Office of the Associate Vice President
for Academic Affairs

Dr. Lorraine Bernotsky
Philips Memorial Hall
Room 008
700 South High Street
West Chester, PA 19383
610-738-0492


CAPC – Updates

News from PASSHE

On June 9, 2011, the Office of the Chancellor approved WCU's proposal to offer a Minor in Applied Ethics.

 

May 2012 Update

Dear Colleagues:

 

Congratulations on making it through another academic year! Looking back over this past year, I am proud of everything we have accomplished as a faculty and of all the wonderful things our students have achieved.  For many of us, summer is a time of reflection and renewal, where we consider the future within the context of both the previous year’s successes and the things we weren’t yet able to realize. Before we begin that process, I am writing as the CAPC Chair to share with you some important updates from the Curriculum and Academic Policies Council that will hopefully be of use to you as you plan for the upcoming year.

 

CAPC Elections & Expanded Membership

I am pleased to announce that as part of our continuing efforts at being a more responsive and inclusive body, CAPC has finished its 2011-2012 elections cycle, which has resulted in an increase in our membership to 37 faculty members. The CAPC Executive committee will be appointing committee chairs and members this summer for the 2012-2013 academic year. Please check the following list later in the summer for a current roster of committee chairs and members: http://wcupa.edu/%5Fadmin/associateprovost/capc.asp

 

Updated Course Approval Timelines

As mentioned in the previous Chair’s update, CAPC has established new course approval deadlines to allow faculty additional time during the academic year to seek approval for courses in the semester preceding the one in which the course is to be offered.   As noted before, there are significant differences in the deadlines of new and modified general education, and major/minor program required courses and new general/major/minor electives. 

 

  • New General/Major/Minor Electives:  Faculty will have the option of choosing the Fall, Winter, Spring, or Summer terms for the proposed starting semester/session.  Courses will be entered into MyWCU on the following schedule:

 

  • New elective courses approved by November will be available on MyWCU for the following Winter or Spring.

 

  • New elective courses approved by April will be available on MyWCU for the following Summer or Fall.

 

  • New and modified General Education, Major/Minor Program Requirements, New Program/Concentration Requirements:  Faculty will have the option of choosing the Fall, Winter, Spring, or Summer terms for the proposed starting semester/session.  Courses will be entered into MyWCU on the following schedule:
    • New courses/modifications approved by the first CAPC General Assembly Meeting of the Fall semester will be available on MyWCU for the following Spring.
    • New courses/modification approved by the last CAPC General Assembly Meeting of the Fall semester will be available on MyWCU the following Summer or Fall.

 Modifications to General/Major/Minor Electives: Implementation follows the above schedule.

 

Distance Education Courses

I’d like to take a moment and thank the members of the CAPC Ad Hoc Committee on Distance Education for the tremendous amount of work they accomplished in reviewing the numerous distance education proposals that CAPC received this year.

 

In an effort to align the distance education practices at West Chester University with that of the broader distance education community, CAPC has refined the terminology used to identify certain types of distance education courses.  There are now 4 types of distance education courses: Web-Enhanced (15% to 29% of content is delivered online or at a distance), Blended (30% to 79% of content is delivered online or at a distance), O8 Online (80% to 99% of content is delivered online or at a distance) and OL Online (100% of content is offered online or at a distance).  To be clear, the approval process is required only of those courses where 15% or more of content is delivered online or at a distance.  It is our hope that this policy will provide flexibility for those faculty members interested in “test driving” the DE experience by replacing up to 15% of in class instruction via distance education without seeking approval first.

 

During this process we also amended the distance education policy to allow for two types of reviews for DE courses: Level 1 and Level 2.  Web-Enhanced, Blended and O8 Online courses are subject to a Level 1 Review and OL Online courses are subject to the Level 2 review. Courses approved via the CAPC Level 1 Review are approved to replace up to 99% of instruction with an online delivery modality, but are not approved to offer the course fully at a distance without an additional review by CAPC.  Courses approved via the CAPC Level 2 Review may be offered without further review should the percentage of content being delivered via a distance fall below 100%. For more information on these reviews and the appropriate forms, please visit: http://www.wcupa.edu/_admin/associateprovost/capcforms.asp#Forms

 

I’d like to thank the campus community for their patience around the evolving nature of the DE policy. Despite what may have seemed like a series of changes to the policy, we believe that we have arrived at a comprehensive policy that will serve the institution well as we continue to have conversations about how to ensure the quality and integrity of this modality for WCU.

  

Best regards,

Jeff Osgood

CAPC Chair