Minutes from Social Sciences Task Force Meeting of September 19, 2008

 

The Social Science Task Force met Friday, September 19, 2008 from 1:00 PM to 3:00 PM at Rio Grande Campus in Room 124. The following faculty members were in attendance:  Geoff Andron, Karen Bell, Jake Bloom, Mary Beth Booth, Jack Bucco, Mary Chipley, Clint Davis, Daniel Gao, Carol Hayman, Sherry Heiden, James Hill, Don Jonsson, Livingstone Kumassah, Tony Lee, Lizzie Pintar, Michael Petrowsky, Michael Pool, Marianna Sidoryanskaya, Alec Slivinske, Gary Smith, Don Tompkins, and James Sondgeroth.

1. The agenda for the meeting was approved.

 

Updated agenda:

1. Approve agenda. 

2. Approve minutes from last meeting which can be found at: http://www.austincc.edu/SOCSCI/Minutes/meet_04_11_2008.htm.

3. Discuss the Program Review process. Please look over the documents linked to this page: http://www.austincc.edu/progrevw/guidelines.php.  We discuss where we are at and what we need to do with the following chairs of our Program Review committees: Mary Beth Booth/GIS, Don Jonsson/Geography, and Geof Andron/Economics.

Removed Item: Listen to a presentation about the a new program ACC is undertaking in cooperation with the Universidad Marista de Mérida in Mérida, Mexico. The presentation will be by Giancarlo Taylor of the International Programs office. The program, Marista Summer Institute, is the brainchild of Clint Davis.  Don Jonsson will be participating in the program.

4. Discuss and take action on changing the course description of GEOG 2471.

5. Look at and revise the course schedules for Summer 2009 and Fall 2009. 

6. Discuss and take action on a request that the Dean and ACC Administration reactivate the dormant, half-time, funded position that was created some years ago to manage and coordinate the Archaeology internship program.

7. This Item was tabled during our April meeting so that it could be taken up in our first meeting this fall. Discuss, and take action on, if need be, requiring ANTH 2373, Archaeological Field Methods, and/or ANTH 2389, Academic Cooperative in Anthropology, as part of the Anthropology AA degree.

8. Discuss the results of last spring’s THECB/SACS pre- and post test results for ANTH 2301, ECON 2302, and GEOG 1301. Discuss the repeat of these course evaluations this fall. See if everyone is comfortable in continuing these pre- and post-test evaluations of the listed courses, or should we move on to evaluating different courses next fall (’09) or a different Exemplary Learning Objective in the same courses.

9. Discuss and take action on adding textbooks to the approved lists: A) for ANTH 2302, add Introduction to Archaeology—Karen Bell; B) add  the book “Making Spatial Decisions using GIS” to the

approved textbook list for GEOG 2471. Here is a link to info about the book:

http://gis.esri.com/esripress/display/index.cfm?fuseaction=display&websiteID=138&moduleID=0 – Mary Beth Booth.

10. Remind faculty of the Social Science Book Club. The club is soliciting suggestions for a book to read for this fall. Please send suggestions to Michael Petrowsky at mpetrows@austincc.edu.

11. Adjourn.


                                 
   

