PRELIMINARY REPORT ON THE
CORE CURRICULUM SURVEY (Pilot)
SPRING 2005



By The
Institutional Research and Effectiveness Department

SUL ROSS STATE UNIVERSITY



INTRODUCTION
The Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board (THECB) requires that each public institution of higher education evaluate its core curriculum at five-year intervals. This survey is used to analyze how the core curriculum reflects the required elements as specified in Coordinating Board rules and the guidelines entitled Core Curriculum: Assumptions and Defining Characteristics.

The core curriculum includes a series of basic intellectual competencies (reading, writing, speaking, listening, critical thinking, and computer literacy) that are essential to the learning process in any discipline. Although students can be expected to come to the university with some experience in exercising these competencies, they often need further instruction and practice to meet university standards and, later, to succeed in both their major field of academic study and their chosen career or profession. Some of theses intellectual competencies have traditionally been tied to specific courses required of all students during their first two years of college. For example, courses in college composition, together with mathematics have long been the cornerstone experience of the freshman year. But a single course or two-course sequence in college composition can do little more than introduce students to the principles and practices of good writing. Within the three to six semester credit hours of course work in the first semester, there is not enough time spend to guarantee proficiency. There are no required courses specifically dedicated to reading or to critical thinking. Thus, if a core curriculum is to prepare students effectively, it is imperative that these intellectual competencies be included among the objectives of many individual core courses and reflected in their course content.

Questions for this survey addressed Area Objectives, Perspectives, and Competencies. They were selected to touch upon as many of these elements as possible. These three types of elements may be represented by rows, columns, and depth of a three-dimentional cube. The following figure illustrates this cube. Questions were selected to address as many cells of the cube as possible.


The Spring 2005 Core Curriculum Survey was authorized by vote in the Core Curriculum Committee on April 15, 2005. After composing and formatting the survey items, the survey was approved by Dr. Cockrum on April 18th. The survey designed was to provide a snapshot of student perceptions about the content of various core curriculum courses at Sul Ross State University as they relate to the THECB Core Curriculum Assumptions and Defining Characteristics. The survey items were designed to provide a benchmark of information about the core curriculum courses that will provide the baseline for trends and predictions when combined with future surveys.

Because of the late date, the survey forms were printed and distributed to individual instructors or to departmental secretaries as rapidly as possible so that instructors could administer the surveys in conjunction with the course evaluations. After some surveys were distributed, the process was halted because of disagreement between committee members about the intent of the authorizing vote. This unfortunate turn of events limited the expected number of Core Curriculum classes from 85 to 21 and the number of responses from 1606 to 336. It will be December of 2006 before another opportunity arises to assess students along with course evaluations in a long semester. This limited number of responses must now be termed a pilot survey and this is a report on the results as of April 22, 2005.


RESPONSES TO QUANTITATIVE SURVEY QUESTIONS
The first 22 questions had a variety of Likert Scale choices. Results are displayed graphically along with the percent of responses of each choice for each question and for ALL participants. The scale of the bar graph is the same for each question. Citations on the right side of the charts are from the THECB CORE CURRICULUM ASSUMPTIONS AND DEFINING CHARACTERISTICS. Red text is colored red for the purpose of this report and is not red in the original. These questions are desinged to provide quantitative measures of how often the required elements are addressed in the core curriculum courses.
These responses indicate that Core Curriculum students read very little. This question addresses part of the THECB Basic Competency:

"READING:
Reading at the college level means the ability to analyze and interpret a variety of printed materials -- books, articles, and documents. A core curriculum should offer students the opportunity to master both general methods of analyzing printed materials and specific methods for analyzing the subject matter of individual disciplines."
More than half of the Core Curriculum students say that they only wrote 1-3 pages. This question addresses part of the THECB Basic Competency:

"WRITING:
Competency in writing is the ability to produce clear, correct, and coherent prose adapted to purpose, occasion, and audience. Although correct grammar, spelling, and punctuation are each a sine qua non in any composition, they do not automatically ensure that the composition itself makes sense or that the writer has much of anything to say. Students need to be familiar with the writing process including how to discover a topic and how to develop and organize it, how to phrase it effectively for their audience. These abilities can be acquired only through practice and reflection."
More than half of the Core Curriculum students say that they only had 1-3 written assignment. In a 16-week semester, this averages one for each 8 weeks. This question addresses part of the THECB Basic Competency:

