Minutes from Social Sciences Task Force Meeting of September 29, 2006

The Social Science Task Force met Friday, September 29, 2006 from 1:00 PM to 2:30 PM at Rio Grande Campus in Room 125. The following faculty members were in attendance: Geoff Andron, Karen Bell, Mary Beth Booth, Jake Bloom, Mary Chipley, Clint Davis, Michael Forney, Carol Hayman, James Hill, Don Jonsson, Tony Lee, Lizzie Pintar, Mike Pool, Marianna Sidoryanskaya, Alec Slivinske, Gary Smith, James Sondgeroth and Don Tompkins.

The meeting was called to order at 1:00 pm.

1. The agenda for the meeting was approved.

1. Approve agenda.

2. Approve minutes from last meeting which can be found at http://www.austincc.edu/SOCSCI/Minutes/meet_05_05_06.htm.

3. Discuss and take action of adding ANTH 2389 to the summer study abroad programs.

4. Discuss and take action on the edited SACS questions for GEOG 1303.

5. Discuss and take action on SACS questions for GEOG 2471.

6. Discuss and take action on SACS questions for ANTH 2302.

7. Discuss what steps we need to take to start a Certificate Program for GIS.

8. Discuss and take action on creating distance learning, internet based or hybrid GIS class.

9. Discuss what steps we need to take to request that ANTH 2301 be listed as meeting the science requirement in the Core Curriculum.

10. Approve a proposed course schedule for the whole of academic year 2007-2008.

    Summer 2006 schedule: http://www3.austincc.edu/schedule/s206u/

    Fall 2006 schedule: http://www3.austincc.edu/schedule/s206f/

    Spring 2007 schedule: http://www3.austin.cc.tx.us/schedule/s207s/

    If you all would take a look at these schedules for making proposals about the 2007-2008 academic year schedules, I would appreciate it. Do you see any sequence of courses we should change when looking at the whole academic year? (By the way, if you do not have the following link book marked in your Favorites under ACC Stuff, you may want to add it: http://www.austincc.edu/dept's/quicklinks.htm.It has links to all the past course schedules from the fall of 1999 to fall 2006 and to college catalogs from FY 2001 to FY 2006. )

11. Adjourn.

2. Jim mentioned that each Social Science Task Force member should review the minutes and report any inaccuracies to rbarrett@austincc.edu. Also please make sure to ensure that you are listed as attending each meeting. The minutes of the last meeting were approved
3. James Sondgeroth, the department chair, mentioned that the Economics department now has a position available for a Full Time Economics instructor which can be viewed at http://www3.austincc.edu/it/jobs/list.asp?strType=Faculty&strSort=strJobNumber.
4. Mary Chipley presented Agenda Item # 3 regarding adding Academic Cooperative 2389 ANTH. The course would begin in Mexico and then end here in Austin. Mary presented her tentative syllabus for the course. The course prospectus will go before the Board in November. This course has been required for the degree plan in Archaeology however was only offered in the summer with Field Methods so it would be more convenient for students to have more selections of the Academic Cooperative.
5. Carol Hayman presented a request to add ANTH 2389 Cooperative Class that would take place at San Martin University in Peru. This course would be ethnographic and would involve a cooperative effort from Professor Hayman and two different Peruvian professors. Carol presented a tentative syllabus for the course.

A motion was made to approve both Academic Cooperative 2389 ANTH to our future schedules. The motion was approved by the Task Force.

6. Lizzie Pintar proposed adding a 10 week course ANTH 2302 in the spring or summer of 2008.  Some students would be able to do extra work (sorting, cataloguing, analyzing, etc), so she would like to offer them the ANTH 2389 course (the coop course) as well. She would like to take her students to her archaeological dig in NW Argentina for the first 2.5 weeks.  She will provide more information to the Task Force at a later date.

7. Don Jonsson presented the new SAC’s GEOG 1303 questions to the task force for approval. The changes were necessary in order to try and meet the goal of 70%. These questions were approved.

8. Mary Beth Booth presented the new GIS questions to the task force for approval. Members of the task force recommended that a few general geography questions be included in the GIS questions. These questions were amended and approved.

9. Liz Pintar presented the questions for SACS in ANTH 2302. She felt that those who use a different textbook would be unable to answer three of the questions. She suggested that the questions be changed in order to accommodate all textbooks in use. A motion was made to table the idea and then communicate and approve by email.

10. Mary Beth Booth told the task force that Donetta Goodall had expressed interest in establishing a GIS certificate program here at ACC. Mary Beth suggested that she survey different companies to find out if these degrees would help the student’s employability. She also recommended surveying the students to see if there is interest in the program. The task force approved Mary Beth surveying the need for this certificate program and asked that she relay the results.

11. Mary Beth Booth requested the addition of a PCM or Hybrid Introduction to GIS course. She felt there was a high demand for PCM courses and would like to try the course strictly as PCM to start and then if that is problematic she would try the hybrid course. Mary Beth explained that a hybrid course is whereby the students meet for the lecture and then complete the labs on their own time. She explained that the textbook she found for this course would include a 180 day free trial for the software that the students would need to complete the course at home. The task force approved introducing the PCM Intro to GIS course in the fall of 07 and spring of 08.

12. Discuss what steps we need to take to request that ANTH 2301 be listed as meeting the science requirement in the core curriculum. The task force discussed that the core curriculum committee would need to see a list of other colleges that accept this course as a core course and whether or not they require that the course include a lab. The task force agreed to have someone put a report together in time for the next core curriculum meeting.

13. Approve a proposed course schedule for the whole of academic year 2007-2008

Summer 2007 schedule changes proposed:

For ANTH CLICK HERE!

For ECON CLICK HERE!

For GEOG CLICK HERE!

Spring 2007 schedule changes proposed:

ANTH: Add Spring 12 week Academic Cooperative-Ethnography

Add CYP Mon Evening Cultural Anth

Add Tues Evening Physical Anth

Fall 2007 schedule changes proposed:

ANTH: Add Fall 16 week Academic Cooperative-Ethnography

Add CYP Mon Evening – Archaeology,

Add CYP Tues Evening- Physical Anth

Try to change time on Anth 2351 in room 016 to later time or return to MWF 9-9:50

ECON: change NRG Econ 2301 TTh 7:45-9:00 to Econ 2302

14. Geoff Andron spoke regarding online submission for SACS results. He asked that each professor go into the system and make sure they have the correct course info by their name. Also, those representatives that know what the SAC’s questions will be will need to submit the questions and answers to Geoff Andron at gandron@austincc.edu.

Please visit www.avtruemail.com/SACS/Instructor.aspx to test out the new system. On that page enter the first few letters of your first name in lower case, in Michael’s case then Michael.

This will take you to your data entry page, where you can enter bogus SACS results for any/all of your courses. Geoff mentioned that if he gets reactions and suggestions from enough of the task force early enough to get the bugs out before the end of may, then he might be able to get the system ready for Fall 2006.

Please email gandron@austincc.edu with feedback or call him at 223-3387.

15. A motion was made to adjourn at 2:30 p.m.