Report Number 50 Of The Academic Affairs Committee
MAY 10, 2023
To the Campus Council,
University of Toronto Mississauga
Your Committee reports that it held a meeting on May 10, 2023 at 3:10 p.m. in Room 3130, W.G. Davis Building.
Present:
Laura Taylor (in the Chair), Sanja Hinic-Frlog (Vice-Chair), Alexandra Gillespie (Vice-President & Principal), Nick Rule (Acting Interim Vice-Principal, Academic & Dean), Tracey Bowen (Vice-Dean, Teaching & Learning), Kent Moore (Vice-Principal Research), Barend Beekhuizen, Andreas Bendlin, Randy Besco, Elizabeth Blake, Jill Caskey, Craig Chambers, Rosa Ciantar, Ruth Childs, Michael deBraga, Margarida Duarte, Jacob Gallagher-Ross, Tanjim Hossain, Paula Hannaford, Danielle McLean, Asif Mohammed, Richard Levin, Michael Nixon, Adriano Senatore, Jumi Shin, Jaimal Thind, Jonathan Weisberg, Ron Wener, Weiguo Zhang
Non-Voting Assessors:
Yen Du (Manager, Academic Programs, Reviews & Quality Assurance), Mark Overton (Dean of Student Affairs)
Regrets:
Varouj Aivazian, Salvatore Bancheri, Osama Abdalla, Asma Behery, Steven Bernstein, Brett Beston, Ilia Binder, Mahmoud Bitar, Laura Brown, Uday Dhingra, Nawal Faisal, Tracey Galloway, Philip Goodman, Monika Havelka, Shelley Hawrychuk, Sarah Hillewaert, Rayan Hobeika, Anoosha Keshav, Helen Kula, Tong Lam, Ciska Luwawu, Shashi Kant, Andrea Olive, Esteban Parra, Andreas Park, Ajay Rao, Leigh Revers, Christoph Richter, Marleen Rozemond, Lindsay Schoenbohm, Hana Tariq, Sarah Sharma, Meghan Sutherland, Soo Min Toh, Mohamad Tavakoli-Targhi
In Attendance: Tenley Conway (Geography, Geomatics and Environment)
Secretariat:
Cindy Ferencz-Hammond
- Chair’s Remarks
The Chair welcomed members and guests to the last meeting of the Committee for the governance year. She also welcomed Richard Levin, Interim Registrar and Professor Nick Rule, Acting Vice-Principal Academic & Dean to their first meeting of the Committee.
- Minor Modifications: Undergraduate Curriculum Changes
Professor Tracey Bowen, Vice-Dean, Teaching & Learning reported that the proposed curriculum changes stemmed from curriculum committee meetings that occurred in March and focused more on housekeeping modifications in this round of proposed changes. In the Humanities report, there were four program and 10 course changes, including two new courses, five course modifications, and three course retirements. In the Sciences report, there were 12 program changes along with 40 course changes, including 11 new courses, 28 modifications, and one course retirement. In the Social Sciences report, there were 26 course changes, four new courses, 17 modifications, and five course retirements. She highlighted some of the new courses offered, such as urban sustainability, medical robotics, and materials of modern art.
On motion duly made, seconded, and carried,
YOUR COMMITTEE RESOLVED,
THAT the proposed Humanities, Sciences and Social Sciences undergraduate curriculum changes at UTM, as detailed in the respective curriculum reports, be approved, effective September 1, 2024.
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Cyclical Reviews – UTM Quality Assurance Process (UTQAP)
At the invitation of the Chair, Professor Bowen, provided an overview of two academic program reviews that were conducted virtually in October and December 2021, for the Department of Economics and the Master of Management and Professional Accounting Program (MMPA). The goal of these reviews was to assess the quality of the academic programs through rigorous and consistent assessment by peers. The process involved internal and external self-studies, consultations with faculty and students, and a two-day site visit with an external review team.
She reported that the resulting external report was evaluated for factual errors and submitted to the appropriate committees for feedback and consultation. The summary included both positive comments and recommendations for improvement for both programs.
The recommendations for the Department of Economics included development of a data-oriented track for students in response to high demand for workers trained in data analysis and economics and increased offerings in environmental economics and international trade. There was also a strong recommendation of some senior offers to offset the loss of tenured faculty and offer a more formalized mentorship program for junior faculty.
The recommendations for MMPA included expanding the range of courses, examining, and eliminating unnecessary redundancies in the curriculum, and shifting the program's focus toward professional impact-based learning. The MMPA program will work on expanding cooperative partners, developing work term opportunities beyond the traditional accounting firms, and exploring opportunities for collaboration with UTM’s Master of Science in Sustainability Management program.
During discussion, members noted the need for a more formalized mentorship program for younger faculty, with guidelines and structures to ensure consistency across different departments. It was noted that UTM was already in the process of creating a UTM-specific mentorship program based on central guidelines, with plans to review input from all parties involved. The program was expected to be implemented soon, given the importance of providing better support for junior faculty in both research and teaching.
