Core Curriculum Subcommittees

The need for coordination of core review and assessment has been discussed at several previous UGSC meetings. In the spring of 2018 the Core Curriculum Assessment Committee came to UGSC to discuss assessment going forward, explaining that the HLC would likely be requiring assessment of all areas of the core. UGSC members discussed the possibility of setting up an assessment rotation for different core areas. They also discussed the need for the Core Curriculum Subcommittee Chairs to work with the Core Curriculum Assessment Committee to develop assessment plans for their areas of the core. Prior to this, the UGSC also discussed the role of the UGSC subcommittee chairs in reviewing and approving courses (April 2017, February 2017, November 2010).

Current subcommittee chairs are:

Communications-intensive (C) courses: Greg Pulliam

Humanities (H) courses: Greg Pulliam

Social and Behavioral Science (S) courses: Rebecca Steffenson

Natural Science or Engineering (N) courses: Nicholas Menhart

Mathematics courses: Fred Weening

Computer Science (CS) courses: Matthew Bauer

There is now confusion over the role of the subcommittee. This proposal formalizes the role of the subcommittee chair as the coordinator of both new course approval and core curriculum assessment in their specified area of the core curriculum. Core curriculum subcommittee chairs should coordinate between the Core Curriculum Assessment Committee and other academic units who teach courses in their core area.

The group of subcommittee chairs are a standing committee. Core curriculum subcommittees are convened by the subcommittee chairs as needed to coordinate new core course review and core curriculum assessment in their given area of the core curriculum.
Subcommittee chairs should decide on the constitution of the core course subcommittee with other academic units that teach core courses in the same area. Any conflicts should be brought to UGSC.
Subcommittee chairs should convene the subcommittee to review and approve course in their core area as needed. *The formal process for approving core courses (from UGSC minutes 2.10.2010) calls for subcommittee approval with at least one additional academic unit. Any conflicts should be brought to UGSC. Otherwise the subcommittee chair is authorized to approve courses in Course Leaf and inform UGSC.
Subcommittee chairs should undergo assessment training, if needed, from Carol Emmons/Rebecca Steffenson by March 12, 2019.
Subcommittee chairs should convene their subcommittee to review a) criteria submitted to the core curriculum assessment committee for course approval and b) the learning goals outlined for their core courses in the core curriculum map. Subcommittee should develop a rubric for new course approval (and review) which integrates the approval criteria and the core learning objectives by April 9, 2019. Please let Rebecca Steffenson know if you would like someone from the assessment committee to attend and help your subcommittee.
Subcommittee chairs should collect syllabi for all core courses in their area and convene their committees to conduct a review of all syllabi to ensure that the appropriate core learning objectives are covered by each course with their core designation before the end of Fall 2019 semester.
The group of subcommittee chairs will meet with the Core Curriculum Assessment Committee before the end of the spring 2019 to discuss an appropriate rotation for core curriculum assessment leading up to the next HLC visit.
Core curriculum subcommittee chairs will work with their subcommittees (and the Core Curriculum Assessment Committee) to establish assessment rubrics and identify artefacts for assessment by the end of the Fall 2019 semester.
Core curriculum subcommittee chairs will coordinate assessment of direct student learning in their core areas at some point before the next HLC visit.

Prior UGAC Discussion of the Core Curriculum Subcommittee Chairs

4-24-18 minutes

5. Discussion: Assessment of Individual Student Work as part of core assessment [R. Steffenson – Chair, Core Curriculum Assessment Committee]

After consultation with the HLC, the Deputy Vice Provost for University Accreditation (Siva K. Balasubramanian) met with the IIT Core Curriculum Assessment committee to communicate the HLC’s expectation that the next step for assessing the core should include direct assessment of individual student work. The core curriculum assessment committee has discussed establishing an assessment rotation for S, H, N, CS, Math (in addition to the group assessment of student work produced in IPRO) and would like to work with the subcommittees chairs to develop a plan for this next phase in the assessment process. Steffenson will seek further clarification about HLC expectations. Current subcommittee chairs are:

Communications-intensive (C) courses: Greg Pulliam

Humanities (H) courses: Greg Pulliam

Social and Behavioral Science (S) courses: Rebecca Steffenson

Natural Science or Engineering (N) courses: Nicholas Menhart

Mathematics courses: Fred Weening

Computer Science (CS) courses: Matthew Bauer

4-28-17 minutes

5. IIT Core Curriculum Assessment Committee update [R. Steffenson – Committee Co-

Chair]

The HLC wants assessment of the core curriculum to include direct evidence of student learning from each learning goal from 2016-2017 and 2017-2018 before an interim report is submitted in fall 2018. This assessment process should inform future core curriculum changes. The IIT Core Curriculum Assessment Committee, which is a subcommittee of the University Assessment Committee, is working this semester to assess student work in IPRO with rubrics designed to test whether students are demonstrating core curriculum learning goals through a) assessment of group work at IPRO day c) assessment of individuals by IPRO instructors. It is possible that we will need to directly assess other parts of the core curriculum in the future (ITP, S, H, C, CS, Math). Steffenson will be contacting all course designation subcommittee chairs to solicit input for the core curriculum map.

