Snow College General Education Committee
January 24, 2012
In attendance: Mel Jacobsen, Melanie Jenkins, LaFaun Barnhurst,
Clinton King, Joseph Papenfuss, Tracie Bradley, Patty Meredith,
Jeff Carney (chair), Rick White (ex officio)
Action on the minutes of 1.24.2012 was postponed.
Rick indicated that he would meet with Math, Science, and English to discuss the CAAP
and CCSEQ data that was gathered last year. Specifically, the discussions should identify
what we learned from the data and how we responded. Jeff pointed out that as a committee
we have agreed to require most GE courses to be accountable for Outcome 6 (analytical, critical,
and creative reasoning) and that this decision results from our collective dissatisfaction
with the results of the Scientific Reasoning portion of the CAAP data. The committee
also spent some time discussing the merits of adding reading instruction to some of
our GE courses as a result of our dissatisfaction with the results of the Reading
portion of the CAAP data. The spirit of the committee is that some portion of the
GE Worksheet (yet to be determined) should be held accountable for the reading component
of GE Outcome 2 (information literacy). Jeff pointed out that he and Dr. Smith agree
that teaching students to read the literature associated with the various disciplines
is pedagogically sound. The committee agreed that if such a requirement is implemented,
it should be up to the individual departments to determine the exact nature of the readings. Patty
expressed some concern that not all instructors may feel qualified to teach reading.
The possibility of conducting an inservice was mentioned.