Common Course Numbering: The Unsettled Issue
We posted the Common Course Numbering: Pros and Cons last November and received thirteen thoughtful comments on the topic. Since then, councils and faculty task forces have convened. The Instruction Commission will review the CCN Steering Committee's analysis and recommendations at their Feb. 15-16 meeting. Among the recommendations is that a "designator" be assigned to the common courses. If collisions occur, colleges needs to re-number their unique courses locally.
According to the Common Course Numbering page at the State Board Web site, some community and technical colleges will implement the CCN plan as soon as summer 2007, others by summer 2008. In the meantime, the opposition movement still rages on. An urgent call for faculty to take action was issued again today. Apparently the sentiments on both sides are still going strong. The major concerns of faculty who oppose the CCN plan are:
- The four-year universities are not participating in the CCN process.
- The actual system wide costs have not been realistically estimated.
- It will cause disruption not better efficiency.
- There may be better alternatives.
- Faculty at some colleges are not presented with viewpoints from both sides.
- There was very minimal faculty involvement at the initial planning stage, but the work and impact of the implementation may fall heavily on faculty.
However, some supporters of the CCN plan remain hopeful.
“I believe responsible, open minded people should be able to see the long term benefits of coordinating numbers for equivalent courses across the state. The four-year universities actually want us to do it because it makes their evaluations of our coursework easier.” (George Neal, Faculty,
“The common course numbering project began more than three years ago. State committees comprised of representatives across our system researched many other state programs that are currently in existence. ... All of the issues ... were fully debated by groups such as ATC, IC and the college presidents and a decision was made to move ahead as the benefits to students strongly outweigh the costs of implementation." (Michael Lamka, Division Chair, Natural & Social Sciences,
What will this lead to? FACTC reps will discuss the CCN issue at the Feb. 9 meeting. As Robert Hobbs, a faculty member of Bellevue Community College, stated that faculty "need to become better informed than we really have time for and we need to state where we stand." If you want to weigh in, please post your comment or share it with your campus FACTC rep.
North
posted by Jennifer Wu @ Monday, February 05, 2007
31 Comments:
To All:
I just have to make a few comments on about CCN. I am a faculty at South Puget Sound Community College. In the name of transparency, I will be upfront and let all of you know that I am married to Sunny Burns, the statewide coordinator of CCN. As you could probably guess, I'm in favor of CCN and but it’s not just due to personal reasons. The idea fundamentally appeals to me because it has a very good chance of making the system more effective and efficient. Its simplicity and elegance is overly compelling. Read on...
The following claim came to me on an e-mail attributed to the Coordinator of Outcomes Assessment at Bellevue Community College:
“Think about this: what if every place each course is listed (HP, catalogues -print and online, schedules of classes, program descriptions, specialized databases that contain course numbers, etc.) had to be changed. We've estimated what that might cost here at BCC and come up with a figure somewhere around $100,000. In addition, the proposed changes we've seen would have us changing courses we currently list at the 200-level to the 100-level, affecting some pre-requisite sequences.”
This claim seems phantasmagorical at best. I can't take those numbers on hearsay. I really have to question how the figure of $100,000 for implementation was derived. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. It is inconceivable to me that the college presidents would incur or overlook costs like that. I'm sure the devil's in the assumptions. I'd like to see an honest breakdown of the cost. My instinct is the number is bogus or based on very poor assumptions.
CCN will save money in the long run by reduced staff time looking up numbers and cross checking them, reduced advising time for those of us who advise students and make it easier for students to understand. Virtual crosswalk using a cross referencing chart to determine course equivalency helps but having the extra number as illustrated in the opponents slide show only adds more confusing data for students to look at (the slide show shows catalogs from two colleges in California with a footnote showing the equivalencies). This added bit of data adds one more degree of complexity to the catalogs. Every extra bit of complexity you place in an information presentation medium such as a college catalog adds a point of confusion and raises the possibility of confusing its audience and / or introducing error. The same number for a given equivalent course simplifies the whole system and is the most elegant solution. The system we have now is overly complex and Byzantine. Using a cross-referencing system would make it somewhat less Byzantine but it would not be optimal. Those that oppose it are fearful of the slippery slope argument, "If they can tell us how to number our courses, the next thing is they'll be scripting our courses for us!!!!". That doesn't follow. It is an illogical presumption. There really is no transcendent meaning to the numbers we use, however there are those among us who cannot discern this fact and we are getting resistance from the "magical number" quality of these existing course numbers. We also are getting resistance from those who just simply resent anyone telling them what to do. I believe responsible, open minded people should be able to see the long term benefits of coordinating numbers for equivalent courses across the state. The four year universities actually want us to do it because it makes their evaluations of our coursework easier (they don't have to keep track of 34 different colleges' numbering systems this way, they can rely on one book!).
George Neal
I love the quote from the fellow at Pierce: "All of the issues referred to in this e-mail were fully debated by groups such as ATC, IC and the college presidents and a decision was made to move ahead as the benefits to students strongly outweigh the costs of implementation." None of the groups mentioned have many faculty on them. I note that the big tide of opposition began with the meetings the state board set up exclusively for faculty, when more faculty realized that the bulk of the work was going to fall on them to implement the system.
