Minutes of the University Committee
for April 1, 2003

Call to Order - The meeting was called to order at 2:05 PM by Prof Peggy James, Chair. Present in addition were J. Buenker, J. Kinchen, D. Kummings, G. Mayer, and G. Wood; Prof Laura Gellott, Chair of the Academic Policies Committee (APC), and Walter T. Feldt, Secretary of the Faculty.

Business - Senate Agenda Items from APC

While not on the Agenda, Prof Laura Gellott, Chair of the APC, was present and the Committee decided to conduct an informal discussion of the items that the APC was submitting for consideration by the Faculty Senate at its April 22 meeting.

First, the Committee discussed a revision to the Withdrawal Policy which pertains to students who wish to drop their entire course load after the deadline, currently after the first half of the course. The proposed revision is intended to prevent students from withdrawing after the semester concluded.

Prof Gellott said that some students sought withdrawal years after completing a semester. Considerable discussion ensued over when it was appropriate for a student to withdraw after completion of the semester. The proposed revision would prohibit this practice. It was generally agreed that there might, indeed, be some situations where withdrawal shortly after the completion of a semester might be appropriate. Some revisions were suggested and it was noted that the Academic Actions Committee is generally permitted to grant waivers of academic policies in truly extraordinary situations.

Another APC proposal would modify the Late Drop Policy. The proposed revisions would require documentation when requesting a late drop. It would not be sufficient to just state "extraordinary reasons" on a form. The UC suggested that the proposal clarify that the dean had the final approval authority on late drop request.

On both of the previous proposed revisions, there was a vigorous discussion concerning whether the policy should be more explicit concerning which exceptions were permissible. The pervailing opinion was that it was difficult to forecast what truly exceptional circumstances might be claimed by appelants and that this matter should be left to the Academic Actions Committee.

Finally, the APC is proposing an extensive revision and simplification of the Academic Foregiveness Policy. This policy is intended to allow students who have "turned things around" to wipe from the record courses taken years earlier that resulted in bad grades. It was originally adopted in an attempt to encourage students who had dropped out to return to campus with a "fresh slate."

Speculation was raised concerning whether a forgiveness policy, in any form, was still necessary or desirable.

The Committee suggested some revisions to the proposal to make it possible to include courses completed elsewhere in the "forgiven" courses, to not permit courses to be forgiven if they were used for a prior degree and to limit forgiven courses to those among the first 24 credits attempted.

Prof Gellott agreed to transmit the suggestions to the APC.

At its meeting on April 8, the UC will formally consider the Faculty Senate Agenda, to include these items, among others submitted.

Search Committee for Associate Vice Chancellor

The Committee suggested some additional nominees for a Search Committee for the revamped Associate Vice Chancellor position, pursuant to the requirement of UWPF 4.19.

University Committee Election

Last spring, the Secretary of the Faculty conducted the All Faculty Election online. This year, Prof Feldt directed that the University Committee Election be conducted online. In both cases, the rate of return of ballots was down from prior paper balloting.

Additionally, some faculty expressed concern about the use of the faculty ID number, commonly the "A number," being used as a password.

The Committee expressed some concern over the lower voting rate, but agreed to continue the online process with modifications. Faculty would be given a more secure password to use, to include a randomly generated number, and, it would be easier to link to the voting page.

Also, for those faculty members who have trouble negotiating the web balloting, an option to vote by paper ballot would be made available. In this case, Kim Brudny, program assistant to the Secretary of the Faculty, would electronically vote the ballot.

The University Committee election was declared complete and the results will be announced shortly.

Adjournment - The meeting adjourned at 3:40 PM

Respectfully Submitted
Walter T. Feldt