Vol. 38, No. 18

4-7-2004
By: Joni Bentz Seal

New arts and sciences structure proving beneficial

The federation of the Colleges of the Arts and Sciences, created last July to enhance collaboration, elevate the stature and promote efficiencies across the five colleges of the arts and sciences, is making significant progress toward its charge.

“Positioning Ohio State to become one of the top public research and teaching universities, per the Academic Plan, required the arts and sciences to become a dynamic epicenter of undergraduate education,” said Michael Hogan, executive dean of the arts and sciences. “We’ve created an environment in which there are incentives for positive change and strategies that enable the development of innovative interdisciplinary and cross-disciplinary programs to enhance the diversity of our students, faculty, staff and the curriculum.”

Composed of the colleges of Arts, Biological Sciences, Humanities, Mathematical and Physical Sciences, and Social and Behavioral Sciences, the federation has progressed steadily during the past eight months toward the goals listed in the White Paper on the Federation of the Colleges of the Arts and Sciences issued last May by President Karen Holbrook and former Provost Ed Ray. Among them: promoting new curricula; strengthening advising and career counseling; improving joint and cluster hiring; and enhancing interdisciplinary study and research opportunities for students have emerged prominently.

Hogan said there’s a tremendous sense of cooperation and enthusiasm about looking across what used to be borders. “There are good discussions happening about shared research experiences on the curricular side,” he said. “The Freshman Seminars are a good example of the result of those discussions. I don’t think we could have pulled that program together so quickly if we were separate entities.”

Edward Adelson, associate executive dean of the arts and sciences, said the underpinnings of the progress has been the restructuring of the former Arts and Sciences Curriculum Committee, which for the first time is composed of elected, rather than appointed representatives, and is intended to expand the authority of faculty.

“We’ve restored the direct faculty oversight of the curriculum, as mandated by the University Rules, through a major re-working of the Rules of the Faculty Senate of the Colleges of the Arts and Sciences,” Adelson said, referring to the 15-member Committee on Curriculum and Instruction (CCI). “We took the former committee and suggested it become a broad-based committee with more representation from the colleges. We have a committee now that is responsive to the needs of faculty of the arts and sciences and who can think more effectively across college and departmental lines. The result is a tremendous number of new curricular initiatives.”

Four standing subcommittees of the CCI are assessing core competencies in the following areas: interdisciplinary initiatives/program creation; the General Education Curriculum (GEC) (two subcommittees); and the new Freshman Seminars program.

Based on their respective areas of focus, the subcommittees are exploring — and in some cases implementing — new interdisciplinary minors, increased faculty research and curricular collaborations, and a host of interdisciplinary programs and courses, scholars opportunities and internships.
For example, the colleges of Biological Sciences and MAPS are discussing collaborative research and teaching activities, including possible joint faculty appointments; two new arts and sciences scholars groups have formed; and the number of internships — 1,900 last year — is expected to top 2,300 this year.

Also underway is a sweeping curricular review that includes wholesale appraisals of GEC categories, a comprehensive outcomes assessment of GEC and major courses, and evaluation of curricular resources across the five colleges. One component, Adelson said — in light of heightened interest sparked by the Enron and other corporate and government debacles — is the creation of an ethics task force to investigate the possibility of an ethics content requirement.

Adelson said the enhanced CCI is now the focal point for all disciplinary and interdisciplinary curricula in the arts and sciences, and this allows for broader discussion and engagement among faculty across the colleges.

“Through such interaction, faculty may discover new uses for a course that they might not have considered for their own major, or create a nexus between the material in a course from another department and what they teach that results in a new interdisciplinary offering,” Adelson said.

“Those are the kinds of endless connections that are possible in a rich arts and sciences environment that were being inhibited by the curricular silos of the five colleges.”

ADMINISTRATIVE ENHANCEMENTS

The executive dean, in cooperation with the college deans, is seeking to develop templates for more cooperative, supportive and non-competitive services common to the five colleges. In addition, a new Pattern of Administration (POA) of the Arts and Sciences has been developed by the executive dean following considerable consultation with the college deans and the arts and sciences faculty at large. The document describes the structure and organization of the federation, provides guidelines for meetings and enumerates standing and other committees.

“The model that’s now established ensures faculty ownership of the curriculum while still permitting deans to do everything else they are supposed to do,” Hogan said.

He said three working committees have been created — business operations, computing and instructional technology, and communications and alumni relations — to find efficiencies and synergies across the colleges. “Whenever possible, we want an open dialogue about improving processes,” Hogan said. “In some cases, increasing efficiency may result simply from sharing best practices, whether in technology or fiscal management, from which all the colleges can benefit.”

A new Faculty Leadership Committee joins the six standing committees under the POA. This committee is empowered to bring any issue of faculty concern to the executive dean.

“It’s a great move forward because no such committee has existed like this where the bulk of the members are non-administrative faculty and are elected by their college faculty,” Adelson said. “The committee fosters a direct pipeline to the executive dean on issues of great importance, such as the budget, fund allocation and research investment. "

Two strategic realignments, recommended in the white paper for early implementation, involved moving the Undergraduate International Studies Program (USIP) — formerly under the College of Social and Behavioral Sciences — and Undergraduate Student Academic Services (USAS) — formerly in undergraduate studies — under the executive dean. Adelson said international studies, a robust major with nearly 550 students, was an obvious candidate for repositioning since it is the epitome of programming that crosses college boundaries. And housing USAS within the federation creates a sense of unity for students between their departmental academic advising and the professional advising they receive from their USAS adviser about their general education requirements and career counseling, he added.

“It fosters conversations between the USAS advisers and the faculty who teach those essential courses, which allows the advisers to do a better job helping students understand what their options are. Since the arts and sciences deliver 90-plus percent of the GEC, and USAS advisers counsel on that curriculum, having all parties report to the same place is a big step in the right direction,” Adelson said.

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