Deans’ Council Meeting, October 1, 1998
 
Present: Raymond Rodrigues (presiding), Farhat Iftekharuddin, Doug Ferrier, José Martín, Mimosa Stephenson, Jim Holt, Cindy Lerma, Wayne Lewis, Eli Peña, (Joe Binder and Margie Mancillas for first item)
 
1. Interview with Institutional Research Director Candidate: Dr. Gail Dantzker met with the members. Discussion included the role of institutional research in enrollment management, developmental education assessment, and program review.
 
2. Declaration of Major: Eli Peña provided an update on progress toward defining a new declaration of major procedure. Carolyn Green reported on the results of a meeting with Student Affairs concerning requirements for the procedure. Members agreed that students would declare their majors by completing a Declaration of Major form, which will be signed by the student and the appropriate ARC and placed on file in the ARC’s office and the Academic Advising Center. In addition to advising files maintained in the ARCs’ and departmental advisors’ offices, the Academic Advising Center will maintain comprehensive student advising files for all students. Carolyn Green will draft a memo outlining the procedure. The memo will be issued by the Provost.
 
3. Retention Efforts: Sylvia Peña reported that the School of Education’s retention plans include early advising, recruiting activities, providing course sequencing information to majors, clarifying School of Education admission requirements, following up with non-returning students, and revitalizing the ACP program. The school is also writing a proposal for a $45,000 grant to support recruiting and retention.
 
José Martín reported that the College of Science/Math/Technology is working on improving the accuracy of the count of the number of students completing their programs, working to improve the professional image of the technical programs, planning for changes in the service courses included in the core, working with Computer Science majors to encourage them to complete their degrees rather than leaving to take a job, obtaining more support for their majors (e.g., scholarships and internships), and working to maintain a sense of discovery in the programs.
 
Farhat Iftekharuddin reported that the College of Liberal Arts is contacting students to encourage them to come in for advising, working to create more co-op opportunities for their students, planning social gatherings with the students, beginning in-class identification of majors, and increasing recruiting efforts.
 
Betsy Boze said that the School of Business is updating the active student advising files (i.e., removing the files of students who have already graduated), creating an Accounting Club, offering group advising sessions, working with the planning for the magnet high school at Rivera (viewing it as a potential feeder for new business students), and increasing the visibility of faculty advisor information (e.g., distributing a faculty directory sheet and setting up a bulletin board with office hours of all faculty members).
 
Marilyn Dyer, who was away at a meeting in San Antonio, provided a written report. She suggested having second-year students in the Health Sciences programs host a social function for the Scorpion Scholars, providing student mentors for groups of these students, inviting the students and their parents for a tour and reception (and a discussion about the new building), producing a film featuring various Health Sciences programs for use in recruiting and advising, and involving the students’ families in various ways.
 
4. Follow up to Scorpion Scholars Event: Lists of students by major will be provided to the respective deans. It was suggested that these students might assist in high school recruiting visits, providing the high school students with a student’s perspective on the college experience.
 
5. HOOP Policies: Betsy Boze presented revised policies: 7.5.3 Role and Responsibilities of Deans and 7.5.2 Role and Responsibilities of Department Chairs. After further discussion, members decided that the policy regarding department chair responsibilities needed to be reshaped to better convey the priorities given to the numerous responsibilities listed in the current policy. Betsy will lead a discussion of chair responsibilities at the next Deans & Chairs meeting.
 
6. General Education Speech and Computing: Noting that the task force’s proposal on the new core curriculum calls for computer literacy and speech to be incorporated "across the curriculum" in the new core, Ray reported that the Computing and Technology Task Force had appointed a group to explore what this would mean in the core and that he had asked Farhat to bring in a consultant to help us think through the implications for teaching speech in this manner.
 
7. Graduate Recruiting Plan for Graduate Studies & Sponsored Programs: Mimosa Stephenson provided a handout to be reviewed for future discussion.
 
8. Amendments to Distance Learning Policy of Coordinating Board: Wayne Lewis called attention to the proposed rules for distance learning and requested that members review the policy for future discussion. Ray asked that special attention be paid to issues related to educational quality.