Core Education Committee

Oregon State University Faculty Senate

Meeting of the Core Education Committee
May 21, 2025
10:00-11:45 A.m.
Zoom

Minutes

Committee members present: Kelsey Emard (Co-chair), Daniel Faltesek (Co-chair), Andrea Allan, Aidas Banaitis, Abigail Crowell, Liz Delf, Matthew Kennedy, Lori McGraw, Holly Mitchell, Kari-Lyn Sakuma, Dave Stemper, Paula Weiss

Committee members absent: Brian Mills, Vipin Arora

Ex-officio members present: Stephanie Baugh (Curriculum Management), Heath Henry (General Education Assessment), McKenzie Huber (Core Education Director), Kali Furman (Difference, Power & Oppression Director), Karen Watte (Ecampus), Ashley Holmes (WIC)

Visitors and staff present: Caitlin Calascibetta (Faculty Senate Office), Andrew Valls (Faculty Senate President), Troy Hall, Michael Jefferis, Kristin Nagy Katz, Caryn Stoess

 

New Business & Information Items

The co-chairs called the meeting to order.

• Bridge Programs and Transitions Courses
  • o Options: the committee could decide on a case-by-case basis; the committee could create a policy; the committee could work with Transitions coordinators in each college what the experience is; or the committee could debate further here in the meeting. A member asked if guidelines could be put in place while also seeking guidance from the transitions coordinators. There is also a concern about setting a precedent so there is a preference for getting guidance and policy set around the topic. Bridge is the onboarding experience for many freshmen. The co-chairs will ask the Transitions coordinators for their opinion on the matter and report back to the committee.

Course Reviews

The committee reviewed and discussed the following Core Education proposals.

• For all SW courses: There is hope in the future that the students will be able to finish this program in 3 years. The goal is for it to become an accelerated program, but regardless of if the program is approved, the unit’s aim to give students more flexibility to focus on their major courses faster. There is some concern that they will not be reaching a broad enough audience when they come back for recertification in a few years. The hours issue will be left for the Curriculum Council to go over.
• SW 204 Antiracism and Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion in Practice (2nd review)
  • Content is good but it is unclear if the instructor can cover all of it in 5 weeks.

Action: Motion to approve with a note to the Curriculum Council that there are some concerns about the workload meeting the credit hours requirement; seconded. The motion passed with 10 votes in favor, 1 vote in opposition and 1 abstention.

• SW 205 Affirming Neurodiversity (2nd review)
  • Learning Outcome (LO) 1 Essential Assignment (EA) has been clarified; managing presentations clarified; demonstration inclusion of marginalized voices clarified; the tables in the syllabus don’t match.

Action: Motion to conditionally approve pending an update to the tables so that they are consistent and with a note to the Curriculum Council that there are some concerns about the workload meeting the credit hours requirement; seconded. The motion passed with 10 votes in favor, 0 votes in opposition and 2 abstentions.

• SW 414 Advocacy for Human Rights and Social Justice
  • Similar concerns as SW 204.

Action: Motion to approve with a note to Curriculum Council that there are some concerns about the workload meeting the credit hours requirement; seconded. 10, 0, 2.

• SW 214 Culturally Affirming and Nonviolent Communication
  • LO 2 does not have students describing different forms of media. For LO 1, it does not identify actual communication theories. The co-chairs will send a separate email to the proposer with concerns that it seems like the goal of all these core ed courses in SW is to keep SW major students taking their entire core curriculum within major, which is the opposite of the vision of the Core Education program.

Action: Motion to rollback SW 214 with the following notes: 1) The assessments and essential assignment for Learning Outcome 2 need to have students comparing across different forms of communication/media, but currently they just pick one. 2) Focus the communication theory to clarify exactly which communication theories are taught in the course. 3) Revise to have broader audiences for the speech (one-on-one activities will not meet the LOCR); seconded. The motion passed with 11 votes in favor, 0 votes in opposition and 1 abstention.

• SW 211 Dignifying Death (2nd review)
  • They did a good job responding to all the concerns it was initially sent back for, but they did not have an hour count. However, it is unclear how they can cover the content in the timeframe they have. It is not reaching the LOs and criteria for the category. Requesting a liaison comment from School of Writing, Literature & Film. They did get an endorsement from Jon Kaplan.

Action: Motion to rollback SW 211: 1) the course seems to use humanities approaches (of writing and literature/film analysis) to ideas of death, but it doesn't appear to be an introduction to the fundamental ideas in writing and literature/film analysis (which seems to be the primary mode of humanities used in this course); 2) we ask that you  obtain liaison comments from the School of Writing, Literature, and Film given the content of the course; seconded. The motion passed with 10 votes in favor, 0 votes in opposition and 2 abstentions.

