| Strategy: Enhance the quality of faculty-student interactions
Point People: Barbara Horwitz and Steven Sheffrin
Narrative Summary of Third Year Implementation Efforts:
During 2005-06, we continued our efforts along a number of different dimensions, bringing more campus leaders and students into these efforts.
Advances and Ongoing Programs Consistent with Strategy:
- Follow-Up to Small Class Study
The very positive reception to the Small-Class Study by Office of Research, Management, and Planning led to further work on this topic. A study completed this year “Summer 2005: A Descriptive Report,” looked at class size in summer versus other quarters. In general, summer classes are smaller, which is one of their attractive features. The new study can be found at: http://www.ormp.ucdavis.edu/budget/ipa/inform/docs/specialreports/summer_2005_report.pdf
- Increasing Student Involvement in Campus Governance
This year the Academic Senate made special efforts to include graduate and undergraduate students on committees and in other activities. The chair of the Senate met with key student representatives to discuss participation. A major challenge is to get the ASUCD and GSA to make appointments in a timely manner. The list of Senate committees and task forces that included student participation for 2005-06 are:
- Academic Senate Committees:
- Academic Freedom & Responsibility (1 ASUCD; 1 GSA)
- Admissions & Enrollment (2 ASUCD; 1 GSA)
- Affirmative Action & Diversity (1 ASUCD; 1 GSA)
- Courses of Instruction (2 ASUCD; 2 GSA)
- Distinguished Teaching Awards (3 STUDENT REPS – AT LEAST ONE GSA)
- Executive Council (1 ASUCD; 1 GSA)
- Grade Changes (2 ASUCD)
- Graduate Council (4 GSA)
- GC: Academic Planning & Development (1 GSA)
- GC: Educational Policy (1 GSA)
- International Studies & Exchanges ( 1 ASUCD; 1 GSA)
- Library (1 ASUCD; 1 GSA)
- Public Service (1 ASUCD; 1 GSA)
- Student-Faculty Relationships (3 ASUCD; 1 GSA; 1 Campus Judicial Board Student Rep)
- Transportation & Parking (1 ASUCD; 1 GSA)
- Undergraduate Council (3 ASUCD; 1 GSA)
- UGC: General Education (1 ASUCD)
- UGC: Preparatory Education (1 ASUCD)
- UGC: Special Academic Programs (1 ASUCD)
- UGC: Undergraduate Instruction & Program Review (1 ASUCD; 1 GSA)
- Undergraduate Scholarships, Honors & Prizes (2 ASUCD)
- Task Forces:
- Focus on Undergraduate Research
Interim Vice Provost for Undergraduate Studies Fred Wood conferred with undergraduate deans, the Undergraduate Deans Council, and other campus leaders in developing a proposal—under consideration—for an Undergraduate Research Center. Undergraduate research provides unique opportunities for student-faculty interaction that cannot be matched in other settings. The deans and other campus leaders provided valuable input into refining this proposal.
One important vehicle for student-faculty interaction is Freshman Seminars. The campus has continued to expand its offerings, with approximately 180 seminars to be offered during 2006-07. Faculty members throughout the campus and, in particular from the School of Medicine, have been instrumental in bringing forth this increase.
- Continued Interface With Student Groups
Departments throughout the campus have continued their efforts to work with student groups. At the campus level, there have been increased interactions with the National Society of Collegiate Scholars. Key campus leaders participated in their induction ceremony, and the organization nominated a number of faculty members for teaching award honors.
Short Statement of Plans for 2006-07:
During the coming academic year, we will continue to monitor developments on class size, particularly in light of the large incoming freshman class. We will also continue our work with student participation on campus matters and other options for increasing student-faculty interaction.
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