Charge Date: April 15, 2024

Background:  The Comprehensive Academic Plan (CAP) for Ramapo College outlines a vision for the future, emphasizing the need for dynamic, innovative, and effective academic structures to support the college’s mission. In alignment with this strategic direction, a Faculty Task Force is hereby established to provide expertise, insights, and recommendations to the Provost on revising or restructuring college-wide academic structures.

Charge:  The Task Force on College-wide Academic Structures is charged with the following responsibilities:

1. Review the Comprehensive Academic Plan. Thoroughly examine the Comprehensive Academic Plan, paying particular attention to goals and objectives related to academic structures. Understand the overarching vision and key strategies set forth by the plan.
2. Assessment of Current Academic Structures. Conduct an assessment of the existing academic structures within the college. Evaluate the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats associated with the current organizational framework.
3. Engage Stakeholders. Facilitate open and inclusive discussions with faculty, students, staff, and relevant stakeholders to gather diverse perspectives on the strengths and weaknesses of the current academic structures and to identify areas for improvement or potential new structures to support our mission.
4. Research and benchmark against current and best practices in academic structures within peer institutions and leading institutions.  Identify successful models that align with the goals outlined in CAP.
5. Develop a set of clear and actionable recommendations or recommended options to the Provost for enhancing school-wide academic structures.  Consider factors such as interdisciplinary collaboration, flexibility, student achievement, disciplinary cohesion, manageability of unit.
6. Implementation Strategies. Provide strategies and practical steps for the phased implementation of recommended changes.  Consider potential challenges and proposed solutions to ensure a smooth transition.
7. Establish metrics and mechanisms for ongoing assessment to measure the effectiveness of the implemented changes.
8. Input and Community. Develop a plan for stakeholder input into drafts of recommendations and a plan to disseminate the task force’s findings. This step should ensure transparency and solicit feedback for continuous improvement.

Timeline:  The Task Force is expected to complete its work by November 1, 2024 with regular progress reports and consultation with the Provost.  The committee should plan to meet every other week throughout the faculty contract period to move the work forward.

Reporting. Submit a final report detailing the findings, recommendations and implementation plan to the Provost.

Members:

Co-Chair:  Dean Ken Goldstein – CA

Co-Chair:  Emma Rainforth – TAS

Ruma Sen – CA

Sangha Padhy – SSHS

Kathleen Ray – Graduate Programs

Malavika Sundararajan – ASB

Lisa Cassidy – HGS

Katie Cohen – LLC

Kathy Stathis – Fiscal Health Core

Anthony Dovi – Admissions and Enrollment

Charge Date: April 15, 2024

Background:  The Comprehensive Academic Plan (CAP) for Ramapo College has an objective to create organizational structures that are nimble and responsive to the shifts in our disciplines, to our knowledge of teaching and learning, to the challenges facing society and to our need to work effectively together. One way this objective can be realized is to examine and revise the convening group and convener model. This task force is established to review and report recommendations to the Provost on convening group purpose as an organizational structure, program leadership, convener and faculty responsibilities for program maintenance and leadership. The task force may decide to provide suggestions for criteria for compensation and a review process for regular re-evaluation of the proposed model. The insights gained from this work will help inform decisions and aims at optimizing the effectiveness of our program structure.

Charge:  The task force on Conveners and Convening groups is charged with the following responsibilities:

1. Review existing documents and data (e.g., CAP task force meeting notes, 2007 definition of conveners, etc.) to inform the committee’s work.
2. Convening Group Landscape: Review the current structure of convening groups at Ramapo, including the number of convening groups, their sizes, the distribution across disciplines and Schools. Assess the rationale behind the current configuration and its alignment with the college’s mission and strategic goal.
3. Conveners Role and Responsibilities. Examine the roles and responsibilities of conveners in academic programs and leadership. Evaluate the extent to which conveners contribute to the overall success of the academic programs and the college as a whole.
4. Interdisciplinary Collaboration: Investigate opportunities for interdisciplinary collaboration and the potential benefits of restructuring or realigning convening groups to enhance interdisciplinary initiatives or to create an alternate structure for oversight of interdisciplinary programs.  Consider best practices from other institutions in promoting collaboration across disciplines.
5. Leadership Development: Assess the existing mechanism for leadership development and succession planning for conveners.  Propose strategies to ensure a pipeline of effective leaders capable of advancing the college’s academic mission.
6. Role of Faculty Service in Convening Groups: Examine faculty service distribution within convening groups and evaluate the allocation of resources to determine the balance of responsibilities for conveners and for faculty.  Identify any imbalances or inefficiencies and propose recommendations for optimizing faculty resources to enhance academic experience.
7. Student Experience and Success: Aligning with other areas of the CAP, investigate the impact of convening group structure on the student experience, academic success and overall satisfaction.  Consider how other strategies detailed in the CAP can be implemented to improve coordination and communication within and between convening groups to enhance the Ramapo experience.
8. Stakeholder Input: Seek input from faculty, students, staff and relevant stakeholders through surveys, focus groups, or town hall meetings to ensure a comprehensive understanding of perspectives on the current convening group structure.
9. Benchmarking and Best Practice: Conduct benchmarking analysis to compare our convening group structure with departmental structure of peer institutions.  Identify best practice and innovations in organization to inform potential recommendations.

