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UCPC Minutes

June 20, 2013

UpChurch Conference Room — Bell Engineering

MEMBERS PRESENT:

Voting: Professors M.S. Bradley, N.D. Dennis, A. J. Dowdle, A.E. Ellstrand, V.H. Hunt, J.T. Scott, T.G. Shields, J.D. Wiersma

Non-Voting: Professors J. Ganson, P.R. Koski, A. O’Leary-Kelly

MEMBERS ABSENT:

Voting: Professors T. P. Cronan, R.M. Costrell, P.M. Hewitt, F.M. Scheide, P.R. Selvam

Non-Voting: Professors C.H. Adams, L.J. Robertson, M.T. Miller; Ms. Harwood-Rom

GUESTS: Professors R. Sabherwal, J. Turner, K. Vickers; Dr. W.K. Warnock; Ms. L. Mosesso

SECRETARY: Ms. T. M. Fisher


The meeting was called to order at 2:00 p.m. by Chair Patricia Koski
  1. Minutes for the May 16th, 2013, Graduate Council meeting stand approved, as no changes were suggested. (The minutes of the Graduate Council may be found at http://grad.uark.edu/dean/gradcouncil/minutes/).
  2. Professor Koski thanked the outgoing Council members for their service to the University: Norm Dennis, Alan Ellstrand, Paul Hewitt, and Frank Scheide.
  3. Professor Koski reported that the Academic Appeals Committee heard one full grievance and several appeals since the last meeting.
  4. Professor Koski reported that the Teaching Assistant Effectiveness Advisory Committee is working hard on preparing for the TA Orientation in August.
  5. A proposal by the Department of Music to create an area of interest in Collaborative Music in the M.M. degree was tabled because there was no one from the Department to present the proposal.
  6. New Business:
    1. Professor R. Sabherwal presented a proposal to modify the candidacy exam procedures for the Ph.D. degree in Business Administration with a specialization in Information Systems, as described in Section V of Attachment A. Following discussion, this proposal was approved and will go to the Faculty Senate in September.
    2. Professor J. Turner and Ms. L. Mosesso presented a proposal from the English as a Second Language (EASL) Committee to modify language requirements for international graduate students (Attachment B) and international teaching assistants (Attachment C). Following discussion, a proposal was made to approve the proposal and was then tabled to allow more input from constituencies. Professor Koski thanked Professor Turner for her many years of dedicated service to the University community, including serving on the Teaching Assistant Effectiveness Advisory Committee and chairing the EASL Committee.
  7. The Council discussed whether courses such as GNEG 5801 and GNEG 5811, which are not graded and carry no degree credit, will fulfill the Graduate Council requirement that post-candidacy doctoral students be enrolled in course work or dissertation hours every semester until they graduate. The Council agreed to poll their constituents on whether there are such courses in other colleges.
  8. Discussion: Council members reported from their constituents on the issue of whether we should institute mandatory checking for theses and dissertations before they can be submitted to the Graduate School to meet degree requirements. Following this discussion, the Council agreed that we will require that the student submit his/her thesis/dissertation for plagiarism checking on Turnitin.com if our license allows us to set up a class which any graduate student can access for this purpose. It was also agreed that if we are able to do this, the Council will revisit the issue in a year.
  9. The graduate faculty recommendations contained in Attachment D were approved.

There being no other business, the Council adjourned at 3:03 p.m.