Student Affairs Committee (SAC) Minutes, Governance Retreat, July 11-12, 2002

1. Acceptance of Minutes: Roger Wise motioned and Adele Anderson seconded approval of May minutes; passed unanimously. June minutes are still in preparation.

2. Year Agenda: SAC membership considered the printed agenda items for 2002-2003. Tai Arnold asked to add a training piece to item on discussion of impact of the new policies and their impact on students. Office of Academic Affairs is doing programs on the new academic policies especially academic progress rates. SAC will receive reports and consultation on how to make the rollout easier. (Additional copies of the new policies booklet were handed out to members.

3. SAC Charge: The SAC charge was discussed, along with the importance of orientation to new representatives. It was noted that there has been increasing commonality with APLPC (Academic Policies and Learning Programs) whereas in the past SAC had dealt with less central issues. The names and functions of the other governance committees were briefly reviewed, referring to the sheets included in the Governance retreat packet. The request was made to have more time for people to talk about their areas and work assignments.

4. Discussion, Student Representation and Involvement: There has historically been difficulty getting active student participation in governance committees. The College needs to help people get a greater sense of affiliation and connection with others. On the other hand, meeting other students is not a top agenda item for many of our students, according to student opinion surveys. Busy adults do not seek personal bonding in the same ways or to the extent as traditional students. But we can argue that affiliation is connected to retention. Also, opportunities to be involved are not always well defined; this carries through to the alumni population. Retention has been hard to define at ESC, and the recent head count of 15,000 students served translates to only seven thousand in the full time matriculation equivalent. More people at ESC are part time and thus total a lower enrollment figure. How can we represent all these students, and give them more of a voice? Issues such as the policies and the college-wide calendar need to be viewed from students’ ; perspectives.

5. Discussion, Students and Resources: There was discussion of the difference of resources addressing student needs such as General Education requirements, writing, math, and library supports at each Center and Unit. Genesee Valley has a Writing Center staffed with tutors, for example; there is a Writers’ Complex on the Web, but these are not the answer for all ESC students. There is possible developmental (credit not counting toward the degree) writing to help students succeed, but we don’t have developmental reading and writing expertise. How can SAC help develop local resources or make them more consistent to access across the College? Even student activities and practices for mentor contacts can vary widely across locations. One suggestion was to get a better handle on what we have for developmental needs in reading, math, writing, and computer skills, to develop a list of resources. (Items included entry, development, student service staff, outcomes, and learning resources.) Another suggestion was to investigate partnerships with other entities for greater student resources. There was interest in benchmarking strategies for resource access and recognition opportunities across locations of the College.

This segment of the meeting adjourned at 3:00 PM.

Friday, July 12, 2002

The meeting began with introductions of attending SAC and PPBC members. The historic joint meeting focused on the following items:

Discussion of student academic achievement and ideas for recognition.

Term based calendars.

Student Achievement and Recognition

The conversation regarding student academic achievement and recognition began with a reading of the 2002 SAC proposal, which was presented to, and passed by the Senate. The discussion that followed included a look at the history of student achievement initiatives at Empire State College, the current practices at some regional centers, and the possibilities for future college wide initiatives.

One challenge that was raised focused on the question of student and faculty involvement at a distributed college. We do things on our own, but how can we share these initiatives and ideas with one another on a college-wide basis?

Several possibilities for honoring student academic achievement were discussed. One possibility for student recognition might be the completion of an Honors Project with individual faculty or a faculty team. The honors project could be recorded on the students’ transcript. Another idea was the development of a process for centers to implement, consistent with the learning process at Empire State College. The criteria would be up front and clear to students, and could reflect a student’s complete body of work. Another possibility for recognition was the idea of a Presidential Scholar.

It was agreed that a singular approach was not the theme, but a creative brainstorming approach of all the possibilities for academic recognition would be pursued by a sub committee of two PPBC and three SAC members. This group will meet and draft proposals for the larger committees to consider.

Term Based Calendar

President Moore presented information on the current term calendars for Corporate College, The Harry Van Arsdale Center for Labor Studies, Graduate Programs, Forum and Center for Distance Learning. Many Empire State College students are already enrolled in terms in these programs. Through the process of conversation and feedback with these Program Directors and Deans, a more consistent calendar may be designed.

