Council approves online evaluations
The evaluation questions require additional approval.
Published April 11, 2008
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Intercollegiate Athletics Committee Chairwoman Anne McKendry and Lori Franz, NCAA Faculty Representative of Intercollegiate Athletics Committee, speak as guests during Thursday afternoon’s Faculty Council meeting in Memorial Union. Franz and McKenry said MU athletes are doing well academically.
The MU Faculty Council met Thursday to approve two initiatives related to admitting transfer students and faculty evaluations that will be posted online.
The council approved a proposal to align the grade-point average calculation for transfer students with the current policy used for MU students.
Under the newly approved calculation method, transfer students can now have the highest grade from a class calculated as a part of their GPA if the student has repeated a class.
That policy will only be applied if the policy at the institution where the grade was earned matches or exceeds the repeat grade policy at MU. If the policy at the other institution exceeds the MU policy, then the transfer student’s GPA will be calculated according to the MU policy.
“We would not recalculate if the other school doesn’t recalculate it,” Academic Affairs Committee Chairman Tom Phillips said. “But we accept their policy if it matches ours.”
Phillips said the new policy would help students who want to transfer to MU.
“It just means that if a student is coming in on a borderline GPA because they have retaken a class and got an A, we don’t have to say, ‘Sorry, you just missed coming in because we don’t count that A,’” Phillips said.
The council also approved a set of three questions that would be used to evaluate instructors in accordance with an omnibus higher education act passed in Missouri early last year.
According to a meeting document, the three statements students would use to rate instructors are: “The course content, including the lectures, syllabus, grading standards and student responsibilities, was presented clearly,” “The instructor was interested in student learning” and, “Considering both the possibilities and limitations of the subject matter and the course (including class size and classroom facilities), the instructor taught effectively.”
Students will be asked to rate their level of agreement of disagreement with those three statements.
Faculty Council Chairman Frank Schmidt said he had not received any additional feedback from faculty after a general faculty meeting on April 1.
The questions that were approved were not changed since they were discussed at the previous council meeting.
Phillips said the recommended questions that were approved by the council would now have to be approved by Vice Provost for Undergraduate Studies Jim Spain.