"WRITING:
Competency in writing is the ability to produce clear, correct, and coherent prose adapted to purpose, occasion, and audience. Although correct grammar, spelling, and punctuation are each a sine qua non in any composition, they do not automatically ensure that the composition itself makes sense or that the writer has much of anything to say. Students need to be familiar with the writing process including how to discover a topic and how to develop and organize it, how to phrase it effectively for their audience. These abilities can be acquired only through practice and reflection."
Core Curriculum students do not see themselves as having problems with grammer and punctuation. This question addresses part of the THECB Basic Competency:

"WRITING:
Competency in writing is the ability to produce clear, correct, and coherent prose adapted to purpose, occasion, and audience. Although correct grammar, spelling, and punctuation are each a sine qua non in any composition, they do not automatically ensure that the composition itself makes sense or that the writer has much of anything to say. Students need to be familiar with the writing process including how to discover a topic and how to develop and organize it, how to phrase it effectively for their audience. These abilities can be acquired only through practice and reflection."
Core Curriculum students do not see themselves as having problems with organization and logic on written assignments. This question addresses part of the THECB Basic Competency:

"WRITING:
Competency in writing is the ability to produce clear, correct, and coherent prose adapted to purpose, occasion, and audience. Although correct grammar, spelling, and punctuation are each a sine qua non in any composition, they do not automatically ensure that the composition itself makes sense or that the writer has much of anything to say. Students need to be familiar with the writing process including how to discover a topic and how to develop and organize it, how to phrase it effectively for their audience. These abilities can be acquired only through practice and reflection."
Core Curriculum students do not see themselves as having problems with creativity and aesthetics on written assignments. This question addresses the THECB perspective:

"6. Develop the ability to make aesthetic judgments;"

also from the THECB description of instruction and content in the Core Curriculum:

"Education, as distinct from training, demands a knowledge of various contrasting views of human experience in the world. Both the humanities and the visual and performing arts deal with the individual's reaction to the human situation in analytical and creative ways."
Core Curriculum students believe they are giving proper credit to original resources in written assignments. This question addresses one of the THECB Educational Objectives under the Communication component:

"6. To develop the ability to research and write a documented paper and/or to give an oral presentation."
Almost half of Core Curriculum students have no oral presentation at all. This works out to an average of about 5 minutes for the longest oral presentation for those who gave one. This question addresses part of the THECB basic competency:

"SPEAKING:
Competence in speaking is the ability to communicate orally in clear, coherent, and persuasive language appropriate to purpose, occasion, and audience. Developing this competency includes acquiring poise and developing control of the language through experience in making presentations to small groups, to large groups, and through the media."
About half of the Core Curriculum students say they gave only 1-3 oral presentations in this class. This question addresses part of the THECB basic competency:

"SPEAKING:
Competence in speaking is the ability to communicate orally in clear, coherent, and persuasive language appropriate to purpose, occasion, and audience. Developing this competency includes acquiring poise and developing control of the language through experience in making presentations to small groups, to large groups, and through the media."
Very little time is spent using computers and other technology to complete course requirements. Thisquestion addresses part of the THECB basic competency:

"COMPUTER LITERACY:
Computer literacy at the college level means the ability to use computer-based technology in communicating, solving problems, and acquiring information. Core-educated students should have an understanding of the limits, problems, and possibilities associated with the use of technology, and should have the tools necessary to evaluate and learn new technologies as they become available."
Over one-quarter of the Core Curriculum students indicate that they have very low participation in class discussions. This question addresses one of the THECB Educational Objectives under the Communication component:

"4. To participate effectively in groups with emphasis on listening, critical and reflective thinking, and responding."
One third of the Core Curriculum students say they were not involved in small group discussions at all. Over one quarter say they had small group discussions in every class. See the analysis by discipline shown below to identify which classes have multiple small group discussions in every class. This question addresses one of the THECB Educational Objectives under the Communication component:

