Your Senate & Curriculum Issues Academic Senate for California Community Colleges Leadership Institute

Your Senate and Curriculum Issues Greg Gilbert and Beverly Shue Curriculum is arguably the most important function a senate oversees, especially since course and program offerings are the principal reasons for students attending your college. Understanding a bit more about the Education Code and the shift from community colleges as a K-14 entity to a higher education partner will enable you to understand your local senates’ responsibility for and oversight of curriculum quality and prepare you for radical changes now being proposed.

The Future of the Community College: A Faculty Perspective” (adopted Fall 1998) According to “Faculty as professionals: Responsibilities, Standards and Ethics,” an adopted paper of the Academic Senate (Spring 2002), local faculty have responsibilities for: disciplines, students, colleagues, academic institution, community scholarly competence, academic conduct, cultural and gender sensitivity, encourage the pursuit of learning learning environments of trust and sensitivity academic standards, and a responsibility to maintain academic freedom.

Matters Academic & Professional The Education Code and Title 5 provide the basis for local senate authority. AB 1725 decoupled community colleges from K-12 and repositioned them within the state’s Master Plan for Higher Education. As a result: Minimum qualifications were raised and Probationary periods were extended. Peer review was attached to faculty evaluation Funding was established for professional development. In addition, local senate authority includes Academic and Professional matters, many of which are referred to in the ten-plus-one and serve as the basis for college governance policies that are established between local senates and their governing boards.

TEN-PLUS-ONE 1. Curriculum, including establishing prerequisites.  2.   Degree and certificate requirements.  3.   Grading policies.  4.   Educational program development.  5.   Standards or policies regarding student preparation and success.  6.   College governance structures, as related to faculty roles.  7.   Faculty roles and involvement in accreditation processes.  8.   Policies for faculty professional development activities.  9.   Processes for program review.  10.  Processes for institutional planning and budget development.  11.  Other academic and professional matters as mutually agreed upon.

CONSULTATION: To Consult Collegially means that the district governing board shall develop policies on academic and professional matters through either or both of the following:  1.   Rely primarily upon the advice and judgment of the academic senate, OR  2.   The governing board, or its designees, and the academic senate shall reach mutual agreement by written resolution, regulation, or policy of the governing board effectuating such recommendations.

RELY PRIMARILY OR MUTUALLY AGREE A district governing board which chooses the “rely primarily” procedure is normally supposed to accept recommendations of the senate in any of the eleven areas of academic and professional matters unless there are “exceptional circumstances” and “compelling reasons.” When a senate recommendation is not accepted, the reasons for the board’s decision must be in writing and based on a clear and substantive rationale. A district governing board which chooses the “mutual agreement” procedure is supposed to reach written agreement with the senate in any of the eleven areas of academic and professional matters. Where there is no existing policy, the board may act without reaching mutual agreement if there are “compelling legal, fiscal or organizational reasons” why it must do so.

RESOURCES The Academic Senate has 41 adopted papers under the heading of “Curriculum” at its website. The vast majority have been written and published within the last decade and cover everything from governance authority to program review, distance learning, Intersegmental General Education Transfer Curriculum (IGETC), course outlines, and the placement of courses within disciplines.

The Curriculum Institute The Academic Senate also hosts the Curriculum Institute each summer. Our outgoing curriculum chair, Jane Patton, has been hard at work preparing this year’s institute which will take place at the Hayes Mansion Conference Center, San Jose, CA July 15-17, 2004. .

Our Ongoing Duty Academic Senate paper, “The Curriculum Committee: Role, Structure, Duties, and Standards of Good Practice,” adopted Fall 1996 states: “The main function of the curriculum committee is that of primary responsibility for the development, review, renewal, and recommendation of curriculum to be approved by the Board of Trustees.”

The Education Code 1. The academic senate has primary responsibility for making recommendations in the area of curriculum and academic standards [Ed. Code '70902(b)(7)]. This right is protected as a minimum standard set by the Board of Governors [Ed. Code '70901(b)(1)(E)]. 2. The local governing board has the responsibility to establish policies for and approve courses of instruction and educational programs [Ed. Code '70902(b)(2)]. 3. Title 5 §55002(a)(1) requires that the curriculum committee contain faculty.