Long Range Academic Plan

SONOMA STATE UNIVERSITY ACADEMIC LONG RANGE PLAN

REVISED FROM THE 1994 GOALS AND IMPLEMENTATION MEASURES LEADING TO A NEW ACADEMIC ACTION PLAN FOR SONOMA STATE UNIVERSITY prepared by the Academic Planning Committee based on THE ASSUMPTIONS FOR LONG RANGE ACADEMIC PLANNING
(Adopted by the Vice President for Academic Affairs Council, May 1993)

UNIVERSAL PRINCIPLES:

1. The University is committed to the belief that students should acquire appropriate skills, learn diverse modes of inquiry and be exposed to a variety of perspectives in their course of study. Along with inter-disciplinary inquiry, the University recognizes and fosters inter-disciplinary perspectives as valuable for full intellectual exploration.

2. The University promotes active involvement in learning and close human interactions throughout the curriculum and throughout the campus.

3. The University recognizes and fosters the richness which results from diversity and multiple perspectives in the curriculum and the entire campus community.

4. The interaction between the campus and the surrounding community is an integral aspect of curriculum planning and implementation in graduate and professional/applied programs.

I. THE NATURE OF THE UNIVERSITY

1. SSU is a community of faculty, staff, students and administrators dedicated to the common purpose of achieving and maintaining excellence in teaching and learning.

2. SSU is committed to achieving and maintaining excellence as a distinguished public undergraduate liberal arts and sciences institution in California and to offering selected graduate programs of the highest quality that meet professional and community needs.

3. SSU is an important educational and cultural resource.

4. SSU continually examines its programs, procedures, and structures, and makes modifications as indicated, to ensure that it is serving its mission, its students, and its community.

5. Even if additional funding becomes available, it is the institution's goal to grow only modestly over the next ten years.

Goals:
1. All activities undertaken by the University are designed to achieve and maintain excellence in all services delivered.

2. Every effort should be made to insure that our size is commensurate with the announced mission of the University.

Implementation:
1. Students of high academic achievement from diverse backgrounds who demonstrate potential for success are actively recruited and supported.

2. Disciplinary, interdisciplinary and multi-disciplinary program options are offered in the curriculum.

3. The University encourages programs at the undergraduate and graduate levels and affiliated centers which address emerging needs of SSU's service area, including outreach activities that link SSU programs with communities, businesses and schools.

II. EDUCATIONAL COMMITMENT

1. SSU is committed to teaching and learning as its primary mission.

2. SSU is committed to supporting its faculty in developing and maintaining excellent teaching, including support for classroom instruction (facilities, equipment, class sizes) as well as support for scholarly and professional activities that develop expertise in the content and process of instruction.

3. SSU is committed to increasing its student retention and graduation rate.

4. SSU places high value on human interaction in all facets of a student’s education and so is committed to offering small classes.

5. SSU is committed to excellence and diversity in its faculty, student body and curriculum.

Goals:
1. To foster outstanding teaching, high rates of student success and diversity in the University community.

Implementation:
1. Systems of support and reward are designed to encourage the professional and intellectual development of faculty and staff and intellectual discovery by students.

III. GOVERNANCE AND ADMINISTRATION

1. The Governance and Administration of SSU involves four major constituencies:
(a) faculty,
(b) administration,
(c) staff, and
(d) students.

2. SSU is committed to a governance of faculty, administration and staff based on collegiality, joint planning and accountability in areas regarding human, financial and physical resources. Insofar as possible students are participating partners in these areas of responsibility.

3. The faculty has primary responsibility in those matters fundamental to the educational mission of the university (e.g., academic programs and other curriculum matters, degree and graduation requirements).

Goals:
1. Institutional structures and lines of communication ensure involvement of all major constituencies of the campus in decisions related to governance and administration of the university.

2. Budget and policy committees will include faculty representatives from the various units in addition to representation by members of the Academic Planning Committee. Student representation is included on these bodies.

Implementation:
1. Efforts will be made to preserve and enhance the shared responsibility and mutual support by all those involved in the academic enterprise of the institution.

IV. COMMITMENT TO FACULTY

1. SSU is committed to support and to provide adequate resources to fulfill the faculty’s primary function of teaching.

2. SSU is committed to support and provide adequate resources for the scholarly, creative, and professional development of its faculty.

3. SSU is committed to support faculty participation in campus governance.

4. SSU is committed to facilitating faculty service to the community.

Goals:
1. To support faculty as teachers and scholars.

2. To promote faculty development, a strong shared governance system, and faculty service to the community.

Implementation:
1. SSU will reduce class sizes to reflect class sizes of comparable campuses in COPLAC and the CSU.