"4. To participate effectively in groups with emphasis on listening, critical and reflective thinking, and responding."
Almost half of the Core Curriculum students say they participated in discussions with students from other ethnicities. See the analysis by ethnicity shown below for more detail. This question addresses the THECB perspective:

"1. Establish broad and multiple perspectives on the individual in relationship to the larger society and world in which he or she lives, and to understand the responsibilities of living in a culturally and ethnically diversified world;"

It also addresses one of the THECB Educational Objectives under SOCIAL AND BEHAVIORAL SCIENCES

"12. To identify and understand differences and commonalities within diverse cultures."
Over two thirds of the Core Curriculum students say they studied with other students outside of class very rarely.
Over one-third of the Core Curriculum students report having to remember material from assigned readings once a month or less. This question addresses part of the THECB basic competency:

"READING:
Reading at the college level means the ability to analyze and interpret a variety of printed materials -- books, articles, and documents. A core curriculum should offer students the opportunity to master both general methods of analyzing printed materials and specific methods for analyzing the subject matter of individual disciplines."
Over half of the Core Curriculum students report analyzing, comparing, and/or solving problems only once per month or less. This question addresses one of the THECB Educational Objectives under SOCIAL AND BEHAVIORAL SCIENCES

"10. To analyze, critically assess, and develop creative solutions to public policy problems."
Over one-third of the Core Curriculum students report encouragement or requirement for critical response, personal opinion, or personal evaluation once a month or less. This question addresses part of the THECB Basic Competency:

"CRITICAL THINKING:
Critical thinking embraces methods for applying both qualitative and quantitative skills analytically and creatively to subject matter in order to evaluate arguments and to construct alternative strategies. Problem solving is one of the applications of critical thinking, used to address an identified task."

This question also addresses one of the THECB Educational Objectives under the Communication component:

"4. To participate effectively in groups with emphasis on listening, critical and reflective thinking, and responding."

This question also addresses one of the THECB Educational Objectives under the HUMANITIES AND VISUAL AND PERFORMING ARTS

"3. To respond critically to works in the arts and humanities."
This question addresses the THECB perspective:

"2. Stimulate a capacity to discuss and reflect upon individual, political, economic, and social aspects of life in order to understand ways in which to be a responsible member of society;"
This question addresses the THECB perspectives:

"2. Stimulate a capacity to discuss and reflect upon individual, political, economic, and social aspects of life in order to understand ways in which to be a responsible member of society;" and
"9. To recognize and apply reasonable criteria for the acceptability of historical evidence and social research."
This question addresses one of the THECB Educational Objectives under the Communication component:

"INSTITUTIONALLY DESIGNATED OPTION

An institution may wish to include in its core curriculum courses that address exemplary educational objectives not covered in the preceding broad discipline categories. Such courses may include computer literacy, kinesiology, health/wellness, interdisciplinary or linked courses, or other courses that address a specific institutional role and mission."
Questions 23-31 could be answered with one or more choices. The percent responding to each choice is displayed graphically for each question and for ALL participants. The scale of the bar graph is the same for each question. These questions are designed to provide quantitative measures of interrelationships between disciplines.
This question measured relationships between the Area Objectives (columns of the cube). It may be seen that communications, social and behavioral sciences, and multicultural studies were used most and that the natural sciences were used the least.
This question measured relationships between the Perspectives (rows of the cube). It may be seen that the historical and logical perspectives were used most and the mathematical and aesthetic were used the least.
This question measured relationships between the Objectives in the area of Mathematics. It may be seen that research material was used most often and mathematical models and mathematical symbols were used the least.
This question measured the use of personal creativity in several areas (columns of the cube). It may be seen that personal creativity was used mostly for written or oral presentations and least for performances or objects of art.
This question measured the use of technology against the competencies (depth of the cube). It may be seen that technology was used most to find information and least to solve problems.
This question measured learning against the competencies (depth of the cube). It may be seen that most learning was by listening and the least by practicing touch and motor skills.
This question measured the use of the Perspectives (rows of the cube). It may be seen that values werr studied the most and the least used was art forms.