Graduate Council: 2006-2007 Summary for Faculty Senate

As part of its routine business, the Graduate Council awarded Graduate Student Professional Travel and, Research, Service and Educational Leadership grants, reviewed Graduate Faculty applications, and heard time extension and academic dismissal appeals.

The other business covered by the Graduate Council included:

• Approval of the 5 year (BS+MS) Computer Science degree
• Review of the GRC 799 policy.
  • Working toward an easy to implement, simple, uniform policy.
  • Many issues still need to be worked on
  • Looking at automating the process
• Approval of elimination of slash courses in dual degree programs
• Passed a resolution regarding the reduction in Academic Initiative dollars allotted for RSEL grant funding
• Reviewed and updated Graduate Faculty Criteria and Policy statements
• Reviewed and updated Professional Travel and RSEL grant guidelines
• Reviewed the Repeating a Course policy and voted to make no changes.

Subcommittees of the Graduate Council:

• Research Day – coordinated with the URC to present graduate student research at the Research Celebration
• Recruitment, Retention, and Resources – report sent to Faculty Senate
  • Lauren Cikara, graduate assistant, meet with Graduate Program Directors to review current practices
  • Review of Plan 2008 resources
  • Review of financial resources available to attract and retain students
• Student Issues – report sent to Faculty Senate
  • Subcommittee had 3 meetings to discover issues our student were encountering
  • Since the report was sent to the Faculty Senate, the Subcommittee has surveyed our graduate students looking for their input
  • Next year work needs to be done contacting similar schools to compare the situation at UW-L with that of comparable institutions
  • Also, work needs to be done in recommending and addressing ways to solve the identified issues