2. SSU will reduce teaching load by hiring sufficient faculty.

3. SSU will support professional and scholarly activities by establishing a minimum allocation of released time, sabbatical leaves, and travel monies.

4. SSU will set as a priority adequate funding each year for R & D to support teaching, curricular innovation, and the professional and intellectual components of faculty activity.

5. SSU will provide for recently-hired faculty with support for professional development such as orientation and internal funding for research, program, and curriculum development.

6. SSU will continue its support for the Center for Teaching and Professional Development and the Office of Research and Sponsored Programs.

7. SSU will provide release time for key members of the Academic Senate.

8. SSU will provide support for Centers and Institutes that support scholarly activities and community service.

9. Through the Offices of Development and Alumni Affairs, SSU will seek ways to promote faculty development and community service projects supported by private sources of funding.

V. STUDENT POPULATION

1. The class level distribution of the student population should reflect a balance appropriate to a high quality four-year undergraduate program and selective graduate programs.

2. SSU will recruit on a state-wide basis for quality at the freshman level with mandated priority to be given to local freshmen and upper division students who meet the CSU eligibility index. SSU will give junior transfers from the service area (including re-entry students) that have completed their GE requirements a high priority for admission.

3. SSU will increase its percentage of underrepresented ethnic populations (e.g., Native American, Latino/Hispanic, African American) to accomplish two purposes:
(a) to ensure that the entire student population is exposed to an educational experience that reflects the cosmopolitan nature of contemporary society, and
(b) to serve the under-represented population of the service region.

4. SSU values the presence of international students, and will admit sufficient numbers of these students to strive for a distinct international presence in the student body.

5. SSU will strive to maintain an economically, socially, and culturally diverse student body with respect to disability, age, gender an sexual orientation.

Goal:
1. To attract a diverse population of students with high academic potential.

Implementation:
1. The University will use enrollment management strategies, developed through consultation by faculty, staff and administration, to maintain a balance of student backgrounds related to such factors as age, gender, ethnicity, economic status and national origin.

2. The University will adjust these enrollment strategies as necessary to support an optimum balance of offerings appropriate to a liberal arts and sciences university and to respond to curricular change and newly developed programs.

VI. FACULTY STAFFING POLICIES

1. SSU's highest staffing priority is to retain tenured and tenure-track faculty and those permanent staff essential to its academic mission.

2. Faculty salaries will reflect CPEC parity for comparable institutions.

3. SSU will provide faculty housing for junior faculty to help develop a sense of academic community.

4. SSU will maintain a core of permanent faculty able to respond to its changing needs, maintain currency within academia and a willingness to engage in multi and interdisciplinary discovery; and will keep temporary faculty numbers to the minimum required by programmatic needs to enrich the curriculum or respond to student needs. We will minimize the hiring of temporary faculty and as vacancies occur we consider it imperative to refill positions with full time tenure track faculty.

5. SSU seeks disciplinary and cross disciplinary faculty who value involving students in scholarly pursuits, research activities, and broad General Education.

Goals:
1. To maintain 75 percent tenure/tenure-track faculty and 25% part-time faculty.

2. To reach an SFR of 18:1.

3. To maintain an appropriate ratio between major and General Education offerings and not to destroy a department to handle lower division freshmen increase needs.

Implementation:
1. SSU will continue to seek ways to attract and retain quality faculty through the active encouragement of intellectual and professional activity within and beyond the classroom, including recognition and support of faculty research and teaching.

2. SSU will provide orientation sessions and development programs for new and continuing tenure-track faculty. Appropriate bodies for this task include, but are not limited to, the Office of Sponsored Programs, the Faculty Sub-Committee on Professional Development, Library professionals and the CMTS staff.

3. SSU will provide programs to enhance the development of professional and support staff members and the Center for Teaching and Professional Development.

4. The interests of the faculty and members of the professional and support staffs shall be represented by the faculty governance system and by the Unions.

VII. CURRICULUM

1. SSU provides a liberal arts and sciences education that prepares students for fulfilling public and private lives. SSU offers select professional and graduate programs.

2. All undergraduate liberal arts and sciences majors are structured around a course which includes attention to the structure and methodology of the field of study and, where appropriate, emphases which can be effectively supported with available resources.

3. To prepare students for active involvement in the community, SSU provides a broad range of opportunities for students to become involved in socially responsible community service.

4. SSU encourages disciplinary and interdisciplinary innovation in both its pedagogy and its curriculum.

Goal:
1. To achieve and maintain excellence in both undergraduate and graduate programs while promoting diverse pedagogical approaches and encouraging academic innovation.

