Minutes of Physical Sciences Task Force

December 5, 2003

 

Meeting Place:  RGC 326

Meeting Time:   9:30 am

Participants:                  Ron Johns, Lala Guerra, Sal Valastro, George Staff, Bob Blodgett, Mostafa Pirnia, Chris Cavalli, Jim Heath, Dean Becker, John Cise, James Friedrichsen,  Saad Eways, Allen Underwood, Leslie Davis, Jeff Bechtold, Laura Tacheny, C.D. Rao, Martin Prahovic, Stanton Truxillo

 

1.)    Approval of Agenda

2.)    Approval of Minutes from November 11, 2003

3.)    Information items presented:

a.)    Departmental Development Day  - Jim informed everyone that for the next Departmental Development Day on the 3rd week of January, Physics Instructors could demonstrate their favorite laboratory exercise in the afternoon workshop and that Geology Instructors could demonstrate their favorite fieldtrip in the morning workshop.  And either on the 2nd or 3rd Friday in February Jim Heath will put together a workshop on Microsoft front-page afternoon tutorial.

b.)    Del Valle Campaign – John Cise reported that the Del Valle petition drive collected the 1000 signatures it needed.   Since the 1000 signatures were collected, it will be on the ballot.  Not sure if in February or May.

c.)     Planetarium Update – Things are moving along.  Ron ask Virgina Boyd to arrange a meeting with Steve Kinslow, Donetta Goodall, Ben Ferrell, Mary Hensley, and Tyra Duncan-Hall to discuss the Planetarium and to get general support from higher levels.  He is also arranging a meeting with Sharon McIlroy, the head of Science and Health Curriculum at AISD.      

d.)    Vassar Workshop – Ron received a pamphlet about the Vassar Workshop.  Wanted to let everyone know just in case someone was interested and to let him know.  It’s for two weeks in June in Vassar.

e.)    Faculty Timesheets - Because of Winter break, fulltime faculty timesheets are due Monday, December 8, 2003.

 

4.) Items presented for discussion

a)      Suggestions for Master Plan initiatives for Professional Development – The Professional Development Committee is trolling for ideas for Master Plan initiatives for Professional Development.  The consensus was that department-specific training should take precedence.  Suggestions for funding included new supervisor training, field trip exploratory excursions, videos on using GPS and GIS equipment and software, and safety training videos.

b)      Handbook revisions -  Ron emailed everyone the Physical Sciences handbook.   Ron is requesting feed back from instructors before the handbook is sent to duplication on December 12, 2003.

 

4.)    Action Items

a)      $5000 for new position benefits – All new hires are to receive their funding for benefits from the department.  The average benefit cost per employee is $5000 per year.  The unanimous feeling was that this is outrageous and inappropriate.  Since no department can afford this kind of money, Ron will meet with other department chairs and the Dean to discuss this matter in more detail.

b)   New Fulltime – The new fulltime faculty member, Greg Flynn, declined the Physics position yesterday.  Therefore we will be going through the hiring process again.

 

 

 

 

Minutes of PHYS/AST/ENG Subcommittee

December 5, 2003

 

Participants-                 Dale Biggs, Mostafa Pirnia, Chris Cavalli, Lala Guerra, Jim Heath, Dean Becker, John Cise, James Friedrichsen, Saad Eways, Allen Underwood, Jeff Bechtold, Laura Tacheny, C.D. Rao, Martin Prahovic, Stanton Truxillo

 

                                    It was suggested that the grading standards needed to be changed because students were not doing the labs and were still passing the course with a C.  The lab is considered 25% of the grade for the course.   Some suggestions were, a separate grade for the lecture and lab, doing certain amount of experiments, requiring a lab exam, reducing the 25% to 15%.  Everyone agreed to keep an eye on their final grades in spring 2004 to see if it’s a problem and if there are problems, changes need to be done in the fall 2004 semester 

 

                                    The only difference with the new edition of Tipler from the old one is removing Chapter 17 from volume 1 and adding it to the back of volume 2.  There is very little change from the 4th to the 5th edition.

 

                                    James Heath suggested changing course topics for the Cutnel and Johnson on the website when he had time at the beginning of the spring semester

 

                                    Feed back on the tutoring lab over all positive.  Suggestion:   tutors should continue guiding students with their homework and not continue to do all of the student’s homework.

 

 

 

Minutes of GEOL/ESTE Subcommittee

December 5, 2003

 

Participants-                 Ron Johns, Sal Valastro, George Staff, Bob Blodgett, Leslie Davis, Jan Smith

 

                                    Those present felt that Jan. 6 might be a good day to make an exploratory expedition to Corpus Christi to scope potential localities for the GEOL 1445 trip.

 

                                    A comparison of the curriculum between GEOL 1105 and ENVR 1344 showed that while there was some overlap, the two courses should not have very similar exercises.  George said he would work with Heather Beatty to hammer out any areas in which the two courses may have too much overlap.

 

                                    Leslie Davis discussed the new video series for GEOL 1345.  She felt that it was poor overall, and was going to work to see what could be done to improve the course’s curriculum.  In addition, she suggested that the course name be changed from Environmental Oceanography to Introduction to Oceanography, and that an addendum be made to the catalog that would prevent a student from getting credit for both GEOL 1345 and GEOL 1445.

 

                                    Jan asked about the possibility of Alan Keenan getting more hours.  Ron said he would check the hourly accounts to see if that was feasible.