  1. Jim mentioned that each Social Science Task Force member should review the minutes and report any inaccuracies to rdayton@austincc.edu. There was an error in the minutes posted for February 6, 2006. Item #8 listed a request to change the Anthropology degree plan. The conclusion of that discussion was listed as changing the Archaeology degree plan. For more information: http://www.austincc.edu/SOCSCI/Minutes/meet_02_03_06.htm. The minutes for September 19 were approved by the task force. Also please make sure to ensure that you are listed as attending each meeting. Voting task force members that attend task force meetings are paid a small stipend of $20.00 per hour at the end of the academic year. The attendance sign up sheet at the meeting is used to process stipends.
  2. Jim Sondgeroth presented information regarding the Program Review process for this academic school year.  Jim mentioned that we will be conducting a program review for GIS, Economics and Geography and introduced the program chairs of each of the Program Review committees: Mary Beth Booth/GIS, Don Jonsson/Geography, and Geof Andron/Economics. Jim mentioned that all fulltime faculty would need to assist with the SWAT exercises for each discipline. The timeline was listed as October –April however Jim suggested that all chairs start immediately so that all items can be completed. Jim mentioned that the only full time faculty for GIS is Mary Beth Booth and suggested that perhaps an adjunct would be willing to help and gave a friendly nod to Daniel Gao. Don Jonsson asked questions regarding the process for the program review and Mary Beth and Al explained that he would find out more once he attended the meetings for the program review chairs. Jim mentioned that the program review was actually very helpful when considering items for the next years budget planning. Jim mentioned that the department had already met most of the departmental objectives and goals in all disciplines. Geoff Andron asked that each faculty member assist the program review chair and that they follow through in a timely manner with any requests for assistance from the committee chair. Mary Beth explained that each chair would receive a $1000.00 stipend for their completed work on the program review process. Jim mentioned that he would be attending all program review committee chair meetings so that he could keep kept up to date on what steps still needed to be completed. He asked that all chairs make themselves available to present their results to the Program Review Committee. Geoff Andron reiterated that he felt this was a collaborate process and that all faculty members should participate to better the results for the department. For more information please visit the following link: http://www.austincc.edu/progrevw/guidelines.php.

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  1. Discuss and take action on changing the course description of GEOG 2471. Mary Beth Booth presented this item regarding changing the course description for Advanced GIS. Mary Beth mentioned that the task force had previously approved the course name change to GIS II but that the change had not been made. Jim Sondgeroth agreed that the task force had approved the name change on the meeting dated February 8, 2008 (http://www.austincc.edu/SOCSCI/Minutes/meet_02_08_2008.htm.) Mary Beth provided a handout and a basic history and rationale for changing the course description of GIS II. The material that Mary Beth originally found useful for students to master has since become less important for students in the workforce. Mary Beth has had feedback that some students will not enroll to take GIS II (Advanced GIS) because they read the course description and feel that they either already know the material or have no need to learn those basic skills.  Please read the following handout for more information regarding this proposal (CLICK HERE!). Jim mentioned that the proposed course description should also include the prerequisite information and the lab fee information. Mary Beth answered various questions regarding the new course material and reiterated that the course would still be a transfer course for those students would be able to better use these skills in the workforce. The task force approved the course description change.

 

  1.  Look at and revise the course schedules for summer 2009 and fall 2009.   Jim mentioned that the dean had asked for fulltime faculty schedules through the summer 2009.

 

A. The Task Force first discussed the Anthropology Summer 2009 schedule. Clint Davis had previously asked for numerous changes to the study abroad schedule for Anthropology that had not yet been reflected on the schedule. Clint asked to cancel the Intro to Archaeology course in Mexico and to replace this course with an ANTH 2373 MesoAmerican Archaeology course. He also asked that the ANTH 2373 Topic: Archaeological Field Methods be cancelled and replaced with an ANTH 2389 Academic Cooperative in Archaeology. Jim and Rachel mentioned that their was currently a room scheduling problem at RGC and that perhaps the program should consider HBC for their two weeks of classes. Clint asked that the 11week Academic Cooperative in Anthropology be shortened to a 1st six week course. Carol Hayman asked that her Peruvian course information be changed from a Cultural Anthropology course to Introduction to Archaeology in Peru. The task force was not provided with a copy of the Summer 2008 schedule to consider what courses had been cancelled due to low enrollment and to consider continuing offering in the summer 2009 or whether or not to kill the sections. Jim Sondgeroth said that he would send this information to the Anthropology faculty members for their consideration and take considerations via email vote. Gary Smith asked whether or not cancelled classes would negatively affect our department. Jim mentioned that the only negative impact would be the process of faculty bumping adjunct faculty and the MSTA adjunct bumping adjunct faculty in cases where their sections are cancelled due to low enrollment. Jim also mentioned that he has been in the situation of hiring new adjuncts to fill unstaffed sections and then having to phone them and let them know that the section was cancelled due to low enrollment. *Follow up action: send Summer 08 and Summer 09 schedules to all Anthropology faculty for planning of schedule.

