10/25/94

CONTACT: Stanford University News Service (650) 723-2558

Faculty Senate will consider undergraduate education proposals

STANFORD -- The Faculty Senate will begin consideration of the recommendations from the Commission on Undergraduate Education with a discussion about the proposed new science requirement on Thursday, Nov. 10.

Senate Chair Robert Simoni said that the Steering Committee on Oct. 19 decided that recommendations from the commission report should be discussed at senate meetings throughout the year.

No schedule or specific plans are set beyond Nov. 10, but Simoni predicted that consideration of the suggested language and writing requirements might come soon.

“These are the kind of academic curricular issues that the senate should spend its time discussing,” Simoni said.

At the Oct. 13 senate meeting, several faculty members complained about what appeared to be plans to establish curriculum design committees before the senate had an opportunity to review the report's basic proposals.

During that meeting, English Professor Regenia Gagnier said that she had assumed “we would come in and have a debate” that day about the commission's recommendations. She asked if the senate was supposed to “just react” to the implementation committees after they develop plans “or are we going to have some process where the senate's going to actually be able to debate these recommendations?”

At its next meeting, according to Simoni, the Steering Committee “agreed with Gagnier” and others who made similar points.

The proposed new science breadth requirement for nonscience and nonengineering majors is first up for discussion, Simoni said, because it generated the most comment at the Oct. 13 meeting.

Chairs of appropriate campus and medical departments will be invited to the Nov. 10 discussion.

-kb-

941025Arc4077.html

This is an archived release.

This release is not available in any other form. Images mentioned in this release are not available online.
Stanford News Service has an extensive library of images, some of which may be available to you online. Direct your request by EMail to newslibrary@stanford.edu.