TO:	Dr. Joel Piperberg Faculty Senate Chairperson
FROM:	Francine G. McNairy Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs
DATE:	November 19, 1999
SUBJECT:	APPROVAL OF FACULTY SENATE CURRICULAR RECOMMENDATIONS

As the Presidents designee, I am informing you of the approval of the following Faculty Senate Curricular Actions:

1. Faculty Senate actions at meetings on 2/16/99, 3/2/99, 3/16/99, 5/5/99

General Education Objectives

COMMENT: Deans Council commends Faculty Senate and the General Education Review Committee for the significant effort that has been invested in establishing the goals and objectives for general education. We recognize that our work is not yet completed, and we encourage you to continue to move forward with piloting the assessment of our goals.

--MUSI 128, 228, 328, 428 Applied Musicianship in Marching Band Workshop (.5 credit, gen. ed. G1 courses)
Approved, effective Fall 1999

New Undergraduate Interdepartmental Minor

--Multi-Disciplinary Minor in Environmental Hazards and Emergency Management
Approved - proposal will be recommended to the Council of Trustees and Board of Governors. Effective date to be determined when notification of State System approval is received, which is estimated to be approximately one year from now.

COMMENT: The subject code EHEM will be used as a subject designation for EHEM 498 Independent Study. Other existing courses that may count in the minor will retain the subject code of the department offering the course. Dr. Henry Fischer in the Sociology/Anthropology Department will coordinate the administration of this minor.

Revision of Undergraduate Academic Policy

--Major QPA Definition
Approved, as revised, effective immediately for enrolled students.

COMMENT: During the review of this Faculty Senate recommendation, Deans Council spent considerable time discussing several issues. Department chairpersons were also consulted. Deans Council found that different departments address the course content and pedagogy differently with regard to defining the major--thus, resulting in varying terminology interpretations. The revision is intended to address these concerns.

Department chairpersons and Deans Council noted that professional education courses are counted differently across departments. Deans Council was unable to find a common definition to meet all the academic needs. For this reason, the revised policy states which professional education courses will count toward the major QPA. (We believe that not listing these courses in the policy would result in departments petitioning the Faculty Senate for inclusion at a future date.)

The Department of Foreign Languages contains several majors in distinct languages with required courses in a second language. The revision clarifies how these courses should be counted.

Because the B.S.Ed. in Social Studies is a multi-departmental major, calculating courses for the major QPA is included in the revision.

Department chairpersons and Deans Council agreed that determining what is included towards the 50% in the major rule is a corollary to the definition for the Major QPA. Thus, we proposed to reference what should be counted toward the 50% rule in this policy.

NOTE: Implementation of the major QPA policy for all currently enrolled students should not have any negative impact on individual students. However, in the event that a student is adversely affected by the change, Deans Council is amenable to using the previous calculation method on an individual basis. The only students who might be jeopardized are those in BSE programs who are in danger of dropping below the minimum requirement of a 2.00 in the major. The new policy could cause such a situation to occur for two reasons: the exclusion of courses that were historically included in the major QPA, or the inclusion of courses that were not previously used in the QPA calculation. An example is the exclusion of EDFN 211, 241, and 330 from major QPAs for Elementary Education and Special Education majors. Conversely, MUSI 171, 271, 372, and 373 will be added to the major QPA calculation for music education majors.
For comparison purposes, the original motion passed by Faculty Senate is included for your review and is followed by the Revised Policy:

Original Motion:

That the university universally adopt the following statement concerning determination of major QPA:

The major QPA includes all core courses, major electives, and any other major courses taken beyond the minimum requirements for the major. Required related courses are not included in this calculation.

Revised Major QPA Definition:
The major QPA includes all required and elective courses in the major. It also includes any courses in the major department that may count toward the major that are taken beyond the minimum requirements for the major. Required related courses are not included in this calculation.

When determining that a transfer student has completed 50% of the major at Millersville, the courses used in calculating the major QPA will determine the total number of courses/credits required for the major.

The following professional education courses are NOT included in the major QPA calculation:

EDFN 211, 241, and 330
EDSE 321, 433, and 435
Because some departments offer teaching methods courses that extensively integrate pedagogy and content knowledge from their discipline, the following courses WILL BE included in the calculation of the major QPA for their respective majors:

Art	ART 321, ART 322, ART 323, ART 325
English	ENGL 485, ENGL 487
Foreign Language	FORL 480
Industry & Technology	EDTE 291, 391
Mathematics	MATH 315
Music	MUSI 171, MUSI 271, MUSI 372, MUSI 373

The major QPA for foreign language majors is based on courses taken in the primary language only.

The QPA in the BSE Social Studies program is based only on courses taken in the option (History, Psychology, etc.) and not on the social studies courses, some of which may count towards the G3 block of the Liberal Arts Core.

Obviously, considerable time and effort were expended in considering the Major QPA issues. The students are certain to benefit from the cooperative efforts of the faculty and administration. We thank you for your patience as the administration evaluated these issues.

c: Ms. Frances Axsmith, Assistant Registrar
Ms. Candace Deen, Academic Information Officer
Mr. Mariano Gonzalez, University Registrar
Dr. Paul Specht, Academic Advisement
Ms. Rachael Wywadis, Associate Registrar
Dr. Dan Heslink, Music
Dr. Henry Fischer, Sociology/Anthropology
Deans' Council