B. The Task Force discussed the Economics Summer 2009 schedule. The task force was not provided with a summer 2008 schedule to help decide which sections should be killed that had previously been cancelled due to low enrollment. Jim mentioned that we would send all Economics faculty a copy of the summer 2008 and Summer 2009 schedules for considerations of cancelling summer 2009 sections. Alec Slivinske and Michael Petrowsky asked about the progress of a previously requested change to a 1st 6week Economics course at RRHEC that met for an unusually long lecture period of 1:20-5:00p.m. Both Al and Michael felt that the students would have difficulty with this extending lecture time and that the course would have a better chance of making if we requested a time change. Jim and Rachel are currently working with the campus management at RRHEC and have been told they should know in about two weeks whether or not the room space would be available. The RRHEC campus indicated that it shouldn’t be a problem to offer the class from M-Th 12:00-1:50pm. Rachel will follow up to make sure this change has been implemented. Jim Sondgeroth mentioned that enrollment picked up quite a bit during the add/drop period and that he would take this into consideration the next time he is considering courses for cancellation recommendations to the dean. Michael Petrowsky has experimented with an early Economics class at the NRG class that begins at 7:10am. Jim mentioned that this class was successful and that we would continue to offer it in the future. Jake Bloom inquired as to whether Cedar Park High School would be offering a section in the summer. Jim explained that we do not know what will be offered until the ECS department forwards requests to us and that our department had little control over what would be offered. Geof Andron suggested that perhaps there should be more early morning or late afternoon classes at RGC. The task force decided that registration tended to slack off at RGC after about two o’clock and that later offerings would not necessarily do very well. Jim and Al mentioned that the 11 ECS sections in the Summer of 2008 seemed to affect the enrollment at NRG. Al felt that many sections that had low enrollment this summer had previously done very well or had filled up. Al and Michael also mentioned the poor teaching conditions at the high schools due to the fact that the schools were closed for the summer. The instructors had little to no facilities help and some were put in portables with air conditioning problems. The instructors had no duplicating abilities and no library services. Jim mentioned that ECS would be working on these problems and that hopefully we would not encounter these problems again. He asked that all ECS instructors let either himself or Rachel know immediately about facility or discipline problems at the high schools. This was to include problems encountered with other high school instructors using their rooms during the college lecture hour. *Follow up action: send Summer 08 and Summer 09 schedules to all Economics faculty for planning of schedule.

C. The Task force discussed the Geography Summer 2009 schedule. Mary Beth and Don mentioned that there should not be two Physical Geography PCM 1st 6week sections. Rachel mentioned that she believed we had accidentally duplicated the paperwork and would contact Dianne Olla to have the duplicated course removed. Update: As of Tuesday September 23rd this course has been removed. Don Jonsson asked for a PCM Geography 1302 to be added to the 1st 6 weeks schedule. Mary Beth asked for a change to her GIS course from a regular lecture course to a hybrid course that meets for lecture from 4:00-5:50 and then for lab from 6:00-7:50pm. The class would be 50% classroom based and 50% out of class lab work. Mary Beth was anticipating that changing the time to after normal work hours and decreasing the amount of time required in the classroom would entice better enrollment.  Sherry Heiden inquired about offering a hybrid in Anthropology and asked for an explanation as to the differences involved for the instructor and student and the relative success of these courses. Jim mentioned that he would be glad to put a hybrid Physical Anthropology section on the Fall 2009 schedule as long as there was a faculty member willing to teach the section. Sherry Heiden mentioned that she would be interested if no fulltime faculty were. Jim explained that there was an HYC course and an HYD course. Please go to the following link for further information: http://dl.austincc.edu/hybrid/.

D. The task force discussed the Anthropology Fall 2009 schedule. Mike Pool mentioned that we should not offer the same course at the same times for the Pinnacle and the South Austin campus. The Pinnacle Physical Anthropology will be removed from the schedule. The CYP Physical Anthropology has had trouble making and has never had more than 12 students enrolled so the task force eliminated this course from the schedule. There was a discussion about the parking challenges at the Pinnacle due to the elimination of the use of the dirt lots for parking. Many instructors felt that they were loosing students due to this problem and were experiencing many difficulties themselves. The additional hybrid Physical Anthropology class will be located at the Rio Grande campus since their skull collection is more extensive than other campuses. Mary Chipley suggested eliminating the Saturday Cultural course because it has been cancelled for low enrollment two years in a row. The Tuesday night Cultural Anthropology course at RGC will be removed from the schedule.

