Tuesday, September 11, 2001

Administration focusing efforts on grad programs, UCR
By Jacque Petersell
Staff reporter

Proposals for new graduate studies programs and new University Curriculum Requirements could be sent to committees for review within the next few months.

Provost William Koehler said no specific area of study is being targeted for the three to five new graduate programs suggested in Chancellor Michael Ferrari’s 2001 Fall Convocation speech Thursday. Instead, current graduate programs are being reviewed and all academic areas will be given a chance to propose a new graduate program by the end of the semester, he said.

Koehler said that depending on the chosen programs, new graduate programs will either be added or will be substituted for older programs.

“It’s impossible to predict what the mix of programs will be,” he said. “There’s certainly no guarantees we will have all the current graduate programs plus a number of new programs. There may have to be trade-offs.”

Koehler said one common denominator for universities with premier graduate programs is the 5-1 undergraduate-to-graduate student ratio at those schools. TCU’s student population rests around one graduate student to seven or eight undergraduate students, he said.

Increasing financial aid for graduate students and creating new graduate programs are two ways to increase graduate student enrollment, Koehler said.

Koehler said, “decisions (about which areas will be funded) have yet to be made because programs have not been reviewed and new programs have not been proposed.”

Ferrari said funds for the future graduate programs will come from the same sources as current programs — graduate student tuition and fees and private support.

Koehler said depending on budget priorities, new graduate programs could begin in one or two years.

Unlike the graduate studies programs, which are fresh goals for the administration, a redesign of the UCR has been a project in the works for a few years, said Richard Enos, professor of English and chairman of the UCR redesigning committee. A recommendation to review the UCR was first made by a task force from the Commission on the Future of TCU two years ago. The UCR has been researched by two other committees.

The goal of the third committee, consisting of faculty and staff members, is to draft a new core requirement system, Enos said. Enos will draft the initial UCR plan using the recommendations made by the first two commissions and then present it to the committee for revisions and additions.

Criteria for the new UCR is based on the goals in the mission statement, Enos said.
“It goes beyond just academic subjects,” Enos said. “We want people to learn such things as social responsibility, the idea that we’ve been very fortunate and to give back to society, integrity and morality.” Enos said an example class would be a lower level ethics class that would help students learn to make decisions later in college and in the work force.

While drafting a new UCR proposal, Enos aid he looked at the core curriculum of 10 schools considered to be TCU’s peer, including Southern Methodist University, Rice University, Harvard University and Vanderbilt University. Enos said after reviewing other programs, he was impressed with TCU’s current UCR. He said continued efforts to improve the UCR have been effective thus far.

Enos said he expects to complete the draft later this month. The committee will review the draft and make recommendations before giving a final draft to Koehler in November.

Jacque Petersell
j.s.petersell@student.tcu.edu