09-136 Earth Atmospheric Sciences BA Admission Suspension (OT).doc
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University at Albany – State University of New York
College of Arts and Sciences
Course Action Form
Proposal No.
09-136
New Course
Revision of:
Number
Description
Cross-Listing
Title
Prerequisites
Shared-Resources Course
Credits
Deactivate / Activate Course (boldface & underline as appropriate)
X
Other (specify):
Proposal to suspend admission
to the Earth & Atmospheric
Sciences BA
Department:
Atmospheric and Environmental Sciences
To be effective (semester/year): Fall 2010
Course Number
Current:
New:
Credits:
Course Title:
Course Description to appear in Bulletin:
Prerequisites statement to be appended to description in Bulletin:
If S/U is to be designated as the only grading system in the course, check here:
This course is (will be) cross listed with (i.e., CAS ###):
This course is (will be) a shared-resources course with (i.e., CAS ###):
Explanation of proposal:
Proposal to suspend admission to the Earth & Atmospheric Sciences BA See page 2.
Other departments or schools which offer similar or related courses and which have certified that this proposal does not overlap their
offering:
Chris Thorncroft
12-17-09
Approved by Chair(s) of Departments having cross-listed course(s)
(PRINT NAME/SIGN)
Date
Dean of College (PRINT NAME/SIGN)
Date
Edelgard Wulfert
2/4/10
Janna Harton
2/3/10
09-136 Earth Atmospheric Sciences BA Admission Suspension (OT).doc
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Proposal to Suspend Admission to the Earth and Atmospheric Sciences (E&A) BA
Atmospheric and Environmental Sciences (December 2009)
The Earth and Atmospheric Sciences Bachelors Degree (E&A BA) has been offered for over a
decade now. Though originally crafted to provide a viable degree for students interested in the Earth
and Atmospheric Sciences, and who would work in related areas (i.e. not research or primary positions
for which our BS degrees are intended), the reality of this degree’s popularity and career fostering ability
to date is unquestionably not what we had hoped for. Consider the following:
1. Of 185 total undergraduate majors in DAES now, only twelve are E&A BA majors;
2. Never has the number of E&A BA majors been more than this dozen or so count;
3. In the decade since awarding the first E&A BA, we are unable to identify a single graduate that has
gone on to distinction in his/her career;
4. Some current E&A BA students and several in recent memory comprise a subset of students that are
unquestionably the weakest that faculty members here have ever encountered;
5. Our hope that the lesser requirements of this degree would not simply attract the weakest strata of
student has not been realized; this is exactly what is happening;
6. The Atmospheric Science and Environmental Science BS degrees continue to flourish, growing in
popularity and reputation, in stark contrast to the E&A BA;
7. The “Earth” component of this degree becomes more problematic with time as the ending of the
undergraduate and graduate Geological Sciences programs follows an inevitable evolution.
For these manifest reasons, the faculty members of Atmospheric and Environmental Sciences
request that University governance approve suspension of admission to the E&A BA as of the beginning
of the fall 2010 semester. Any remaining students, of course, would be allowed to finish their degree
under the current curriculum.
We tried an experiment; it did not work out. Though there is no serious overhead as far as
courses specific to this particular degree, we feel that it nonetheless makes sense to end the degree. It’s
not a matter of our inability to offer relevant courses due to diminished faculty, but rather, more
fundamentally, acknowledgement that this degree is not providing the appropriate depth and
foundation required for post-graduation success, coupled with the fact that it necessarily funnels in the
weakest students. It is far better for all concerned to concentrate on the Atmospheric and
Environmental Science BS degrees that we know are unquestionably of higher rigor and which provide
our graduates with competitive ability in the focused areas these degrees were designed for.
