For Release December 11
Board of Regents Meets at USD, Discuss Plans for Future Collaboration
PIERRE-The Board of Regents is meeting at the University of South Dakota December 12-13. Slated for discussion are plans for the future development of Discipline Councils and The Off-Campus Network which are key components for further collaboration in the Unified System of Public Higher Education.
Discipline Councils will integrate academic disciplines across institutions by overseeing the connectivity among different institutions in instruction, scholarship, and service. Each of the Councils will be responsible for ensuring the system wide relationship of curriculum offerings, deployment of resources, and contributions of public service through such activities as system inventories of curriculum, faculty expertise, and efforts to acquire external resources. This will further develop a statewide perspective on needs to be addressed by specific disciplines in a system wide collaborative manner.
Regents' Executive Director Robert T. Tad Perry explained that, "The development of Discipline Councils will enhance the academic program opportunities at each of the universities by ensuring the effective use of resources, as well as permit the universities to better address state needs for service and research. All of this will be possible through the use of system wide alliances that can share resources, offer services across the state, and allow more students to benefit from faculty expertise." Perry went on to explain that greater collaboration within disciplines would allow for the recruitment of specialized faculty that could serve students across the state rather than at a single university.
Associated with the Discipline Councils is the Off-Campus Academic Program Delivery Council, which will play a pivotal role in providing access to higher education opportunities across the state. The Off-Campus Council will coordinate the delivery of educational services to locations beyond the immediate area of an institution. Perry continued, "Technology is allowing far greater access to higher education across the state, which is a particularly important aspect of serving the rural areas. To avoid duplication, universities will form partnerships to maximize the resources available to serve students beyond the campus and allow more to access higher education opportunities."
Also, the Board will review a report on course section sizes for the university system. The section size report is one component of the system's efforts to better manage its resources. The current report shows that the number of small sections has steadily declined. Small sections are considered to be graduate course with less than 7 enrolled and undergraduate courses with less than 10 enrolled. The 7/10 Rule, adopted by the Board in December 1995, calls for the reduction of small sections. Small sections are down from a high in Fall 1995 of 581 sections to 116 sections in Fall 1996--a decrease of over 80% in the number of small sections. "We have promising news from this report that the universities have made great strides in effective resource management", said Perry referring to the small percentage of courses excepted from the 7/10 Rule. "We are well below our goal of no more than 5% small sections. Of all system courses, 99.4% meet the 7/10 Rule." Board President Karl Wegner added that, "This shows that our university system is serious about efficiency efforts, and I commend the campuses for their work in curriculum management."