Proposals that amount to an overhaul of the Department of Sociology and Anthropology and changes to the Department of Biology and Earth Science were approved by the curriculum committee.
In its Feb. 8 meeting, the standing committee of administrators, faculty and students approved the deletion of the Anthropology Minor, removed three sociology concentrations, added a new sociology course, changed the requirements for three majors and approved four name changes. These changes will require a report to University Senate but they are slated to go into effect in the fall.
Also approved was the deletion of the Human Resources major and minor, which will require green-lighting by Senate.
Heidi Ballard, associate professor and chair of the Department of Sociology and Anthropology, said her proposal to delete the Anthropology Minor was due to the departure of professor Miranda Hallett last year. She said most of the remaining majors with a concentration are on track to graduate and would be taught by part-time faculty.
In addition, she said the removal of the concentrations would allow interested non-majors to take certain classes.
"Our concentrations are a barrier to students who aren't majoring to take the courses that they want to take in a particular area of study," Ballard said.
A new course, SOCL 2900 (Introduction to Social Justice Studies), will replace SOCL 2000 (Social Problems) and SOCL 1200 (Sociological Practice in Human and Community Service). This course collapse is scheduled to take effect after the coming spring 2016 departure of professor Phillipa Docka-Filipek, a departure which Ballard confirmed via email.
The name of the department was changed from the Department of Sociology and Anthropology to the Department of Sociology, Criminology and Justice Studies. All remaining courses with the SOAN prefix were changed to SOCL.
Sarah Bouchard and Michael Hoggarth, professors from the Department of Biology and Earth Science, proposed and were granted five and seven-credit hour models for lab classes, granting students registered for lab classes credit for the labs themselves rather than just the corresponding classes. This means that students enrolled in a lab class in Fall 2016 may receive more credit than students enrolled before Fall 2016.
Bachelors of Arts in Biology students will no longer be required to acquire research credits for their degree, instead research will be counted as credit for 3000-level classes. Changes in requirements for students registered for a Bachelor of Science degree in Environmental Studies were also approved.
Bouchard said on the subject that the Department had, "embarrassingly, too many students and too few faculty."
The course BIO 3500 was changed to 2900 in order to change the course level and an experimental course, PHYS 4910 (Nuclear Physics) was added.
The committee tabled a Race and Ethnic studies minor for later approval by the committee. A Justice Studies minor was introduced but will require the approval of the School of Arts and Sciences.