E. The task force discussed the Economics Fall 2009 schedule. Al Slivinske suggested that we cancel the EVC Economics course at 12:00-1:15 because it has consistent low enrollment and or cancellations. Jim mentioned that he would try to remove the course from the schedule but since it is the only Economics class offered at EVC he might have some resistance. There was discussion about the cancellations of the one night a week Econ courses at NRG and the possibility of changing these courses to two nights a week. If we are unable to get the course changed to two nights a week then the task force would like for the course to be cancelled. The task force suggested adding daytime Economics courses to the Cypress campus. The task force would like to add a Macro and a Micro section at around 12-1:15pm on MW. Ask Jim what time to offer the Macro section. The task force will kill the Pinnacle 1:25pm section that didn’t make this semester. The Saturday SAC class will either be changed to 9:00a.m. or be cancelled.

F. The task force discussed the Geography Fall 2009 schedule. Don Jonsson mentioned the shortage of Geography classes at RGC. He suggested the 2:40pm-4:05pm time slot but the task force felt that registration at RGC tapered off after 2pm. The task force decided to cancel the Saturday NRG class. The task force asked that the one night a week course at RGC be moved to two nights a week and if not then to cancel that section.

 

  1. Discuss and take action on a request that the Dean and ACC Administration reactivate the dormant, half-time, funded position that was created some years ago to manage and coordinate the Archaeology internship program. Mike Pool requested that the task force request from the dean that the funds become available. Rex Peebles originally asked for these funds to be used for the Archaeology degree plan. The dean has two objections to these funds being used to research and implement the Archaeology degree plan and or Academic Cooperative opportunities because she believes the professors that are teaching these courses should be doing the research. The dean also wanted to make sure that the demand was there for the Archaeology degree plan.1` Two students are listed as Archaeology majors. Clint Davis mentioned that if funds were going to be requested than a detailed proposal should be provided to the dean for her consideration. Jim mentioned that if the Anthropology faculty would like to come up with a proposal he would be glad to present that item to the dean. The task force decided to set a deadline for the proposal to be submitted by the next task force meeting or to be forfeited. 
  2. This item was tabled during our April meeting so that it could be taken up in our first meeting this fall. Discuss, and take action on, if need be, requiring ANTH 2373, Archaeological Field Methods, and/or ANTH 2389, Academic Cooperative in Anthropology, as part of the Anthropology AA degree. Mike Pool mentioned that the Anthropology degree was a liberal arts degree and that the degree plan should not be so restrictive. He believes that the degree plan should include a general elective as an option for those students who do not want to or are unable to take the ANTH 2373 or ANTH 2389. Mike continued that most Bachelor of Arts degrees don’t require the Academic Cooperative and or the Archaeological Field Methods and that most will consider the transfer credit as a lower division elective. U.T. might transfer this course but it would not go towards their degree plan and that Texas State does not accept either course. Clint Davis replied that the Associates in Anthropology was not a liberal arts degree and that if the student was seeking a liberal arts degree they could seek a degree in General Studies. Clint mentioned that he did not want to water down the curriculum and that students would not be better off taking an elective instead of the Academic Cooperative or the Archaeological Field Methods course. Mike Pool mentioned that the Academic Cooperative is not always offered year round. Mary Beth Booth mentioned that if someone is unable to get the required course within one year they can have the course waived from their degree plan. A motion was made by Sherry Heiden. This motion proposed that the degree list the ANTH 2389 or ANTH 2373 or General Elective. The task force did not approve this. Mary Beth mentioned that the Anthropology degree could follow the GIS degree but listed the required courses with a small asterisk that states that a substitution may be allowed with advisor’s approval. Mary Chipley made a motion to leave the degree plan exactly as it is. A vote was taken and the majority of the task force voted that the degree plan be left as is with the Academic Cooperative 2389 or the Archaeological Field Methods 2373 be required. Mary Beth mentioned that any student could petition to their advisor for substitutions. Clint Davis proposed a motion to state that once a degree plan has been established there not be any changes for two years. Mary Beth Booth vehemently opposed this proposal because her degree plan is ever evolving and needs changes frequently. This motion was not approved.

