Changes to Promote Student Success
In case you haven’t noticed, some very significant changes have taken place in the past few months, and more are expected in the months to come. We finally have in place an automated degree audit system that allows students to track their own progress toward a degree. All students can run a degree progress report (DPR), although this will be the most complete for students who were admitted from fall 2007 onward.
We are making a commitment to entering students that the University will not stand in the way of their graduating in a timely manner, provided that they satisfactorily complete the courses listed on the flowcharts for their respective majors. To this end, block schedules are being prepared for entering freshmen to ensure that they have fall quarter classes necessary to follow these flowcharts, and the institution has committed to offering adequate seats in required courses in the future. In addition, continuing students now register for fall classes in May, giving both the institution and the students an opportunity to do better planning.
While these changes may be well known, the reasoning behind them may not. In the interest of clarity, let me summarize the causes of these shifts and some possible additional outcomes.
Promoting Student Success During a Period of Budget Reductions
The primary driver behind the changes has been a desire to promote student success and, in particular, to fulfill what is seen as our ethical responsibility to make timely graduation a possibility for all students. Additional circumstances are causing us to consider further changes, not only in administrative systems but also, possibly, in the curricula we offer. The state budget crisis is one such reality, although the level of uncertainty remains so great at this time that it is difficult to know precisely how to react. One thing is virtually certain, however: we are unlikely to see a restoration of, or increase in, state funding in the foreseeable future, if ever.
Our Polytechnic Identity
Another driver is the current strategic planning effort, which happens to be taking place at the same time as our preparation of a self-study for the reaffirmation of university accreditation by the Western Association of Schools & Colleges (WASC). In both activities we are re-examining, and are likely to redefine, our identity as a comprehensive polytechnic university.
In the past, we have relied on a programmatic definition; that is, we have defined ourselves by enrolling around 70 percent of our students in a selected set of programs that we have labeled “polytechnic.” In the future, we might define ourselves in terms of a set of characteristics that distinguish our graduates, irrespective of major, from those emerging from a “non-polytechnic” university.
Implications for Curriculum
It is widely accepted that the curriculum is “owned” by the faculty (although the resources needed to offer the curriculum are not). Faced with the drivers mentioned above, the faculty will likely consider a number of proposed changes in the coming year, possibly starting at an Academic Senate retreat during Fall Conference.
Flexibility and Predictability
Many people agree that Cal Poly’s curricula are unusually complex, with students and others complaining of a lack of transparency. This appears to be a barrier to student success. Among existing practices that seem to compound the problem is the requirement for “advisor approved electives,” or the equivalent, which often leave certain course requirements entirely to the discretion of a faculty member.
Without clearer specification of requirements up-front, e.g., lists of courses from which students may choose, it becomes much more difficult, if not impossible, to provide students with the ability to track their own progress toward their degree. Proposals are likely to be made to simplify curricula and make them more predictable and transparent.
A Student-Centered Definition
If we were to adopt a student-centered definition of what it means to be a comprehensive polytechnic university, a logical next step would be to ensure that our curricula and co-curricular activities reflect that definition. Efforts are currently underway to assess the contributions of GE, the majors, and co-curricular activities to the achievement of our existing University Learning Objectives. This assessment will provide important evidence in support of any proposed curricular or co-curricular redesign. In due course, the objectives themselves might be changed or, perhaps more likely, the specific outcomes by which they are assessed might be adjusted to reflect the new definition.
Reconsidering the Balance of Knowledge and Skills in Undergraduate Curricula
All undergraduate curricula need to incorporate both “content knowledge” and “transferable skills,” but determining the appropriate balance, which is likely to vary from one major to another, is always problematical. In some majors, the amount of content that we expect students to learn has grown vastly by accretion.
Many of our students’ potential employers, including many of the leaders who comprise President Baker’s Cabinet, recognize the limits to student retention of content knowledge and the fact that much of this knowledge rapidly becomes obsolete. They don’t argue that content knowledge lacks importance, but they increasingly emphasize the need for graduates to be able to think critically, communicate effectively, work with people of diverse backgrounds, and perform the other skills set out in the University Learning Objectives. Proposals are likely to be made to re-examine the content/skills balance and to make appropriate adjustments.
Continuous Curriculum Review
Typically, curricular proposals emerge at the beginning of a catalog cycle and, if approved, are implemented two years later with the publication of a new catalog. Most of the ideas for change mentioned above are nowhere near fully-fledged, however, and are certainly not ready for review in a new two-year catalog cycle. To allow more time for discussion, we will not begin a new cycle this fall; instead, we will tentatively plan for a new cycle to begin in fall 2010.
At the same time we will give careful consideration to the possibility of departing altogether from the rigid catalog cycles that we have used in the past. Some of you know that, for the past ten years, I have advocated for a more flexible system that would allow us to be more nimble in responding to changes in curricular needs and opportunities while ensuring—at a minimum--that quality control is maintained, the needs of students are met, and the operational requirements, e.g., the programming of our degree audit system, are reasonable.
Lots to think about! Have a good summer and be ready to participate in some really interesting discussions when you return in the fall.
-W. David Conn
Vice Provost for Academic Programs & Undergraduate Education