- Annual Report, Academic Integrity, Office of the Dean, 2021-22
The Annual report on Academic Integrity was presented by Professor Andreas Bendlin, Vice-Dean, Academic Experience, and Lisa Devereaux, Director, Academic Success and Integrity.
They provided a detailed presentation on statistics observed for the 2021-22 academic year.
They reported that the data showed that there was a doubling of academic integrity cases during the period compared to pre-pandemic conditions, with unauthorized assistance being the most common offense. There was also an increase in cheating using online resources like Chegg and essay mills and an alarming increase in so called spyware cheating involving tiny earpieces and button microphones. The Academic Integrity (AI) office was putting a lot of effort into communications and outreach to support faculty and staff in the administration of the academic integrity process and an academic integrity toolkit was shared with all faculty at the beginning of the term. There was also an AI student ambassador program and a social media campaign focused on education. Professor Bendlin also reported that the AI office was in discussions with the Office of the Provost to review and potentially revise the University’s Code of Behaviour on Academic Matters and he would be pleased to share progress on this issue with the Committee at a future meeting.
During discussion of the report, it was noted that the university was developing guidelines for faculty on how to handle suspected cases of academic misconduct, including interviewing students about their work to determine if it was generated by a generative AI like ChatGPT and keeping appropriate notes of those meetings. There was also work being done on providing improved protocols for conducting exams and sharing that with faculty. It was also acknowledged that there was a backlog of cases and to that end the AI office was working on filling two vacant positions in the office to address the issue.
- Annual Report, Office of the VP Research, 2021-22
The Annual Report of the Office of the Vice-Principal Research at UTM was provided by Professor Kent Moore, Vice-Principal Research. He noted that the aim of the office was to support, promote, and inspire research and scholarship, as well as encouraging collaborative activity throughout the community that enhanced the regional and global impact of research. The 2022 Annual Report entitled Synergy highlighted these efforts in detail. Professor Moore pointed to the summary of research output at UTM: with funded research at about $15 million, 75% of which was related to the Tri-councils.
The office provided resources and infrastructure to support researchers when writing grants and promoted resources for research. There were two new staff members, including the Strategic Research Initiatives and Partnerships Manager, who fostered collaborations with external partners in support of research. He highlighted initiatives like the SURF event, which was held in the summer and allowed over 100 students to present their research posters and had a celebration of books that recognized scholarship in manuscript publications. There are also grant writing programs for different grants, and a new pedagogical research fund that supported faculty across UTM in pedagogical research.
- New Type 2 Certificate: Certificate in Sustainability, UTM
At the invitation of the Chair, Professor Tenley Conway, from the Department of Geography, Geomatics and Environment (GGE) presented the proposed Certificate. Professor Conway noted that the proposed Certificate in Sustainability addressed the goals of two different documents. The first was the President's Advisory Committee on the Environment, Climate Change and Sustainability (CECCS), which had a goal of implementing sustainable pathways for all undergraduate students across the university. The second was UTM's Sustainability Strategic Plan, which had the goal of making a certificate in sustainability available for all.
The proposed certificate would complement the existing Minor in Sustainability offered by GGE and would stand beside the not-for-credit Certificate of Completion in Global Sustainability offered through the Institute of Management & Innovation at UTM. The proposed certificate aligned with and supported the CECCS Sustainability Pathways Program in which students could complete any or all of the three programs: Sustainability Citizen, Sustainability Scholar, and Sustainability Leader. The certificate was composed of a total of 2.0 credits, with one 0.5-credit core course as its foundation: ENV210H5: Sustainability. This course would serve as an introduction to sustainability as a field of study and would ensure that all students completing the certificate program had the necessary foundation to be successful in their other sustainability courses and achieve the program learning outcomes. The remaining 1.5 credits were drawn from a list of options divided into 4 perspectives (Economic, Environmental, Political/Institutional, and Cultural/Social), with the requirement that at least two perspectives be represented in the options. The certificate had also identified 72 courses as potential options (drawn from a list of courses identified by the Roundtable on Sustainability as having significant sustainability content).
In response to a member’s question, Professor Conway noted that efforts would be made to expand on the 72 course options.
On motion duly made, seconded, and carried,
YOUR COMMITTEE RESOLVED,
THAT the New Type 2 Certificate Program: Certificate in Sustainability, be approved, as detailed in the proposal dated April 18, 2023, effective September 1, 2024.
CONSENT AGENDA
On motion duly moved, seconded, and carried
YOUR COMMITTEE APPROVED
THAT the consent agenda be adopted and that Item 10, the Report of the Previous Meeting, be approved.
- Annual Report, UTM Library, 2021-22
- Annual Report: Committee On Standing, 2021-22, Office of the Registrar
- Annual Report: Academic Appeals Subcommittee, 2021-22
- Report of the Previous Meeting, Report number 49, February 9, 2023.
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Business Arising from the Report of the Previous Meeting
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Date of Next Meeting – September 19, 2023, at 3:10 p.m.
The Chair reminded members that the next meeting of the Committee was scheduled for September 19, 2023, at 3:10 p.m.
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Other Business
There was no other business.
The meeting adjourned at 4:12 p.m.
May 16, 2023