 

  1. Discuss the results of last spring’s THECB/SACS pre- and post test results for ANTH 2301, ECON 2302, and GEOG 1301. Discuss the repeat of these course evaluations this fall. See if everyone is comfortable in continuing these pre- and post-test evaluations of the listed courses, or should we move on to evaluating different courses next fall (’09) or a different Exemplary Learning Objective in the same courses. Jim Sondgeroth mentioned that our department had received the majority of the Pretests back and appreciated the full participation of the task force. Karen Bell asked that we send out the post tests earlier because she did not receive her questions until the last day of classes. Mary Beth Booth mentioned that she would like to add GEOG 2470 to the THECB/SACS questions to help evaluate the learning in her courses. She stated that she will create the questions. The task force approved adding GEOG 2470 to the pre and post tests for next fall. Jim mentioned that the Anthropology task force members look over their Physical Anthropology questions because the majority of students were able to get the questions right on the pretests which left for little to no improvement possible on the post tests. Jim suggested that the difficulty of the questions be increased. Mary Beth made a motion to have the Anthropology department get together and review the Physical Anthropology questions and revise as needed. The motion was approved. Jim mentioned that the college does want us to rotate courses and exemplary objectives to make sure that all courses were evaluated. Michael Petrowsky questioned the phrasing of the results by Jim Sondgeroth in ULEAD. Please click here to review the results for each discipline. Al Slivinske mentioned that the number 1 and number 4 Economics questions were ambiguous. Mary Beth mentioned that we can redo our goals each year. Geoff Andron asked whether the scores of the pre and post tests could be made available to those professors teaching those sections. Jim Sondgeroth responded that this was not possible because the scantrons had already been combined by course and reminded the task force that these pre and post tests were not meant to evaluate the instructor, however instructors could grade their own tests before sending them into the department.
  2. Discuss and take action on adding textbooks to the approved lists: A) for ANTH 2302, add Introduction to Archaeology—Karen Bell; B) add  the book “Making Spatial Decisions using GIS” to the approved textbook list for GEOG 2471. Here is a link to info about the book:

http://gis.esri.com/esripress/display/index.cfm?fuseaction=display&websiteID=138&moduleID=0 – Mary Beth Booth.

Karen Bell proposed the addition of an textbook for Archaeology by Brian Fagan entitled Ancient Lives. Please visit the following link for more information: http://www.pearsonhighered.com/educator/academic/product/0,3110,0132226189,00.html. Karen stated that she was looking for a textbook that had a focus more on Prehistory than a how to in Archaeology. She felt this textbook would allow for more Archaeology of the world. The task force approved the addition of this textbook to the textbook inventory for Archaeology.

Mary Beth Booth proposed the addition of a textbook to the GEOG 2471 approved inventory. She presented the textbook Making Spatial Decisions Using GIS. Please visit the following link for more information: http://gis.esri.com/esripress/display/index.cfm?fuseaction=display&websiteID=138&moduleID=0. Mary Beth explained that her students were not provided with ideas on how to apply the concepts that have learned in real life scenarios with her previously approved textbook. The task force approved the addition of the text by Keranen and Kolboord.

 

  1. Remind faculty of the Social Science Book Club. The club is soliciting suggestions for a book to read for this fall. Please send suggestions to Michael Petrowsky at mpetrows@austincc.edu. Michael Petrowsky reminded the task force about the opportunity for professional development by participating the  Social Science Task Force Book Club. Michael mentioned that nominations had concluded and that the task force should now vote for their favorite recommendation. Jim Sondgeroth mentioned that he was checking with other departments to find out how much professional development was awarded in their book clubs and would attempt to increase the professional development that our book club will offer. Michael mentioned that he had only had three votes as of September 19th. Michael asked that those who are interested email him at mpetrows@austincc.edu.
  2. A motion was made to adjourn at 3:00 p.m. Motion approved.