Implementation:
1. Academic departments/programs will conduct periodic reviews of their curricular offerings to ensure thorough coverage of fundamentals of the major, to respond to emerging needs and directions in the major field of study, and to assure timely completion of requirements.

2. Efforts will be expanded to include internships, team projects and community-related educational experiences as part of both undergraduate and graduate education.

3. New mechanisms will be developed which are explicitly designed to encourage academic innovation, including new disciplinary, interdisciplinary and multi-disciplinary approaches to education on the campus.

VIII. GRADUATE AND PROFESSIONAL EDUCATION

1. SSU offers selected graduate and professional programs that are consistent with the educational mission of the University.

2. Graduate and professional programs are created and maintained in response to demonstrable needs.

3. Graduate and professional programs do not compromise the integrity and quality of undergraduate curriculum and programs.

4. Graduate and professional programs are appropriately staffed and are provided with resources adequate to offer courses in a timely manner and to administer the program.

5. Some graduate and professional programs are collaborative efforts between SSU and professional communities or other institutions in its region or state.

Goal:
1. To offer a limited number of high-quality graduate and professional programs which can be completed by students in a timely manner while enhancing their intellectual development and professional preparation.

Implementation:
1. Periodically review graduate and professional programs, and take appropriate action in response, with regard to the University mission, demonstrated needs, effect on undergraduate programs, staffing, administration, and resources.

2. Provide adequate resources to ensure that students have timely access to courses, access to faculty, appropriate library and other informational resources, and opportunities for professional experiences such as teaching and research assistantships and conference attendance and presentations.

3. Provide adequate resources to ensure that faculty have time and support for teaching, advising and mentoring, thesis supervision, program administration, accreditation reviews, and development of their own scholarship to support graduate-level teaching.

4. Provide adequate resources to ensure that programs, departments, and schools have needed staffing, space, equipment, and operating expenses specifically for their graduate and professional programs.

5. Identify and provide adequate resources to support graduate students not situated within a single program or department, such as ITDS students.

6. Encourage collaboration among faculty, departments, and campuses to benefit the quality of graduate and professional programs and of students' experiences.

IX. GENERAL EDUCATION

1. General Education programs are philosophically coherent and have clearly defined and regularly assessed goals.

2. Permanent faculty responsible for developing and teaching General Education will consider General Education as an essential part of their teaching and curricular development responsibilities.

3. The GE program embodies and expresses the basic values of SSU (See Universal Principles).

Goal:
1. To provide undergraduate students with a challenging, meaningful and enriching General Education program.

Implementation:
1. Faculty work to define what students who complete the GE program should know and be able to do, including the identification of intellectual skills and basic knowledge which all students should acquire as part of an SSU GE program.

2. Faculty work to develop a variety of strategies to promote students' awareness of the coherence of SSU GE programs, and how they relate to the basic values of SSU.

3. In addition to courses presented along traditional disciplinary lines, each student should be able to experience the following: thematic arrangements, cohorts of students, linked courses, team-teaching.

4. To the greatest extent possible, undergraduate students have the benefit of GE courses taught by full-time permanent faculty.

5. Faculty who share responsibility for specific categories of GE meet regularly to plan and review the content and effectiveness of courses offered.

6. There is a core of permanent faculty responsible for the curriculum in all GE Areas. G.E. courses are taught by faculty with expertise in GE pedagogy and motivated to engage lower division students.

X. PHYSICAL RESOURCES

1. SSU is committed to a process assuring maximum flow of information and participation by all segments of the campus community in decisions pertaining to campus planning.

2. SSU values and recognizes that its physical and social environment, and its instructional spaces, are integral parts of the educational process. SSU will design new buildings, as resources become available, on a scale that supports the educational process and clearly defined needs. These buildings will be designed as models of energy efficiency and environmental sensitivity.

Goals:
1. To use existing physical facilities and any new buildings as they become available in such ways as to maximize the educational goals of the campus.

2. To maintain the beauty and educational effectiveness of the physical campus setting.

Implementation:
1. The President and all administrative officers shall actively promote physical changes that reinforce the ideals and mission of SSU, including excellence in instruction, close faculty-student interaction, and the enhancement of a true learning community.

2. The Campus Planning Committee shall develop further mechanisms to involve all constituencies of the campus community in decisions affecting physical changes on the campus.

3. The Space Utilization Committee shall articulate priorities for making space utilization decisions, including instructional need, departmental need, offices for new faculty, and communicate to the campus as it conducts an ongoing review of space utilization on the campus.

