Bylaws - UCC

UCC Bylaws

  1. Purpose
  2. Membership
  3. Terms
  4. Officers
  5. Voting rights
  6. Executive Committee
  7. General Education Committee
  8. Curriculum Matters
  9. Meetings
  10. Agenda
  11. Rules of Order
  12. Proposals
  13. Support Services
  14. Amendment of Bylaws

1.  Purpose

The University Curriculum Committee (UCC) shall function as the chief body of the University in all curricular matters.  The UCC shall represent the interests of the students, faculty, and administration regarding the University curriculum.  The UCC reviews course and program changes and new proposals and forwards recommendations to the University President for approval and implementation.  The UCC shall address long-term planning issues and shall develop and coordinate the curriculum based upon the goals and mission of the University.

2.  Membership

The UCC will have 14 or 15 members with specific representation as follows:

  1. Faculty:  10 members with the total comprised of 2 members by election from each of the 4 College Curriculum Committees:  Business, Education, Liberal Arts & Sciences; and Visual & Performing Arts, plus 2 graduate faculty identified by Graduate Council.
  2. Library:  1 representative from the library faculty.
  3. Students:  2 members appointed by the Executive Committee, 1 undergraduate and 1 graduate student.
  4. Administrative;  1 Provost or designee.
  5. Other:  1  General Education Committee Chair, if not already a member of UCC.

Faculty shall have served a minimum of 2 years at the University in a tenure-track position in order to be eligible to serve on the UCC.

3. Terms of Membership

  1. Faculty shall be elected for 2-year terms.  There shall be no limit to the number of consecutive terms a faculty member may serve.
  2. Administrators' terms are determined by the President.
  3. Students' terms are for one year and may be renewed.

4.  Officers

  1. All officers of the UCC shall be faculty members.
  2. A candidate for Chairperson must be able to serve a full 2-year term, or complete the remaining time of a two-year term if being elected to complete a prior Chair's incomplete term in office, barring any unforeseen event.  A Chairperson shall be elected by the committee biannually for a 2-year term.  The Chairperson's duties, responsibilities, and powers shall be:  
    1. Determining a schedule of meetings.
    2. Conducting meetings.
    3. Arranging the screening of proposals to assure that proper procedures have been followed
    4. Deciding what matters will be placed on the agenda.
    5. Through electronic means, providing access to agendas and proposals to the UCC.
    6. Announcing the UCC meetings in the University's Daily Brief.
    7. Sending the approved list of proposals to the Provost or designee.
    8. Appointing ad-hoc committees as needed.
    9. Advising department chairpersons and faculty about the structure, implementation, and routing of programs and course proposals as needed.
    10. Conducting the UCC Executive Committee meeting.
  3. A Vice-Chairperson shall be elected; annually for a 1-year term and shall assume all of the duties and responsibilities of the Chairperson.  If the Chairperson cannot continue to serve, The Vice-Chairperson will become Chairperson and a new Vice-Chairperson shall be elected.
  4. A Secretary shall be elected annually for a one-year term whose duties and responsibilities shall be:  
    1. Providing official minutes of the meetings.
    2. Maintaining the UCC web page.
  5. If there is a vacancy in the offices of the Vice-Chair or Secretary before the end of a term, the vacancy will be filled by election.
  6. There shall be no limit to the number of terms that an office can service on the UCC.
  7. Any officer may be removed from office by a vote of 9 voting members.
  8. Elections shall take place in sequential order starting with Chair, Vice-Chair, and Secretary.

5.  Voting Rights

  1. 8 faculty members (2 from each of the four colleges), 2 graduate faculty 1 library faculty and 1 Provost, or their designee, will have full voting rights.  Thus the UCC has 12 voting members.
  2. Members who need to be absent may send a substitute who will have the same voting rights as the person replaced.
  3. Proxy votes will not be accepted.

6. Executive Committee

  1. The Chairperson, the Vice-Chairperson, and the Secretary of the UCC will constitute the membership of the Executive Committee.
  2. The UCC Chairperson will chair the Executive Committee
  3. The Chairperson will call meetings as necessary.
  4. The Chairperson will bring Executive Committee concerns and proposals to the UCC.

7.  General Education Committee  (GEC) 

Functions and duties:

  1. The GEC will function as a standing committee reporting to the UCC.
  2. The primary purpose of the GEC will be to make recommendations about the structure and content of the General Education program.
  3. The GEC will have its own Chairperson who will report to the UCC and serve as an ex-officio member of the UCC.
  4. The GEC will operate according to the GED bylaws.  Any changes to the  GEC bylaws must be approved by the UCC.

8.  Curriculum Matters

Matters directly related to curriculum proposals:

  1. Proposals to initiate new or revise existing programs, courses and policies.
  2. General Education proposals.
  3. Distance Education proposals.
  4. Selected Topics and One-Time-Only courses.
  5. Other matters impacting curriculum as outlined on the current Curriculum Proposal Cover Sheet, but not addressed in section 7.A.