Tracy Furutani
North Seattle Community College
I went to a meeting where the faculty was asked for their input. The amount of work required for CCN was the time spent at the meeting. There are many of us who have put a lot of work into this process. I think the opposition comes from people who never attended a single meeting and those who did come chose not to participate. I want to see an itemized list of ways it will significantly impact faculty workload. I have not been presented with any evidence CCN will impact our workload. This is the same challenge I make to those who claim there will be a major financial impact. Where is the evidence it will significantly impact workload. Is it based on fact or just simple speculation?
Valeris: "Four-hundred years ago on the planet Earth, workers who felt their
livelihood threatened by automation flung their wooden shoes, called 'sabot',
into the machines to stop them."
Uhura and Chekov: [Look at each other dumbfoundedly]
Valeris: "Hence the word...'sabotage'."
--"STVI:TUC", Stardate 9523.8
Through our active listserv, faculty members of the Northwest Biology Instructors' Organization (NWBIO) have, since early October, engaged in online discussions about the CCN plan. We have synthesized our concerns and have offered them respectfully and in a timely way when administrators requested formal faculty input.
Biology faculty have participated in good faith in the faculty workshops and in the process. Yet, our specific concerns with respect to the process, the course numbering protocols, and the outcomes of the faculty workshops have been routinely ignored, glossed over, or misrepresented by the CCN project proponents. This has been extremely frustrating and certainly runs counter to standard principles of shared governance.
Please read the two position papers from NWBIO faculty that have been sent to the project facilitators and our executive level administrators. Art Goss has provided links to these documents (two letters from NWBIO) on his website.
http://scidiv.bcc.ctc.edu/ag/ccn/
Scores of biology faculty across the state have indicated support of the positions and concerns represented in these two letters.
If you hear that biology faculty are satisfied with the CCN plan, that the problems with biology course numbers have been worked out, and that there are now merely small pockets of resistence, please understand that you are not being given accurate information.
First I’d like to reiterate my biases so no one can accuse me of having a hidden agenda. First, my wife is the chair of CCN. I am privy to experiences she has in attempting to implement CCN. Second, I support CCN because it is a good idea. See my previous postings. Now to the heart of the matter…
I think it should be noted that Ruth Ann Mikelson did not attend the session where Biology Faculty from across the state worked on CCN. I was there. Ruth Ann did go to a subsequent meeting on Chemistry. Here is my observation. I observed a constructive, respectful dialog between faculty, state board staff and my wife. There were no instances of anyone being treated badly. The Biology faculty was divided into groups. They did ask questions about why this was being done and they received rational, respectful answers. They, in turn, respected the process and became engaged in consolidating the numbering system. Everyone participating seemed satisfied when they left. There was little to no acrimony at all. Anyone claiming otherwise should be able to openly present evidence to the contrary. This was the forum to exchange concerns, they were exchanged and the process was completed well. My impression is that most of the claims from NWBIO about being treated badly are coming from people who did not attend the session. There may even be a few who did attend the session and went on to object to CCN in NWBIO. I cannot speak for their motivation, but I think it is a bit disingenuous to come to a meeting and either feign agreement or not speak up and then make claims that they weren’t heard or treated disrespectfully.
The only other possibility is that state board staff or Sunny responded VIA e-mail or mail to some of the NWBIO members disrespectfully. I know Sunny Burns ;-> and I also know some of the State Board Staff. I cannot imagine any of them being disrespectful. I would challenge anyone who feels they were treated poorly by the leaders of CCN to produce one piece of correspondence where their concerns were treated unfairly. Remember, just because you do not get your way, it does not mean you weren’t heard. There really is no way to satisfy all concerns so those who are in charge have to make decisions that may make some unhappy. I know this all too well, I have to do this every day in my classroom. So do all of us.
We also need to remember to treat staff working on CCN (or anything else for that matter) with respect. I have a number of reports of Faculty being rude and aggressive with state board staff. They are just people trying to do a honest job and not treating them with respect is unacceptable. It reflects badly on all of us. We should reject those in our ranks who behave poorly to others.
There seems to be a bit of straw man argument fallacy here. The NWBIO post previous to George's reply is not about being treated badly, but about being characterized as being on-board when great divisions still exist. George then says people are being disingenuous when they do not speak out at the meeting. But the meeting is not open to the primary question. Part of the objection of many is that the discussion is always about how we will implement this. For many the primary questions remains IF we should be doing this. That discussion is not being had openly. The Faculty statewide was NOT adequately involved in that discussion and CCN remains a "my way or the highway" proposition. Polite people will not make a big fuss in meetings when there is no forum for their principle view. They will simply leave and try to be productive elsewhere. George continues with "The only other possibility is that.." and takes up hypothetical poor treatment. How about this for another possibility? Convene a workshop where we might actually recommend another alternative or recommend against this project. Get some of the detractors to make their case as well as the board makes the case for the project. GEt the UW and WSU to say what they currently do, and what they are likely to do with our efforts. Then see what discussion occurs. Talk about statewide views in THIS context.
Additional Infomation.
Number of Community College Students transferred to Universities last year: 15,000.
Number of students enrolled last year that had attended another Community Colege within the last 5 years: 60,000.
Source: State Board.
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