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Self-Study Notes |
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Roanoke College |
04/12/00 |
No. 2 |
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A Note from the President I am pleased to share with you some important information about our reaffirmation of accreditation process. The chair of our Reaffirmation Committee will be Dr. Linda Salane, Vice President for Strategic Planning and Assessment at Columbia College in Columbia, South Carolina.
Dr. Salane has held several key administrative posts at Columbia College, has served the Commission on Colleges of the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools in a variety of ways, and is an experienced chair of Reaffirmation Committees. Coincidentally, Ed Whitson and Greg Weiss attended a workshop on assessment that she conducted last December at the SACS annual meeting and came away very impressed by her understanding of liberal arts education and her presentation ability.
The dates for the Reaffirmation Committee's visit have now been finalized. The team will arrive on Monday, November 6th and be here through Thursday, November 9th. Please make a note of these dates. All of us should make an effort to be on campus throughout their visit. Beginning early in fall semester, Greg Weiss will provide many more details about our responsibilitis during the visit.
David M. Gring Compliance Audit group nears end The Compliance Audit Committee has completed its review of the SACS' 400-plus "must" statements and hopes to have a draft of the compliance report done by the end of spring semester. Members of the campus community will have an opportunity to review and comment on the document. Overall, the review has generally proceeded on schedule and has revealed only a few areas in which additional work is likely to be needed to bring the college into compliance with the SACS Criteria. More information about this phase (as well as the following phases) of the Self-Study process can be found at the campus Web site: Steering Committee The Steering Committee reports that SACS has received acceptances from all four people who were invited to serve on the Strategic Study Visiting Committee. The committee also reviewed the final report of the Calendar Task Force and helped gain the Board of Trustee's approval of the revised Statement of Purpose at their Feb. 11 meeting. According to its monitoring of other Self-Study groups, the Steering Committee reports that work is progressing "nicely." Calendar Task Force concludes The Calendar Task Force submitted its final report to the Steering Committee on Feb. 10. The task force concluded that class meeting times at Roanoke College compare favorably to those at other institutions, and therefore it suggested that changes to the college's calendar were neither needed nor desired. To reach that conclusion, task force members reviewed information from 35 colleges and universities. |
Board approves Purpose Statement The Board of Trustees approved the revised Statement of Purpose at its February meeting. The approval came after resolution of a procedural question that arose following the Nov. 19, 1999, faculty meeting. After the Faculty Affairs Committee consulted with an outside parliamentary procedure expert, the committee offered a second vote to faculty at the Jan. 19 meeting. However, the faculty declined the second vote, clearing the way for the trustees' review of the statement. ILG reviews next round of courses The Intensive Learning Group is considering some 20 courses that are in the planning stages for May 2001. It hopes that many of these proposals can be passed along to the Curriculum Committee and be ready for faculty approval this spring or next fall. ILG has also discussed guidelines for independent studies, internships, and non-traditional students in the program and submitted them to FAC, which forwarded them to the appropriate standing committees for review. ILG completed its work on an assessment plan, and it has been submitted to the Strategic Study Committee for their review.  Strategic Study Committee hosts third consultant Dr. Charles Toomajian, from Williams College, discussed the new Intensive Learning Program at the invitation of the Strategic Study Committee. Because Williams has a program similar to the one under development here, Dr. Toomajian was able to offer many suggestions and recommendations to the Intensive Learning Task Force. Based on his remarks and those of the earlier two consultants, the Strategic Study Committee has developed an assessment plan for intensive learning. As a part of that effort, it has created a list of objectives for May term courses, and it is currently planning student focus groups that will help to plan the May term. The committee also designed an assessment strategy for CCLS and has submitted a report that details that strategy to the Steering Committee. Over the summer, the Strategic Study Committee will review the evaluation results from the first year of co-curricular and intensive learning so that recommendations for changes may be made early the following year.  Need more information? Please contact Greg Weiss (x2416), Director of the Self-Study, for more information about the Self-Study. To submit items for the newsletter, please contact Tom Carter (x2366), editor. |