3.4.12 Faculty Control of Curriculum

Commission Standard: The institution places primary responsibility for the content, quality, and effectiveness of the curriculum with its faculty.

Status: In Compliance

Rationale: Western faculty have curricular oversight at the program, department, college, and university levels. Proposals to develop or change courses, programs, or academic policies must be submitted to the University Curriculum Committee and approved by the University Senate, but only after review and approval by department and college curriculum committees, and, when appropriate, the General Education Committee, the Professional Education Council, and the Graduate Council. Each of these committees is described below.

Departmental curriculum committees. Committees in each academic department review academic programs and curricula. Some departments maintain separate curriculum committees for each program; others have separate committees for undergraduate and graduate programs; and in others faculty serve as a committee of the whole for curricular issues. Curriculum change proposals approved by departmental committees are forwarded to a college curriculum committee.

College curriculum committees. College curriculum committees are composed of the dean (or designee), department heads and directors, and one elected faculty member from each department. Each college also has a graduate curriculum committee to consider graduate matters.

The General Education Committee. This is a standing committee of the University Senate to oversee general education guidelines and criteria, existing and new courses in the program, program assessment, and other matters pertaining to general education.

The Professional Education Council. This body, which replaces the University Teacher Education Committee as of 2004-05, oversees the university's professional education programs. Chaired by the dean of the College of Education and Behavioral Sciences, membership includes the associate dean for academic programs; the director of the Office of Teacher Services; elected faculty members from each academic department that offers a program leading to certification by Kentucky's Education Professional Standards Board; faculty representatives from the Graduate Council and the University Senate; undergraduate and graduate student representatives; a classroom teacher appointed by the Kentucky Education Association; and a school principal, superintendent, guidance counselor, school psychologist, or pupil personnel director appointed by the executive director of the Green River Regional Education Cooperative. Advisory members include the university registrar, the director of teacher certification, and the associate dean for administration and research.

The Graduate Council. T his faculty committee supervises graduate instruction in general, including admission and degree requirements, curricula, and graduate faculty membership. The council, which submits recommendations through the University Senate to the provost, is composed of the dean of Graduate Studies and Research as chair, three elected faculty representatives from each college offering graduate courses, and five elected students, one from each of those colleges.

The University Curriculum Committee   This is a standing committee of the University Senate established to review course and program proposals in light of the university's mission statement. Its purview includes academic matters such as degree and graduation requirements, standards of scholastic achievement, and regulations governing faculty-student relations. The committee also serves as a curriculum committee for courses that cross college lines.

The University Senate This body makes recommendations to the president and provost concerning academic requirements and policies, faculty responsibilities and welfare, and other matters of importance to the faculty.

A special case of faculty oversight of curricula is Western's joint engineering degrees with the University of Kentucky (Mechanical and Civil) and the University of Louisville (Electrical). Western's programs were approved through the curricular review procedures described above. However, to accommodate the Kentucky CPE, oversight committees composed of three engineering faculty from each of the cooperating universities review and approve curricular changes in each program.

All academic programs are internally reviewed on a rotating cycle by an Academic Program Review Committee composed of approximately ten faculty members selected by the provost based on nominations from the University Senate or academic deans. The chair is a faculty member elected by the body. The review focuses on self-study reports addressing program quality indicators such as admissions and retention data, evidence of student learning and success, and the program's relationship to the university's mission.

In addition, the overall effectiveness of each program is assessed annually by the University Outcomes Assessment Committee . In this process, program faculty identify expected student outcomes, assess for them, make program revisions based on the results, and report to the committee. The full process is described under Core Requirement 2.5 and Comprehensive Standard 3.3 , above.