A more challenging and spirited conversation will occur this year in a discussion of the independent study term calendar. The current term calendar may never change, but the Genesee Valley Center has chosen to experiment with a modified term calendar beginning in the spring 2003. As a pilot program, the GVC will analyze student feedback and retention rates and compare the data to other centers. Bob Milton, GVC Dean/Director hopes to learn more about retention and patterns of enrollment.

Several SAC student representatives shared their feelings about the flexible nature of the regional center calendars, and the challenges inherent to being a student in a distributed environment. Some of the opportunities available for students to be more connected include participation in a local Alumni Student Association, discussion threads on the web site, and through the SAC newsletter.

Respectfully submitted,

Karin Dedrick

Roger Wise, Ken Porter-Hutton and Lee Purcell noted that the student representatives do represent the student body as a sample of one hopefully representing the entire universe of students.

Focus Group Study:

Adele Anderson and Ken Porter-Hutton spoke about the focus group study that is ongoing. Anyone wanting greater detail about the study can contact Adele. This study is a true qualitative research piece that might be submitted for publication.

The project started at the Genesee Valley Center. The focus groups focused on student experience of Empire State College. Four themes have emerged so far: 1) Idea of the quality of the mentor student contact, 2) the difficulty of educational planning, 3) translating the college experience to outside experience, 4) student social supports.

With regard to the idea of the quality of the mentor student contact Adele noted that this is a serious issue touching on topics such as the lack of a timely response by mentors, lack of a backup for an absent mentor, lack of a college community for students, students feel a lack of support.

Ken Porter-Hutton added that students view the student-mentor relationship as their most important engagement at the college. Students want to be able to call and get a response. Students also tend to view the faculty as constituting a community among themselves to the exclusion of students. This exclusion of students is not in keeping with the ESC idea that we are a community of learners.

The study will be continued at the Long Island Center and will include a substantial number of unit students.

A general group discussion about the focus group results ensued:

Roger Wise asked if SAC ought to take up the issue of mentor student contact.

Adele Anderson suggested a need to find out how students change from pragmatic learners to students with broader educational goals.

The Vermont Project:

Kathleen Egan described how an ESC team will travel to a conference where they will be assisted by consultants with regard to specific problems the team will present. The team will report at the September conference call. The problem of how representative the makeup of the ESC team is was discussed.

Further Discussion of Focus Group Results:

There was a general interest in seeing whether the focus group results so far reflect what is going on at other centers. So far focus groups have been held at Genesee Valley and CDL. During the Summer 2002 groups will be held at the Long Island Center.

Ken Porter-Hutton raised issue of our need to understand better what is actually going on with students.

Adele Anderson suggested that Tai Arnold could be asked about the student opinion surveys that go out every two years.

Marianne Weatherup noted that it took her 2 1/2 years of being a student to feel like she's in a college.

Newsletter:

Fall and Spring issues being planned. These newsletter topics were suggested:

Opportunities for student involvement

General Education issues

Disability policy

Student academic progress

Financial aid information

Scholarships

The new branding

An article on Governance by the student representatives to the Governance retreat

Meetings and Conference Calls:

Tuesday 10/29 face to face meeting

Friday 2/21 face to face meeting

Conference call will be at 1 p.m. on Wednesdays. Schedule to be distributed

Policies and Procedures for Students:

Tai Arnold reported that a packet has gone out to students. She stated that the college is working on engaging center people in a training program about the nitty gritty of these policies. The computerized aspect of the policies will not be implemented until everyone is trained. The ESC Network has a discussion page up.

It was noted that among other questions to be addressed was included the issue of how to deal with students who have more deficits than they can reasonably make up.

Deans have the right to make exceptions on enrollment but not on financial aid.

Under the new model, financial aid offices will have more responsibility for informing students about issues.

The sense is that this project will not be implemented before 9/02.

Tai Arnold will attend center meetings to discuss the policies and procedures.

Respectfully submitted,

Jose Del Pilar