This is to inform the campus community that, on 3/18/03, I approved the attached Policy on Curriculum Revision and Review.

The policy was drafted by the Accreditation Implementation Committee (AIC) on Curriculum Revision and Review co-chaired by Patricia Kennedy, Associate Professor of History, and Bernadette Howard, Acting Assistant Dean of Instruction. Also attached is the memorandum, dated 3/17/03, from the Co-Chairs to me transmitting the policy for my approval. As noted in that memorandum, the policy in essence has been extensively debated and reviewed and was accepted by the Faculty Senate (with certain recommended changes) at its meeting on 2/5/03.

The Recommendation of the October 2000 Accreditation Visiting Team

As you may recall, the AIC on Curriculum Revision and Review was established to review and help implement the following recommendation made by the October 2000 accreditation visiting team: "...that curriculum review and revision be made a systematic and cyclical process with the goal of assuring academic rigor and integrity in all courses and programs." This recommendation in essence was a carryover from the following recommendation made by the 1994 visiting team: "...that curriculum documentation and review become systematic and consistent in order to ensure that variations [between approved Core Outlines and individual course syllabi] are in the realm of professional latitude rather than substantive and qualitative in nature as at present."

The team's concerns. In making its recommendation, the October 2000 visiting team was concerned, among other things, with the following: "...while courses are reviewed as they are developed and modified, there is no systematic review of courses once they are taught repeatedly"; "A comparative review of sample Core Outlines and corresponding syllabi suggests that there are substantive inconsistencies between the outline (as the prescriptive document) and the syllabus (as the descriptive document)"; "critical curriculum information was not consistently described in the Core Outlines"; "...division chairs should ensure that all syllabi are regularly compared with their relevant [Core] Outline to provide assurance that the objectives and student competencies for all sections of a given course, wherever and by whomever offered, are consistent with the outline of record for that course"; "Periodic review of established Core Outlines should be formalized and institutionalized to assure the currency and continued appropriateness of curriculum content, instructional methods, course activities and objectives, and student competencies."

The Policy and Its Implementation

As you will note from the attached Policy, its purpose is "To establish policy and procedures for institutionalizing curriculum revision and review, and for the periodic review of core outlines and course syllabi...."

The policy is a major step in implementing the accreditation team's above-quoted recommendation. I thank and commend the Committee, the various disciplines and Divisions, the Faculty Senate, and the faculty at large for all of your efforts in reviewing and debating the various issues, in making accommodations, and in reaching consensus agreement on the final draft of the policy.

I now ask all of you to support the purpose and intent of the policy by respectively doing what we need to do, in good faith and on a timely basis, to implement the policy and the procedures prescribed in the policy.

The importance of the Focus Mid-Term Report

As you know, although the Accrediting Commission for Community and Junior Colleges accepted our Interim Report, we are now subject to a Focused Midterm Report with Visit. One of the accreditation recommendations we must especially focus on in the Midterm Report is the above-quoted recommendation relating to curriculum review and revision. Because it is a carryover recommendation from the 1994 visiting team, or two accreditation cycles ago, we must show resolution of the concerns which precipitated the recommendation or show substantial additional progress, subsequent to the Interim Report, in achieving such resolution.

The broad purpose of accreditation is institutional quality and self improvement.

Mahalo,

Mark Silliman
Provost