Curtis told the committee that he had spoken to Dr. Vartabedian about the DHC minutes, which reflected considerable discontent with the Liberal Studies proposal on the part of A&S department heads. Apparently the discontent was in fact fairly localized and has, for the most part, been addressed. Patti stated that her department supports the changes made last spring in the Fine & Performing Arts category, and is pleased with the proposal in its present form. Dr. Godfrey has circulated a memo addressed to our committee, and Curtis met with him to discuss his continuing concerns. While Dr. Godfrey is disappointed that we "missed an opportunity" regarding his "Mind, Body, Spirit" idea, he is willing to live with the proposal in its present form. Curtis had explained to Godfrey that his options at this point were to see that the proposal was voted down and sent back to us, or to support the proposal and go to the implementation group with a strong statement of his concerns. He defended his "Mind, Body, Spirit" idea, but Curtis countered that we could not support the proliferation of one credit hour courses, and did not believe that the faculty would support this approach, even as an alternative to Wellness.

Bruce Henderson spent time after the August 13^th Senate meeting summarizing the hours in the major, program requirements, and general University electives for several programs that are concerned about the 42 hours and the change is double-dipping in the sciences. He found that the new Liberal Studies program makes very little difference in the real distribution of hours in any university programs, in fact several programs gain one or two elective hours in the new LS program. His table was shared with the committee, and there was considerable discussion of whether or not to share this information with Senators. It is educational and responds to the issues that several programs have raised. It might generate a fair amount of curiosity-level discussion that would only delay the important discussion in the next Senate meeting. It is incomplete in the sense that only programs that have expressed concern have been examined; this might cause other programs to feel belittled by their absence, which is not the case. Those programs not concerned by the double-dipping issue were not examined. The committee finally decided that the information will be available to anyone interested in it, but we will not publish it to avoid unnecessary distraction of the discussions.

The question was raised of how the Review Committee will respond if the proposal is not approved by the Senate. There was considerable confidence that we do not need to examine this closely, as the proposal has a good chance of being approved. It is something we should consider individually, however, as it is still a possibility.

Gary Pool asked if we should be concerned that the Senate might generate and approve a list of recommendations for the implementation group to deal with. How much should we be concerned about the fact that what is actually implemented might differ from what the Review Committee intended? This will inevitably happen to some extent, and we should be aware of this. There is simply a limit to how much control we will (or should) have after the proposal leaves the Review Committee for good.

We discussed the issue of what our role in implementation should be. Surely, it would be nice if members of the Review Committee could be involved in the implementation, but do any of us have the energy to become involved in the implementation process? Bruce said it is very important that we put together a package of our work product intended to guide the implementation and ongoing oversight of the Liberal Studies program. Some of the problems with the General Education program stem from lack of an archive to provide guidance from its creators. It would also be nice to have some voice in the makeup of the implementation committee from outside of the Review Committee. Surely the implementation should be placed in the hands of some bright, energetic, young faculty who will be "owners" of the program for the foreseeable future. John suggested that we recommend "types" of people to be involved, rather than individuals, meaning to specify that those who will be carrying out the program be involved in its implementation.

Curtis encouraged committee members to attend the next Senate meeting to have the chance to see our proposal voted on formally. The Senate meeting will be on Thursday, September 16^th at 3:00 pm in Killian 104.

Respectfully submitted,

Nory Prochaska, recording secretary

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