Timeline:  The Task Force is expected to complete its work by November 1, 2024 with regular progress reports and consultation with the Provost.  The committee should plan to meet every other week throughout the faculty contract period to move the work forward.

Reporting. Submit a final report detailing the findings, recommendations and implementation plan to the Provost.

Members:

Co-Chair:  Dean Susan Hangen – HGS

Co-Chair:  Tim Haase – ASB

Ann LePore – CA

Kokila Kota – TAS

Emily Leskinen – SSHS

Tae Kwak – HGS

Jessica Steinheimer – Office of Student Success

Jenn Hicks-McGowan – POER

Charge Date:  February 28, 2025

Background:  The Comprehensive Academic Plan (CAP) for Ramapo College outlines a vision for the future, emphasizing the need for dynamic, innovative, and effective curricular structures to support the college’s liberal arts mission. In alignment with this strategic direction, a Task Force is hereby established to provide expertise, insights, and recommendations to the Provost on establishing curricular structures that support the Ramapo liberal arts experience.

Charge:  The Task Force on Liberal Arts Curriculum Structures is charged meeting during the contract year with the following responsibilities:

1. Review the Comprehensive Academic Plan. Thoroughly examine the Comprehensive Academic Plan, paying particular attention to goals and objectives related to curricula. Understand the overarching vision and key strategies set forth by the plan.
2. Assessment of Current Curricular Structures. Conduct an assessment of the existing structures within the college, including overall degree requirements, unit core requirements, other required courses, credit structures. Evaluate the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and challenges associated with the current framework to achieving a liberal arts education for all students, particularly the integration of our four core pillars across the college curriculum.
3. Examine continuous improvement models. Identify and assess the ways in which our curricula are regularly evaluated for meeting our mission, foster student success in academic achievement and degree completion, impact on students, faculty and the community, sustainability, equitable use of resources.
4. Engage Stakeholders.  Facilitate open and inclusive discussions with faculty, students, staff, and relevant stakeholders to gather diverse perspectives on the strengths and weaknesses of the current structures and to identify areas for improvement or potential new structures to support our mission.
5. Research and benchmark against current and best practices in curricular structures within peer institutions and leading institutions.  Identify successful models that align with the goals outlined in CAP.
6. Develop a set of clear and actionable recommendations or recommended options to the Provost for enhancing a Liberal Arts curricular structures and enacting practices for continuous improvement.  Consider factors such as the size and scope of the General Education program, credits required to complete majors across the college, school core, opportunities for students to explore, through elective options, minors or double majors in disciplines not related to a primary major.
7. Implementation Strategies.  Provide strategies and practical steps for the phased implementation of recommended changes.  Consider potential challenges and proposed solutions to ensure a smooth transition.
8. Establish metrics and mechanisms for ongoing assessment to measure the effectiveness of the implemented changes.
9. Input and Community.  Develop a plan for stakeholder input into drafts of recommendations and a plan to disseminate the task force’s findings. This step should ensure transparency and solicit feedback for continuous improvement.

Timeline and Reporting:  The Task Force is expected to complete a draft of its findings by June 30, with a final report detailing findings by October 1. The committee should plan to meet every other week throughout the faculty contract period, with regular progress reports and consultation with the Provost, to move the work forward. Funding for Summer work is available should the Task Force or a subcommittee of the Task Force need additional time to complete the report.

Co-Chairs:

Jeremy Teigen, Professor of Political Science (HGS)

Vanessa Arriola, Assistant Provost for Budget and Management

Members:

Rikki Abzug, Professor of Management (ASB)

Bonnie Blake, Professor of Graphic Design and Interactive Media (CA)

Naseem Choudhury, Professor of Psychology (AFT Representative)

Jeff Ellsworth, Associate Professor of Law and Society (FAEC Representative)

Anne Marie Flatkeval, Associate Professor of Nursing  (TAS/Nursing)

John Gronbeck Tedesco, Professor of American Studies (HGS)

Sharon Leathers, Assistant Professor of Education (SSHS)

LaQuan Norman, Director of the Cahill Center  (Out of Core Rep)

Emma Rainforth, Professor of Geology (TAS)

Victoria Sciancalepore, Digital Humanities Librarian (Library)

Jessica Steinheimer, Assistant Director of Student Success (Out of Core Rep)