Student input prompts hiring for crowded classes
Twenty-two English 1010 instructors joined Utah State University’s faculty this year, and more for other bottlenecked courses are in the works.
The new instructors, consisting of both lecturers and graduate students, will enable all incoming freshmen to take the beginning English class in their first year at USU, something that has not always been possible.
Joyce Kinkead, vice provost of Undergraduate Studies and Research, calls the results “amazing.”
“We really celebrated,” Kinkead said. “When our new freshmen come in, they are always anxious about getting English 1010 in.”
Freshmen who are unable to get into the fall English 1010 class are put on a list to take it in the spring.
Now, students like freshman Tyler Stoker, computer science major, say they are having no trouble signing into the class. His classmate Paul Sanders, an undeclared freshman, said he was relieved the class was easy to get into.
“I hate the hassle of running around at the last minute trying to get into classes. It’s a pain in the neck,” Sanders said.
Kinkead gives the credit for the change to the students. Last year the student body government, the Associated Students of USU, voted to increase Tier II Tuition by 5 percent, which is money that goes directly to the university.
“We just have to thank the students for taxing themselves with that second tier tuition, because that was what made it possible,” she said. “The students had identified that as a high priority, and they get to decide how their money is going to be spent.”
Lynn Meeks, director of writing and professor of English, agreed that the improvements are thanks to second tier tuition as well as the support of the provost’s office. Meeks said the university hired three English 2010 instructors this year, and plans to hire six more next year.
“I think when we get those instructors on board, we will not only be able to meet the demands for 2010, but the department is thinking of expanding general education courses in addition to 2010 and 1010,” Meeks said. “We’re really trying to make getting the general requirements easy.”
Students who are unable to get into a traditional English 2010 class can still sign up for an online class, she said, and can even take it over the summer without being on campus.
“This year, we’ve been able to provide alternatives and we’ve never been able to do that before,” Meeks said. “We’re able to serve a lot more students.”
Next on the slate is adding new instructors for the crowded beginning math classes, math 1010 and 1050.
“I sure hope we have [enough math sections] for fall 2004, and if we can’t completely alleviate it, at least we’ve made 75 percent progress,” Kinkead said.
The effort to clear up crowded classes was initiated by ASUSU, which put together a focus group in 2001 designed to discover the pressing concerns of students, Kinkead said. The group determined one difficulty students experienced was getting into beginning English and math classes. The group presented its concerns to the university administration and faculty, Kinkead said, which then hired more instructors and found ways to better manage enrollment numbers.
“We have used their suggestions as a road map on what we needed to do to improve the undergraduate experience,” Kinkead said.
This summer, she said, the advising office was helpful in alerting the provost office if there was a shortage of sections for a particular class. If that happens, the provost office has the power to allocate emergency funds to open more sections.
The advising office is also looking forward to seeing additional advisers hired for next year, Kinkead said.
“That’s in our second tier tuition money for next year, so we have to wait until tuition is collected to do that,” Kinkead said.
-heidithue@cc.usu.edu