2-28-17 minutes

6. Natural Science or Engineering (N) code assignment review process. [R. Trygstad – Chair]

a. Currently the Undergraduate Core Curriculum requirements in Natural Science or Engineering are met by courses in engineering, biology, chemistry, physics, or courses in architecture, food safety and technology, and psychology marked with an (N). i. Adviser query: do ITP courses offered by the Engineering, Biology, Chemistry, and Physics requirements fulfil a Natural Science or Engineering Core Curriculum requirement? (Probably a UGAA question.) b. We need to establish a formal process for review of courses submitted for an (N) designation. Discuss.

UGAA noted that the UGSC had approved the creation of IIT core designation subcommittees in spring 2014. The current UGSC Core Curriculum Subject Subcommittee Chairs are as follows:

Communications-intensive (C) courses: Greg Pulliam

Humanities (H) courses: Greg Pulliam

Social and Behavioral Science (S) courses: Rebecca Steffenson

Natural Science or Engineering (N) courses: Nicholas Menhart

Mathematics courses: Robert Ellis

Computer Science (CS) courses: Matthew Bauer

Subcommittees are tasked with evaluating assignment of Core Curriculum subject designation codes or listings in the Bulletin; subcommittee chairs will be standing and convene a subcommittee as necessary.

Minutes from 11-30-10

The chair reminds the UGSC that it is UGSC practice to authorize subcommittees to approve new courses for general education, and then report back to the UGSC on those new courses. The subcommittees are established. Humanities: Pulliam/Trygstad. Social and Behavioral Sciences: Ellington/Hosman. CS: Bauer/Trygstad. Math: Fasshauer/Snyder. Natural Science: Spink/Kamper.

10/14/08

It is moved and seconded that

The UGSC will create subcommittees of two (or more) persons to review designations of courses as satisfying general education requirements. There will be subcommittees for reviewing general education courses in Computer Science, in Humanities, in Mathematics, in Natural Science or Engineering, in Social or Behavioral Sciences, and in Writing and Communication, Each of these subcommittee will have UGSC authority to approve new designations. Each subcommittee will report back to the UGSC in a timely way about its decisions. The UGSC has the authority to leave or to reverse the decision of the subcommittee. In general, the subcommittee should include one person from a unit that typically offers the relevant courses, and one person from a unit that does not typically offer such courses.

The motion passes by unanimous consent.

From HLC Report Fall 2018

Core Curriculum Review

The CAC has discussed process and curricular changes as a direct result of the assessment process. These proposed changes were presented to UGSC during the fall 2017 and spring 2018 semesters.

Structural Change: One of the outcomes of this process is the creation of structures for more faculty oversight of the core curriculum. The UGSC has created subcommittee chairs to manage the individual components of the core curriculum. The core curriculum chairs manage the process for developing new core curriculum courses and oversee the assessment of courses in their subfield. The current subcommittee chairs are:

Communications-intensive (C) courses: Greg Pulliam

Humanities (H) courses: Greg Pulliam

Social and Behavioral Science (S) courses: Rebecca Steffenson

Natural Science or Engineering (N) courses: Nicholas Menhart

Mathematics (M) courses: Fred Weening

Computer Science (CS) courses: Matthew Bauer

IPRO/ITP courses: Rebecca Steffenson

Core Curriculum Change: During the spring 2018 semester, the CCAC worked with the Ethics Center to develop a proposal to reintroduce ethics “E” courses as a component of the core curriculum, to ensure that students are receiving instruction that will enable them to achieve the LO3b learning goal. That proposal was introduced to the UGSC in April 2018. An “Ethics Across the Curriculum” subcommittee will be constituted in the fall 2018 to develop a proposal for reintroduction of “E” courses in the core curriculum.

IIT Core Curriculum Assessment Going Forward

In March 2018, the CCAC received additional feedback from the HLC encouraging IIT to work on incorporating individual student artifacts into the assessment process going forward. The CCAC discussed possible proposals for meeting this expectation in the future and discussed these proposals with the UGSC in April 2018. Two options were discussed.

Option A. The first option would mean working with IPRO to develop of an individual IPRO assignment that could be assessed by faculty as a direct measure of student learning. One shortcoming of this approach was the large number of adjuncts employed to teach IPROs. UGSC discussed that it would be better to include full time faculty more directly in the assessment process.

Option B. The second option would involve developing plans to assess different parts of the core on a rotating basis and having a team of faculty review work from a sample of core S, H, N, M, CS courses over time. It was noted that option B would be significantly more time consuming and require extra faculty time. The core curriculum subcommittee chairs will meet in fall 2018 to discuss the feasibility of option B.

The CCAC has also discussed additional process changes for the group assessment. After debriefing faculty reviewers, it was clear that many participants would like ways to provide additional feedback on student work and the assessment process. Steffenson will revise the group rubric to allow qualitative comments from faculty reviewers and develop a mechanism for collecting faculty feedback.

Finally, the CCAC acknowledges that the current learning goals, which were developed in December 2013, may need reconsideration. The UGSC core curriculum subcommittee should meet to discuss whether to re-evaluate these goals for the next assessment cycle.