• COUN 212 Global History of Mental Health (2nd review)
  • A lot of work was put into fixing the course, but it does not feel like a global course – every week had some sort of Western focus. There was also a lot of philosophical focus. The hour count seems uneven.

Action: Motion to rollback COUN 212: Our initial assessment of this course was that this course did not fit the category. As more details have been provided, we sustain this motion. The course does not meet the category. 1) in looking at the content of the course, there is still key usage of western philosophers like Foucault, Descartes, etc. and a focus on how the West experienced colonization, etc.; 2) does not introduce fundamental ideas of arts & humanities; 3) lacks depth of teaching how to do comparative analysis and really dive deeply into the humanities concepts and approaches and especially ideas of colonization and anticolonialism. Given these reasons, we don't see this course fitting the category; seconded. The motion passed with 11 votes in favor, 0 votes in opposition and 1 abstention.

• CROP 350 Producing More with Less: Challenges in World Food Production and Security
  • It is unclear if Social Science is embedded enough in the course. They have the structure to do it, but they need to meet all the requirements. They do spend the first two weeks introducing an analytic framework, which is something students can use in the future.

Action: Motion to rollback: The committee is excited by this course's potential for Seeking Solutions. The analytical framework introduced at the beginning of the course for later application was a strong and creative approach. We need a few minor revisions to fully address the Seeking Solutions category: 1) more social science content and materials need to be integrated into the course (guest speakers cannot be relied upon); 2) 30-minutes of weekly mentoring must be provided regardless of whether a TA is provided or not, so that will need to be figured out, there are various ways to accomplish mentoring; and 3) more clarity on how teamwork skills will be assessed; seconded. The motion passed with 12 votes in favor, 0 votes in opposition and 0 abstentions.

• RNG 470 Pastoral Systems of the World
  • It is a good course for the category but LO 2 but doesn’t have students analyzing consequences as required in the Learning Outcome, Criteria and Rationale (LOCR) requirements. LO 4 doesn’t explain how the assignments are being evaluated.

Action: Motion to rollback RNG 470: Great potential course for Seeking Solutions. Minor revisions are needed to achieve the full category requirements: 1) The activities and assignments for LO2 need to have students comparing consequences across different possible solutions/approaches, rather than just examining one; and 2) How will teamwork skills be assessed for LO4?; seconded. The motion passed with 12 votes in favor, 0 votes in opposition and 0 abstentions.

• LEAD 262 Team and Organizational Leadership
  • There are no issues with the course but there are some concerns about the name from the College of Business liaison. They have not adequately set it up as an intro to organizational leadership.

Action: Motion to rollback LEAD 262: For the Social Science category, the course needs to focus on explaining and evaluating how social systems, structures, and institutions shape outcomes and behavior; also, Social Science courses must be an introduction to a field of social sciences, please clarify what field of social science this course introduces and needs an Ecampus redevelopment proposal; seconded. The motion passed with 11 votes in favor, 0 votes in opposition and 1 abstention.

• LING 201 Introduction to Language, Linguistics, and Power
  • There is very little information on the course content and how they meet the LOs. No institution provided.

Action: Motion to rollback LING 201 – the committee is unsure how this course is a social science course or meets all the social science LOs and criteria; the committee recommends considering this course for the Arts & Humanities – General category, or even potentially Difference, Power & Oppression - Foundations (with some revisions); seconded. The motion passed with 12 votes in favor, 0 votes in opposition and 0 abstentions.

• AEC 254 Introduction to Natural Resource Economics and Policy
  • Overall, meets the LOs for the most part but the description for qualitative data is very weak. Main concern is that the category already has three AEC courses, and they are all intros to the same subfield with only minor variations. The EAs for the LOs are essay questions on exams – does that qualify as an essential assignment?

Action: Motion to rollback for more information of the qualitative data used in the course; please provide a reasoning for adding another course to Core Ed so similar to what is covered in AEC 250, 122, and 251; seconded. The motion passed with 12 votes in favor, 0 votes in opposition and 0 abstentions.

• HST 104 World History: Ancient Civilizations
  • There are few details on course activities. Why are they discussing US History? What is an oral paper? There is no explanation for what it is.

Action: Motion to roll back with comments: 1) please add more detail to the descriptions of Learning Outcomes and assessment methods; 2) remove references to U.S. history in the syllabus course content list; and 3) respond to liaison comments in CIM; seconded. The motion passed with 12 votes in favor, 0 votes in opposition and 0 abstentions.

• TRAL 227 Outside: Sharing your Outdoor Origin Story
  • Discussion moved to the next meeting.

Adjournment

With no further discussion or business before the committee, the co-chairs adjourned the meeting.