Meeting Place: NRG 2119

Meeting Time: 10:00 am

Participants: Paul Williams, Lala Guerra, Chris Cavalli, Jim Heath , James Friedrichsen, Elliot Richmond, Hadi Parhikhteh, Luis Cuellar, Ron Johns, John Cise, Bob Blodgett, Gary Crane, Peter Wehner, Bruce Darling, C.D. Rao, Anne Turner, Allen Undewood, Jeff Bechtold, Paul Nacozy, John Blum, Cindy Carr, David Wolf, Mike McGraw, Dean Becker, David Froehlich, Larry Wigginton, Qurrat Thakur

General Session

1.) Call to Order

2.) Approval of Agenda: Approved

3) Approval of Minutes from: February

4.) Information items

a.) Community College Aerospace Scholars – It was announced that the deadline for students to sign up to participate in the Community College Aerospace Scholars was extended till after spring break. Saad Eways will be in charge of taking the students to Houston on April 8 & 9, 2010 to participate in the Program.

b.) Evaluations – Jim Heath announced that the adjunct faculty evaluations were almost complete. He reminded fulltime faculty to complete their faculty input forms by Friday, March 12, 2010.

c.) Call for nominations for Department Chair – Jim Heath was nominated for Department Chair. Elections will be held during April’s department meeting.

d.) May Meeting - May department meeting will be held at CYP.

e.) Master Planning Space Survey – As part of the master planning process, a master planning survey has been developed to find out how space is being used. Given that the survey is very lengthy, Lab Coordinators from each campus were asked to email Paul Williams with data on how space was being used on their campus by Monday, March 8, 2010.

f.) International Year of Astronomy Talks – Everyone was reminded that 2009 was declared the International Year of Astronomy by the United Nations. Everyone was also informed that the next Astronomy talk would be on March 12, 2010 at RVS in building G, room 8100 at 7:00pm. A star party is to follow. The topic will be “On the Shoulders of Giants, Part II: Ptolemy to Tycho.

Minutes of PHYS/AST/ENG Subcommittee

March 5, 2010

Participants Paul Williams, Lala Guerra, Chris Cavalli, Jim Heath , James Friedrichsen, Elliot Richmond, Hadi Parhikhteh, Luis Cuellar, John Cise, Gary Crane, C.D. Rao, Allen Undewood, Jeff Bechtold, Paul Nacozy, John Blum, David Wolf, Mike McGraw, Dean Becker, Larry Wigginton, Qurrat Thakur

Engineering Compact Flyer

5 boxes of Engineering Compact Flyers were delivered to NRG campus. Saad Eways volunteered to take 4 boxes to the RGC

Engineering Circuit Course –An Engineering Circuit Course has been proposed. A course description now needs to be written in the course management system, and our degree needs to be re-done and ready for it to be offered in fall 2011. But before entering the information in the management system we need to go to transfer clients and make sure that it will transfer

Cool Web Resource - Jeff Bechtold shared a web resource he had found in the University of Illinios Champaign Urbana Website. The web resource gives examples of Interactive examples, Interactive online lectures and Tycho. To register, go into the University website or go to Jeff’s web page and click on the UIUC link.

RGC 335 - It was announced that there was a work order in process to remodel room 335 at RGC. But before the remolding starts, a clear proposal of what needs to be done will need to be faxed to Paul Williams. He will then take it to the Dean to review.

PHYS IPR Update – It was announced that data had been compiled for the Physics IPR and was sent to the members of the committee. A meeting has been scheduled after the department meeting today to discuss the recommendations of the PHYS IPR and have a draft ready after spring break. The deadline to have this report completed is April 15, 2010

Spring TSAAPT/APS Meeting – Paul Williams reminded and updated everyone about the Spring TSAAPT/APS meeting on March 18, 19, and 20. He also informed faculty attending the meeting, to fill out travel request forms to get reimbursed.

Assessment – Everyone was informed that we no longer had to assess EEO’s but still had to write our own outcomes and write an assessment plan. To complete this task teams were formed under three objectives, communication, conceptual understanding and problem solving. These teams will report at the April department meeting with a draft of concepts outcomes. Teams are as followed:

PHYS Problem Solving Communications Conceptual Understanding

James Friedrichsen, Chair Alan Underwood, Chair Paul Williams, Chair

John Cise Saad Eways Chris Cavalli

Mike McGraw Jeff Bechtold

David Wolf

Paul Nacozy

For Astronomy: Jim Heath, Chris Cavalli and Elliot Richmond