Wednesday, February 5, 2020

Council in Attendance: 
Ahmed Al-Kaisy (Engineering)
Christopher Livingston (Architecture)
Wade Hill (Nursing)
Brock Smith (Agriculture)
Dennis Aig (Arts)
Sobia Anjum (Student Representative)
Lisa Davis (Letters & Science)
Tena Versland (Education)
James Becker (Health & Human Development)
Michael Brody (Faculty Senate)
Sara Mannheimer (Library)
Anne Christensen (Business)
Que Vo (International Programs)
Susan Kollin (Letters & Science)
Craig Ogilvie (Dean of The Graduate School)

Also in Attendance:
Emily Peters (Graduate School)
Dean Sarah Shannon (Nursing)
Susan Raph (Nursing) 

Absent:

Meeting started at 10:59 am

Approval of January 22, 2020 Minutes

Motion to approve made by Aig, 2nd by Versland, unanimously passed

Announcements

Faculty Senate Update (Brody)

  • Two graduate programs approved: Optics and Photonics and MSIM

PhD Enhancement Fund Awards (Ogilvie)

  • Thank you to the subcommittee for reviewing
  • Departments have been notified; 12 awards
  • Simplified the process: support newer programs and programs in lower tiers of the PhD prioritization report, strong developmental paths for teaching roles
    • Next time may move up the deadline

 Faculty Mentoring of Graduate Students, CIMER Aug 18-19 Train-the-trainer (Ogilvie)

  • The Graduate School is bringing the Center for the Improvement of Mentored Experiences in Research (CIMER) to campus for a train-the-trainer event
    • Partnering with the CFE
  • Idea is to have about 25 faculty attend that can then go back to their departments to share the information and translate it to their discipline
    • 2 faculty trainers could potentially pair together to run departmental workshops (dept A one semester, dept B the next semester)
  • Recruiting faculty members that would like to spend a day and a half in the train-the- trainer session and then be prepared to run these workshops
    • Signup date TBD – can contact Dean Ogilvie if interested

Old Business

Hourly Pay for Graduate Students, Policy Revision Draft (Policy & Proc Subcommittee)

  • Review and discussion of the proposed policy
  • The main concern is that academic departments should not be paying students hourly when they should be on an assistantship
    • Dean Ogilvie will send revisions to policy subcommittee chair (Hill)

 

Master of Music in Music Ed, and Master of Music in Music Technology (Livingston/Aig)

  • Livingston sent a letter to Music with UGC’s feedback
  • Q: Would UGC like the proposers to attend a meeting?
    • A: Depends on how they respond
  • Livingston will email the updated proposal to Council, once it is revised

New Business

College of Nursing DNP Curriculum Changes: Dean Sarah Shannon and Susan Raph in attendance to update UGC on recent changes to the DNP curriculum

  • The DNP program is the largest professional doctorate at MSU (our most similar doctorate is EDD). The DNP program was approved in 2013. Since then, 73 students have graduated from the program.
  • Strong demand, admitted 43 students in fall 2019
  • Family-DNP students just took credentialing exam, all 19 graduates passed on their first attempt
  • The College of Nursing is accredited by CCNE and keeps abreast of national trends
  • Curriculum changes were made to align with national trends
  • When the program was created, PhD programs were used as a model, but the DNP program is very different from a PhD
    • A practice doctorate is designed to translate new knowledge into a field – not generate new knowledge
    • Goal is for DNP graduates to be able to shorten the amount of time to translate knowledge into practice
  • “Scholarly Project” is the national term – shifted this project to be late in the student’s education and changed it to a course-based model over 2 terms (two 3-credit courses)
  • 3 faculty teach the Scholarly Project courses, each faculty has 6 students as chair, serve on 12 committees
    • This change is in line with national trends for a Scholarly Project
    • The change created 3 spare credits across the program – redistributed these credits to other courses that needed additional credits to cover the content taught
  • Q: Redistribution of credits didn’t change the total number?
    • A: Correct. The total number of credits didn’t change.
  • Q: What was the setup before?
    • A: The setup was a Scholarly Project, but the committee was put together early in the student’s program, like a dissertation committee
    • The model is the students don’t come up with their own project idea—they are assigned a real-life problem
  • Q: Will all 43 students admitted fall 2019 be taking the courses at the same time?
    • A: Yes, 9 faculty for 3 sections of approximately 18 students. Use both tenure and non-tenure track faculty. DNP prepared faculty are not on a tenure track.
  • Q: Did the changes reduce the load on the faculty?
    • A: I think so. The number of faculty is the same, but it is a team teaching, cohort model.
    • The department also used to have to pay faculty once they were assigned to a committee, before they were actually working on the committee
    • From a faculty perspective, it’s a nice rotation model. Also reduces the number of committee revisions.
  • Q: How much time will students get with the faculty for their project?
    • A: Students will be in project credits for 6 total credits over 2 semesters

 Graduate Certificate for Dual Enrollment Mathematics Teachers, Proposal (Livingston)

  • Interested in Council’s view on 9 credits versus 12; there is currently no policy dictating the number of credits for a graduate certificate
    • We have one graduate certificate program that was approved at 10 credits. All other graduate certificate programs are 12 or more credits.
  • The 9 credits in the proposal comes from 9 credits required in a discipline to teach dual enrollment courses
    • Approving this does set a precedent that other programs could present a rationale for 9 credit certificates
    • Focus of this program seems very narrow. Unlikely that someone could use the same argument for another program. This program is addressing a specific issue. Rural schools have a difficult time getting dual enrollment teachers.
  • Q: Is the requirement for 9 credits Montana specific? Is it possible if a teacher moved somewhere else, they would be missing 3 credits?
    • A: Dual enrollment requirements are usually a community college standard—may be a rule set by the accrediting body
    • OPI governs K-12 schools in Montana. They are interested in ensuring that teachers are prepared to teach courses where HS students gain higher-education credits while at HS.
    • OPI guidelines https://opi.mt.gov/Class8DualCredit online are quite vague, they do not specify a number of credits required for dual enrollment licensure, but they do specify that the teacher be employed by an institution of higher-ed and is qualified to teach that discipline. Hence the accrediting agency of the institution of higher-ed sets the criteria.
  • Overall the proposal is very positive. The only concern is the number of credits. Our minimum number of credits required for a graduate certificate should be consistent with other schools.
  • Q: What is the motivation for these 9 credits specifically?
    • A: These are the courses currently taken to prepare teachers to teach dual- enrollment courses at HS
  • MSU students are already taking these classes, the mathematics portion of the MSMME program. These courses are all online. The program is setup with online courses during the year and intensive on campus courses during the summer.
  • Q: What is the standard for certificates on campus?
    • A: Only one certificate requires less than 12 credits (10 credits). Most certificates are 12 credits, but a few are much higher (ex: 21, 30).
  • The issue of certificate credits should be addressed—it has come up in the past and will likely continue to come up. There should be a set policy.
  • Do we have a set of questions for the proposers?
    • Mobility to other states?
    • Where did 9 credits come from—OPI doesn’t seem to specify this number?
  • The number of credits is a concern. What if we get another program with 7 credits? This is not a question for the proposers, but a policy question for UGC to decide.
  • With the push for new certificates, there needs to be a set policy.
    • Start with guidance from Provost
    • UGC needs to decide what is expected academically
  • Decision to table the proposal for now. UGC needs to address policy on the minimum number of credits.
  • Ask for justification from the proposers explaining their credits – they can provide relevant data to justify their number

Adjourned at 12:04 pm

Next scheduled meeting – February 19, 2020 LJ 325