By Noah Grand
Daily Bruin Reporter
All departments in the College of Letters and Science have been
asked to re-evaluate units for classes to comply with regulations,
speed up graduation rates, and counter financial losses.
UCLA loses $17,665,782 in state funding per year because the
state only funds UCLA for full-time equivalents ““ students
taking at least 45 units per year ““ according to Glyn Davies,
assistant vice chancellor of academic planning and budget.
“Our students on average take 13.1 units per
quarter,” Smith said. “That means we get 92 cents on
the dollar.”
But others, such as political science Professor Richard
Anderson, said this view puts too much blame on the students for
losing state funding.
“The people who have power over this is the administration
and faculty, Anderson said. “We are saying that students need
to change their behaviors.”
All departments have had the option to change the number of
units for at least 15 years when Vice Provost of Undergraduate
Education Judith Smith proposed increasing units in physiological
sciences. She was chair of that department from 1980 to 1986.
Smith said she thinks many classes are undervalued, so the
number of units a student earns does not correspond to the amount
of time they spend on the class.
“Most of our students are taking more than four years to
complete (graduation) requirements,” said Executive Vice
Chancellor Wyatt Hume. “This suggests that in some cases we
are asking students to do a lot more than the nominal unit
structure would suggest.”
Academic Senate regulation 760 defines one unit to be equal to
three hours of coursework, inside and outside of class.
The recent wave of proposed changes came after the English
department changed most of its classes from four units to five
units last fall, citing heavy reading and writing requirements and
student survey results as the reason for the change.
Anderson said these surveys are not accurate and should not be
used to justify a change in units.
“It’s the rare person that can determine how much
time they spend in a week on a course or any other activity,”
he said. “No sensible decisions are being made
here.”
Smith said the changes the English department made prompted
other departments to consider doing the same.
“The answer is they should do it,” she said.
“Students are the ones who really suffer if changes
aren’t made.”
Classics Professor Bernard Frischer questioned whether proposed
unit changes will benefit students.
“Student leaders and faculty will certainly want to take a
close look at the re-unitting proposal,” Frischer said,
“to make sure it isn’t a mere numbers game designed to
give UCLA more money for less work, but genuinely reflects an
improvement in undergraduate education commensurate with the
proposed increase in units.”
The French, physics and chemistry departments have already
changed the number of units that some classes are worth. The
departments of economics, organismic biology, ecology &
evolution and East Asian languages are among the departments
submitting changes for the fall.
“When we ask departments to look at their curriculum, it
is not a mandate of four unit courses should be five units,”
Rowe said. “It is a request to look at courses for the
appropriate unit attribution. It’s never been our goal to
have all courses go through the unit change.”
Smith, along with Hume and Letters and Science Provost Brian
Copenhaver, discussed the proposal with departments as a part of
UCLA’s growth plan.
Over the next 10 years, 60,000 additional students are expected
to enter UC campuses as a result of Tidal Wave II. UCLA needs to
accommodate 4,000 FTEs, according to Smith.
She said a way to cope with Tidal Wave II is to increase the
average number of units that students take from 13.1 units a
quarter to 14.5 units. Such an increase will add to the number of
FTEs at UCLA without adding more students to the campus.
“We are looking at changing certain regulations as part of
a concerted effort to enter our new growth period without bringing
in too many students that we can’t educate,” Smith
said.
Currently, UCLA undergraduates average four and a half years to
graduate. Smith said students taking longer than four years to
graduate prevent more students from attending UCLA.
“For every senior who stays a fifth year, there is a
freshman who has been denied access,” Smith said.
Anderson agreed that students taking more units and graduating
in four years is the best way to cope with Tidal Wave II, but said
the changes are not the correct way to do so.
“The thing to do is just make every class worth five
units. Tell professors to make classes worth 15 hours of
work,” Anderson said.
Copenhaver said he advised against making large-scale changes
and that changes should be made only on a class by class basis.
The current process leaves it up to departments to decide if,
and how many, changes should be made, according to Karen Rowe,
English professor and faculty executive committee chair.
After faculty members in a department decide to undergo a unit
change, the proposal is sent to the Faculty Executive
Committee.
Rowe reviews the proposals and then forwards her decision to the
undergraduate council of the Academic Senate for a vote.
“There have been departments that do not need to or do not
desire to change their units,” she said.
Departments should look at making changes holistically, Rowe
said, because similar classes would have similar reasons for
undergoing the unit change.
OBEE, which has proposed to increase the number of units for 11
classes, according to OBEE Academic Counselor Nancy Purtill. The
changes resulted because of the amount of field and/or lab work
required.
An increase in unit value per class decreases the number of
classes a student needs to graduate.
Some majors, such as biochemistry, would need to cut the number
of required classes if they decide to re-unit, said chemistry
Professor Robin Garrell.
Frischer said reducing the number of classes that students need
to take could harm the quality of education.
“Students and undoubtedly state legislators will want to
make sure UCLA’s education is not being watered down in the
name of reform,” he said.
Leo Hanian, undergraduate chair of the economics department,
said that the unit changes were in response to university
proposals, to increase the minimum degree progress requirement to
13 units per quarter.
“If going from 12 units to 13 units is passed, having more
five unit classes will help students,” Hanian said.
“Since classes are four units, a student would need four
classes to be considered full time and that is tough.”
A separate Academic Senate proposal would change the minimum
progress requirement from 12 to 13 units per quarter. That proposal
has been approved by the faculty executive committee and
undergraduate council, and will be voted on by the faculty in the
near future.
With reports from Patil Armenian, Daily Bruin Senior Staff.