View source for WASC: CCSC meeting, 17 Apr 06

Quick intro (by Richard):
* Overview of WASC process
* Current plan for UG education [[WASC Proposal|proposal]]: teaching quality and undergraduate workload

Discussion:
* Redefining the core?  
** Core has a bit of a bootcamp mentality.  Perhaps we should look at this?
** Example - Cambridge has much less of a well-define core
* Benchmarking against other schools
* Gap between research and teaching; interest of the students is not necessarily aligned with faculty research interests
** Alignment of students in Divisions with graduates in Divisions
** Alignment is not necessary, but we should understand it
** Alignment of faculty advisors with UGs; not uniform across the Divisions
* Students may not care about what faculty have to teach
* Workload balance is a good one
** Some courses teach way too much; some balance not enough
** CCSC in principle is in charge of this, but really more advisory
** Some work has been done in synchronizing Math and Physics, for example
* It might be time to look at core again; we haven't done it for 7 years or so
* Self study of what the core has in it and whether or not its meeting our goals
** Are we trying to cram too much in?
** Online course evaluations might provide some new data and evaluation of the core
** Look at the data from surveys to understand if the core has set up the students for what they need
* Problem set centric methodology
** Students want the lectures to align with the homeworks to align with the exams
** Faculty who try to give more insight into the field sometimes get criticized when they try to explore related areas
** May be different answers for different types of courses
* Has there been a shift of the majors since the course was put in place
** Look at what the students are graduating in and see if the core is serving them well
** Applications are probably not a good indicator; students shift after they get here
** Be careful to study causal effects; the majors might line up with the core because the core is required
* Inspired independent study
** Decrease workload to allow more independent study
* '''Undergraduate advising'''
** This came up at the end; seems like an important third topic for us to look at