Academic Affairs Cluster

ACADEMIC AFFAIRS COMMITTEE OF CPC

M I N U T E S

December 12, 2007

2:30 p.m.

LRC 207

PRESENT

Administration

Kristi Blackburn, Dr. David Humphreys, Bobby McNeel, Dr. Robert Richards,  Luis Rosas

Faculty

Nabeel Barakat, Joy Fisher, Marian Locascio, Lauren McKenzie, Joyce Parker, Beverly Shue, Jim Stanbery, Pamela Watkins, Mark Wood, Bradley Young

Students

Oluwatoba Oluyide, Michael Preston, Charly Robledo, Carlos Saenz

ABSENT

Administration

Dr. Ann Tomlinson

Faculty

Carmen Carrillo, King Carter, Juanita Naranjo, Dr. Evelyn Portis, Dr. Stanley Sandell, June Smith, Tricia Wickers

Classified Manager

Carla Mussa-Muldoon

Classified

Hovsep Kotelyan, Traci Liley

CALL TO ORDER

Luis Rosas called the meeting to order at 2:40 p.m. in LRC 207.

I. ADOPTION OF AGENDA

The agenda was accepted as presented.

II. ADOPTION OF MINUTES

After review of the minutes from the November 21, 2007 meeting, the minutes were accepted as presented.

III. SPECIAL MEETINGS NOVEMBER 27, 28 AND DECEMBER 5

Attempts were made to have special meetings on November 27 and 28 to take care of Educational Master Plan input and also to get the unit template out to Division Chairs. Because those attempts fell through, a special meeting with Division Chairs was called for Wednesday, Dec. 5. Beverly Shue and Mark Wood were two of the presenters at that meeting.

Beverly Shue reported that as a result of receiving program review and unit plan documents from most of the Division Chairs, she was able to compile a report with an extract of each submission. One of the things that she found very helpful in working with the Student Learning Outcomes (SLO’s) was the measurable terminology that was used to be able to show that you can define what the divisions are planning. Mrs. Shue encouraged the chairs to look at what some of the other divisions are doing to help in developing ideas about how they would carry out their own assessment process. Using the subject of Art as an example, the SLO’s were listed in hierarchal order. In other words, you go from the simple or the basic learning to the more complex learning. Analytical skills would be an example of complex learning. Mrs. Shue closed by saying that she views her report as more of a reference document for Division Chairs where they can actually start to think about how to develop assessment.

Mark Wood noted that two of the concerns brought up at the meeting of Dec. 5 included 1)making sure that the unit plan template does not require information that is not readily available and 2) making sure that the language is the same in all of the documents.

Lauren McKenzie voiced his concern that the proposed forms asked for much more information than was necessary and should more closely resemble the one already in use. Jim Stanbery stated his belief that the process will lose credibility unless it goes forward in a way that everybody is comfortable with, and proposed a meeting of the committee for Wednesday, Dec. 19, at 2:30 p.m., preceded by a special session the day before at 3:30 p.m., to which anybody who is interested can come to work out an approach that is satisfactory to all concerned.

IV. EDUCATIONAL MASTER PLAN SUBMISSION PROCESS AND

TIMELINE

Jim Stanbery referred the committee to a document entitled LACCD District Planning Committtee Proposed Comprehensive Educational Master Plan Content Guidelines (Draft 12/6/07) and went on to say that the committee has discussed the Educational Master Plan but when the District talks about the EMP they are referring to a relatively abbreviated document, approximately 3-8 pages in length, of the kind that has been discussed in previous meetings. Specific inquiries were going to be made as far as which parts of it would be supplied for us from the District Office. Mr. Stanbery will confirm

with the Academic Senate how it is actually going to be written.

V. PROGRAM REVIEW ON-LINE FORMAT FROM SOUTHWEST COLLEGE

Mr. Rosas reported that in the Division Council meeting just prior to the present meeting of the Academic Affairs Committee of CPC, a PowerPoint presentation was shown on how L.A. Southwest College put their program review on line as a web document. As a time-saving measure and because most of the discussion took place already in Division Council, Mr. Rosas stated that he would not repeat the presentation again in this meeting.

VI. SLO ASSESSMENT PROCESS

Dr. Humphreys prefaced his presentation by stating that this is the beginning of a dialog and whatever is being presented here needs to be vetted through the process and that people need to have a chance to talk about it and think about it and then try to integrate it into the processes and institutionalize it. There were a couple of assumptions we were making about assessment at Harbor—that there has to be a significant faculty involvement; it is ongoing and not a single effort to meet outside pressures; that the goal is continuous improvement of the instruction at Harbor; and that our approach to assessment does not assume added layers of standardized testing but that the testing of SLO’s in the course and program and institutional levels may depend on multiple measures that are defined by the faculty.

He emphasized the distinction should be made between evaluation and assessment. Evaluation should be thought of as gate keeping—it should be thought of as assigning grades measuring whether or not the individual student has measured up to the objectives of the course. Assessment, on the other hand, is a more aggregated bit of information about why students in that course or program are meeting the objectives and if they are not, how do we refashion the instruction in order to improve it. It should be stressed also that the results are not used in faculty evaluations. The only piece that has anything to do with faculty evaluation is whether faculty participate. This has already been provided for by the District Faculty Evaluation Task Force. The WASC standard demands that there be an ongoing assessment of whether or not students are meeting the outcomes of the course, the program, and how does that feed back into the institutional planning process. Dr. Humphreys concluded his presentation by proposing that an electronic repository of SLO results be kept in the office of the V.P. of Academic Affairs where it is available to faculty and others and would be maintained by the Division Chair or his/her designee to keep it current. Which SLO’s are going to be measured each year then becomes a department decision.

VII. Adjournment