4. The President’s Campus Planning Committee and the Provost and Vice President’s Space Utilization Committee shall meet on a regular basis in order to anticipate the impact on academic programs of any proposed changes in physical facilities and utilization of existing space on the campus.

XI. INSTRUCTIONAL SUPPORT

1. SSU provides infrastructure, staffing, educational technologies and equipment to support curricular needs.

2. The campus recognizes the vital role the University Library plays in supporting the curriculum, providing access to information resources, and fostering information competency skills necessary for successful lifelong learning.

3. Universal campus access to current information technology is necessary to enable effective teaching and learning. Within the context of instructional programs, the University will develop opportunities for the use of such tools by students and faculty.

Goals:
1. To prepare students who can engage in lifelong learning; are competent in finding, evaluating and using information resources; and who can function effectively in an age of ever-changing technology.

2. To enable students to experience and master basic elements of the methodology and structure of their field.

Implementation:
1. SSU will develop and implement criteria for the cost-effective use of educational space, technology, equipment and other resources that reflect the complexities of SSU’s educational mission and are based on adequate input by knowledgeable faculty. These criteria will be used by all campus planning committees.

2. SSU will provide adequate staffing for instructional and computer labs, library, and department offices to support instructional needs.

3. SSU will provide adequate and equitable level of resources to support the instructional mission of the University Library.

4. SSU will provide and maintain equipment necessary for instruction by faculty in the academic disciplines.

5. SSU will support a campus computer network and will support, maintain and refresh faculty workstations.

6. SSU will maintain an adequate physical infrastructure for instructional support, including sufficient classrooms, electrical and network access.

7. The Administration will provide support (release time, equipment, materials) to faculty to develop project-based curricula.

8. The Institution will support academic and curricular innovation.

XII. STUDENT SUPPORT

1. SSU faculty clearly articulate for students the learning objectives of their programs. Admission, academic and career advising is provided by faculty and career professional staff. SSU faculty and career professional staff provide admission, academic, and career advising.

2. SSU provides learning assistance appropriate to a student’s levels of preparation and offers programs that enhance academic achievement of students at all levels.

3. SSU faculty and staff support activities that complement the formal curriculum and provide rich opportunities for personal development beyond the classroom.

4. SSU makes available maximum opportunities for student financial assistance corresponding to the requirements of state, federal and private funding sources.

Goals:
1. To foster programs that contribute to a meaningful living environment and enhance opportunities to integrate personal growth into academic and philanthropic experiences.

2. To support effectively students from diverse economic backgrounds so that they can secure the maximum opportunities for personal growth and intellectual achievement.

3. To address the full range of student needs, including personal and financial support as appropriate, to enhance student experience on and off campus and to integrate academic endeavors with the practice of citizenship.

Implementation:
1. Faculty and staff develop effective advising procedures and carefully monitor these to ensure that all students receive timely and effective advising.

2. Students partake in a variety of learning approaches: integrative/cross cultural teaching, disciplinary offerings, cooperative and collaborative learning experiences, participation in especially those for that support the success of disadvantaged students--tutorial programs led by junior and senior level students, and effective use of technology. Insofar as possible, students should have the opportunity to participate in research projects and serve as teaching and research assistants.

3. Students have the opportunity to augment their financial situation through on-campus employment.

XIII. FINANCIAL SUPPORT FOR THE UNIVERSITY

1. SSU faces an increasing need to rely on funding for academic programs and student support from the students themselves and from sources other than state resources.

2. Certain professional and applied programs, mainly at the graduate level, may of necessity be offered on a self-support basis, through Extended Education, or through local community partnerships.

Goals:
1. To develop increased sources of funding to support the academic mission of the university in a time of reduced support from traditional sources.

2. To assure that any revenue generating initiatives should not detract from the University's primary mission.

Implementation:
1. Proposals for new academic programs projects or activities, which require additional funding, will provide the Academic Planning Committee and the Education Policies Committee with information justifying their merits. The justification will be based on three criteria: contribution to educational effectiveness; sources of funding; and cost of implementation.

2. Incentive programs are developed for faculty to engage in research projects which generate funds for research assistantships, release time for faculty, and resources to hire additional faculty and staff and buy equipment.

3. Research is undertaken which supports the teacher/scholar, student/scholar model of teaching and learning, and serves the needs of the community and society while tapping the resources of local, state, and national governments, non-governmental organizations and business associations. This generates community goodwill and promotes political and budgetary support for the campus.

4. The University will adhere to the guidelines governing cooperative relationships.

Approved by the Senate 2/5/04

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