institutions. The committee asked that a process be implemented for departments to have an opportunity to regularly review those articulations.

4. Proposals from Math Department regarding Math Placement Exams

The Mathematics and Statistics Department is considering some changes regarding the math placement exams and wants feedback from the advisors. If implemented, the changes would be affective Fall 2007. The following proposals were presented for discussion:

Proposed Policy 1: Mandatory Math Placement Exam

To better prepare students for success in MATH 1010 and subsequent math courses, we propose the implementation of a mandatory math placement exam for new students with an ACT math score of less than 23 beginning Fall 2007. This will benefit students who would otherwise repeatedly take MATH 1010 by helping them obtain the skills they need to succeed in MATH 1010 and build their confidence with success in a prerequisite course rather than frustrate them by failure and a sense of wasting money.

If approved, math placement exams would be scheduled as part of SOAR. Exceptions would be made for students who take math courses through concurrent enrollment. One question was whether or not an online version would be available through Extension. Advisors like the idea of a refresher course and suggested that it be offered more than once per year.

Proposed Policy 2: Completing a Math Requirement by the end of the Sophomore Year

The majority of students who enter college needing a developmental math course have not been strong in math and, as a result, they put off their math requirement. We propose requiring students at Utah State University to complete their Quantitative Literacy (QL) requirement by the end of their second year at USU. Students who have not completed their QL requirement could not register without registering for a math course.

Comments and questions from the group: Who would place and remove the hold? It seems like this might be an issue related to a student’s “major” and not just a math department issue. Will the policy penalize a student? Many thought the policy would be helpful to students.

Proposed Policy 3: Implement a One-Year Limit for Math Prerequisites

We propose implementing a one year limit on math requirements beginning Fall 2007 for MATH 0900 through MATH 1210. Students with prerequisites older than one year must demonstrate readiness via the math placement exam.

If approved, it is believed that this policy could be implemented in Banner. The overall group was not as supportive of this proposed policy. The suggestion was made that students should monitor themselves. Fees for the refresher course have not been determined.

For now, questions may be directed to Linda Skabelund (linda.skabelund@usu.edu). We will continue this discussion at our May 11 meeting.

5. Course Cluster Update and Ideas for Next Year

Over 1000 students have currently taken advantage of this program as compared to 315 last year at this time. The majority have requested 10 or more credits. The General Catalog has gone to press and will have a notation next to course numbers which have changed. Banner is not recognizing some prerequisites; contact roland.squire@usu.edu if you have questions. SOAR dates are full up through June 20. The cluster website will be modified to allow us to have major-specific SOAR dates next year.

6. Advisor Input regarding Online Orientation

Please email lisa.hancock@usu.edu with ideas for online orientation. Right now email messages from new students go directly to advisors. It was suggested that the messages would also go to the SOAR office. They will check once a week to see if the advisor hold has been cleared. If not, the SOAR office will contact the advisor and follow up with the student letting them know it will be a little longer before they hear from an advisor.

7. Accessing SIS Plus Information Using Discoverer

Trevor Bennett was unable to attend the meeting. SIS Plus is gone! There may be a special meeting to discuss how to access the SIS Plus information.

8. Other

Congratulations to Lisa Hancock who was presented the Outstanding Professional Employee Award for this quarter.

Stephanie Hamblin informed some of the advisors that they are now authorized to do Banner training in their own departments.

CALENDAR

April 21 Admitted Students’ Day

May 11 Advising Coordinating Committee

May 24-25 Utah Advising & Orientation Conference

August 15 New Advisor Orientation

August 16 USU Advising Conference

Oct. 18-20 NACADA National Conference

SOAR ADVISING (Advising sessions begin at 1:30 PM)

May 19 One-Day

May 22 One-Day

June 16 One-Day and Outdoor

June 19 One-Day

June 20 One-Day

June 22 Two-Day

June 27 One-Day

June 28 One-Day

July 6 One-Day

July 7 One-Day

July 11 One-Day and Returning Adult


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