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A & S future under review

By O'Beria Seats

Discussion concerning the future of the College of Arts and Sciences will continue through a formal ad hoc committee established this summer to determine possible outcomes for the college after several departments proposed separating into their own college last spring.

Faculty voted 78 to 132 against the proposed new college in April, but that action led to the creation of the committee to outline possible reorganization of the college.

The ad hoc committee was authorized and instructed by the Arts and Sciences faculty to report back to the college with its proposals by Oct 15 in order to prepare to meet the presidents reporting deadline. There are a total of 21 departments within the College of A&S: Anthropology; Art; Biological, Geological, & Enviornmental Science (BGES); Chemistry; Communication; Economics; English; Health Sciences; History; Mathematics; Modern Languages; Music; Nursing; Philosophy; Physics; Political Science; Psychology; Religious Studies; Social Work; Sociology; and Speech & Hearing.

The committee formed at the beginning of summer term. At the end of the spring term, a representative and an alternate were chosen from each department to serve on the committee.

Richard Rakos, associate dean of faculty enrichment, who serves as the administration's representative to the committee, said that faculty were not around enough during the summer to have consistently worked on this project.

The representatives and alternates from each department participated at an all-day retreat on Aug. 23. "The purpose of the retreat was to try to jump start the committee's work and get it focused and working in a rapid manner because we are under a tight deadline," Rakos said.

Rakos and an outside facilitator participated at the retreat to help committee members establish ground rules for its work. "We went through brainstorming and did a S.W.O.T. analysis of the College of A&S, which stands for strength, weaknesses, opportunities and threats," he said.

By the end of the day, the committee divided into two task forces or subcommittees. One of the subcommittees is working on the internal reorganization of the College of A&S into divisions, and the second subcommittee is exploring reorganization of A&S that would split it into multiple colleges. Each subcommittee is working independently.

"The task forces are now investigating and getting data to develop proposals on these two ideas," Rakos said.

Barbara Modney, associate chair of Biological, Geological and Environmental Sciences, is head of the multiple college task force. "We are still looking at ways to split the College of A&S into a different number of colleges, Modney said. We are looking at nine models that we are still discussing."

She said, "It would be premature to say which way we are going when we haven't even finished talking about them yet."

Modney said that a narrow focus or concentration in one area would be an advantage of an individual college; for example, a college of natural science would pull groups of people together who have many commonalties.

Other advantages of multiple colleges are control over their own budgets, as well as opportunities for independence and growth. Others say another advantage is that students can also identify with their colleges. For example, if CSU had a college of health sciences, a student can identify herself as being in the health sciences.

The second task force's goal is to keep A&S as one college, with a new configuration that would include divisions within the college. "The task force or subgroup I'm serving on is developing a model that does not involve the college breaking up into distinct units, instead it involves recommendations for reorganizing the college," Professor Jane Mcintyre said.

Professor Mcintyre is chair of the philosophy department and serves on the internal reorganization task force. "The general framework we agreed upon is to investigate within the college having the college reorganized according to academically focused divisions," she said. They are looking to divide the college into five basic subunits that would have more autonomy within the college. The subunits would be divisions of humanities; social sciences; natural sciences and math; professional programs; and interdisciplinary.

Philosophy; english; modern language; religious studies; history; art; and music would fall under the division of humanities. Anthropology; economics; sociology; political science; and psychology; and communication would be under the division of social sciences. Biological, geological, & environmental sciences; chemistry; physics; and math will be under the division of natural sciences and math.

Speech and hearing; health sciences; social work; and nursing would fall under the division of professional programs. And women studies; black studies; classic and medieval studies; and first college would fall under the division of interdisciplinary studies.

"We are proposing that there be curriculum planning and curriculum committees for each of the divisions, which would then make recommendations to the college as opposed to having a college-wide committee that deals with the curriculum as a whole," McIntyre said.

"We also want to have an associate dean for each subunit division. They would be the spokesperson or representative of the needs and interests of those academic divisions," she said. "They would also deal with curriculum, scheduling, and personal issues for the subgroup of departments that they represent," McIntyre said.

McIntyre said that there are some good reasons why the college of A&S should stay together. "If the college stays together it would be easier on students. If we break up into a variety of colleges, students who may want to change majors would face dealing with a different bureaucracies and a different set of major and college requirements," she said.

McIntyre said that if A&S stays together, this would keep students in the same college with the same basic framework of college requirements. Another advantage of an internal division within the College of A&S would give faculty of related interest opportunities to work together in a structured manner to make recommendations to improve new courses, programs or majors.

Interim Dean Earl Anderson of the College of A&S said, "It is my job as interim dean to make sure that everyone in the faculty has a voice and opportunity to participate in this process. And also to make sure that all procedures are followed."

"The strength of the college is in the academic departments and department chairs. It is obvious that our program is strong based on the increase in enrollment growth that we've had for three years in a row," he said.

Anderson said that any change or reorganization would not affect any aspect of the educational requirements or majors.

Proposals from both subcommittees will be presented to A&S faculty, and if there is a vote it will be forwarded to A&S curriculum committee.

After review by the A&S curriculum committee, proposals will be submitted to the university curriculum committee, and then to the faculty senate.

Ultimately the president and provost will make the final decision.

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