A-Senate: Changes to university program guidelines still being discussed
Academic Senate abruptly voted to adjourn its meeting on Tuesday after discussing changing the University Program Group IV-C guideline language.
The motion to change the language is still active. Some senators felt the decisions were moving too fast, and they were afraid they would make a mistake.
"This is huge," said Joe Finck, a physics faculty member. "Making a decision right now, we may make a decision that we regret later."
UP Group IV-C covers "Studies in Racism and Cultural Diversity in the United States." Classes included in this course must focus on "one or more of the major groups which experience both racism and invidious discrimination in the United States."
Group IV-C classes could also include courses that focus on groups that are discriminated against because of gender, ethnicity and sexual orientation. ASL 100, an introduction to the deaf community, the cultural aspects of deafness and the deaf community, was added to the group at Tuesday's meeting.
Currently, classes focus more on racism in the United States. Tracy Brown, director of the General Education Committee, said the group is meant to study the ethnic and racial diversity in the world and the U.S.
Senators were quick to make a motion to change the language of Group IV-C course guidelines to include more classes like ASL 100. Some, like Nancy Eddy, a communications and dramatic arts faculty member, said the language of the course guidelines could limit classes that discuss other forms of discrimination.
"I would say if I was going to offer a class on LGBT (discrimination,) this would be the category," Eddy said. "It’s discrimination. If it doesn’t go into cultural diversity, where does it go?"
Katrina Piatek-Jimenez, a math faculty member, said racial discrimination is important to study, but other forms are just as important.
"While I do agree that discrimination due to race has been a huge problem, our country is changing," she said. "Some of these other discriminations have been hidden or not spoken about. I feel like we’re discriminating against these forms of discrimination by not including them."
David Smith, a philosophy and religion faculty member, said that he was shocked the discussion was going so quickly.
"Not to disparage other forms of discrimination as worthy studies, but I believe it needs to be more than a discussion in the General Education Committee," he said. "We need to have a discussion university wide."
Academic Senators will discuss sending the language changes back to their departments. It is still unclear if there will be action on the motion at the Oct. 14 meeting.
