The UB senate joined 28 other faculty governance organizations from across the system in endorsing a resolution advanced by the SUNY senate urging SUNY Provost Peter Salins to suspend his plan to assess student learning using a system-wide test after the first two years of undergraduate study.

The resolution also recommends creating a Student Achievement Committee composed of faculty and other relevant constituencies to develop a plan for a campus-based, student assessment program for SUNY.

Johnstone calls plan 'mischievous'

Senators were urged to support the SUNY senate resolution by former SUNY Chancellor D. Bruce Johnstone, University Professor in the Department of Educational Leadership and Policy.

Johnstone called Salins' plan a "very, very mischievous, né wicked, direction the new SUNY trustees and their provost are taking us."

Judith Adams-Volpe, director of Lockwood Library and a SUNY senator, briefed members of the Faculty Senate on the Salins proposal, which was the topic of much discussion at last week's meeting of the University Faculty Senate.

She said that the SUNY senate believes testing and assessment of students should remain based in the individual campuses.

"They are very concerned about the efficacy of a test that would try to measure general education over all the types of campuses that comprise SUNY, including two-year campuses and technical colleges," Adams-Volpe said.

The group, she said, would like to see more analysis about the potential efficacy of the test, and more discussion about what it would try to measure and how the test results might be used.

Adams-Volpe noted that Salins told SUNY senators at last week's meeting that he wants to use the test to produce data to measure student improvement.

Consequences a concern

She said many SUNY senators questioned what would happen if students did not show significant improvement when they were retested after two years of study. "Then what might the consequences of that be for the campus?" she asked. "Would there be budgetary consequences, for instance, if some campuses show more improvement than others?"

Adams-Volpe added that SUNY Chancellor John Ryan, who also attended last week's meeting, informed SUNY senators that he was "not involved at all in the process or policy making on this issue."

In other business, UB senators, after much debate, finally approved a plan to allow students to repeat courses in which they have received grades they deem to be less-than-satisfactory.

Senators amended the original resolution from the Grading Committee that would have restricted such a practice to courses in which students have received a grade of C+ or lower.

The resolution as approved strikes the C+ limit, effectively allowing students to retake any courses, no matter what the grade earned.

However, the grade earned the second time will be the one counted in calculating the GPA, even if it proves to be lower than the first grade received.

The senate on Tuesday also discussed a resolution asking that President William R. Greiner sign the Talloires Declaration and instruct appropriate university groups to undertake or continue the actions listed in it. The 10 actions outlined in the declaration include such items as establishing institutional recycling and energy conservation policies, and developing curricula, research initiatives and outreach activities to support an environmentally sustainable future.

Welch introduces resolution

In introducing the resolution on the Talloires Declaration, Claude Welch, SUNY Distinguished Service Professor in the Department of Political Science, said the document arose from a 1990 meeting of a group of university presidents who were concerned that they and their peers should be taking a leadership role on environmental issues.

While senators agreed with the principles detailed in the declaration-and noted that UB already is doing many of those things-some voiced concern that there may be many similar "good causes" awaiting senate endorsement.

The resolution will come up for a vote at the senate's next meeting on Nov. 10.