9.  Meetings

  1. A minimum of 7 monthly meetings will be scheduled for each academic year.
  2. A calendar for monthly meetings and agenda deadlines shall be posted to the UCC web page by the first meeting of each academic year.
  3. The regular meeting of the UCC shall be on the fourth Thursday of the month, when possible, from 11:00 a.m. to 11:50 a.m.
  4. A quorum of 6 voting members shall be necessary to conduct the UCC meetings.
  5. The Chairperson reserves the right to call additional meetings following the regular monthly meeting if the pertinent business is not completed at the regular monthly meeting.
  6. With the consensus of the membership, the Chairperson may call special meetings.  Special meetings will address the UCC business that falls beyond the scope of the agenda for regularly scheduled monthly meetings.
  7. All students, faculty, and administrators are welcome to attend regular UCC monthly meetings.  They can express their views if ruled in order by the Chairperson.

10.  Agenda

The agenda shall consist of the following in this order:

  1. General announcements by the Chairperson.
  2. Matters considered by the Chairperson to be of an emergency nature.
  3. Procedural matters.
  4. Approval of minutes.
  5. Committee reports.
  6. Old Business including tabled proposals.
  7. New Business.
    1. Program and Course Proposals.
    2. Proposals will appear under the college from which the proposal originated.   Proposals will be in numerical order, by the curriculum routing number, within each college designation. Proposals will be placed on the agenda alphabetically by college name and rotated forward one step on each agenda.
  8. General Education proposals will retain the numerical designation of the originating unit.
  9. Distance Education proposals.
  10. Announcement of One-Time-Only and Selected Topics courses.
  11. Any curricular matter submitted to the Chairperson by any student, faculty, or administrator.  The Executive Committee must first review such matters and judge them appropriate for consideration by the UCC.

11.  Rules of Order

Robert's Rules of Order shall govern the UCC proceedings in all cases where they are applicable.

12.  Proposals

All proposals for revised and new courses must be completely developed and include: 

  1. Course Description: as it will appear in the Master List of Courses
    1. a succinct description of the course content, with keywords from the course objectives,
    2. the number of clock hours,
    3. the number of semester hours of credit.
    4.  and prerequisites must be included.
  2. Rationale:
    1. must include the reasons for the development of the course.
    2.  a description of how the course will help to achieve the goals of the major program and/or General Education.
  3. Course Objectives:
    1. written to reflect the desired outcomes from the course as observed in student behaviors.  
    2. must indicate demonstrable learning expected of the student for the successful completion of the course.
  4. Assessment:
    1. List of instruments used to assess student's achievements of the course objectives
    2. The composition of the list and the nature of the assessments themselves are at the discretion of the submitting department.
  5. Course Outline:
    1. provide sufficient detail so that course content can be determined from the outline.
    2. is not delineated by date or class sessions.
  6. Instructional Resources:
    1. list of instructional resources supporting the proposed course.
    2. can be print or electronic format.
    3. may include any combination of books, journal articles, media, reputable websites, or other formats appropriate to the course proposed.  
    4. should be listed in alphabetical order in the citation style of that discipline.
    5. the library owns or has access to at least 50% of the core literature for the course.
    6. where appropriate and applicable, resources should be as recent as possible and should meet the accreditation standards for that particular program.

Additional information:   some departments may wish to include such items as controls, special costs or needs, and unusual procedures or teaching strategies to be used in the course.  The decision as to whether or no to include such information is at the discretion of the individual department.

One-Time Only and Selected Topics Course Proposals:  

  1. These course proposals are routed directly to the UCC following department approval.
  2. These proposals will be announced at the UCC meeting, but not voted upon.
  3. A One-Time-Only course may be offered only one time.  To be offered again, the course must receive full approval through the regular approval curriculum process.
  4. A specific course title for a Selected Topics course may be offered up to two times, but must be announced each time so that it is noted in the curricular records.  If a department wishes to offer a specific course title for the third time, the department must route the course proposal through the UCC process as a regular course.

All new and revised proposals must include a new and revised check sheet.

All proposals for new and revised courses and programs must follow the curriculum routing procedure.

All proposals must be accompanied by a complete cover sheet and the accompanying documents specified on the check sheet.

All proposals must be uploaded to the UCC's proposal submission website by the announced deadlines.  Compliance is necessary for a proposal to be placed on the agenda for that month

13.  Support Services

Support services for the UCC shall include, but are not limited to:

  1. No less than 6 hours of reassigned time per academic year for the UCC Chairperson.
  2. The services of a University secretarial staff member to expedite the UCC business.
  3. Office space for the Chairperson to conduct the UCC business and to house the recent UCC records.  
  4. An appropriate budget for the UCC for mailing, phone, and supplies.

14.  Amendment of the UCC by-laws

Bylaws may be amended at any time with an affirmative vote by 9 of the voting membership of the UCC.

Amendment of the UCC bylaws is subject to review and approval by Representative Council of APSCUF.

Last revised 10-16 (UCC)
Revisions approved by APSCUF 03-17