CAHSS Deans need student voices to grow

On April 22, the College of Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences (CAHSS)’s Dean, Dr. Juanita Cole, hosted the department’s first “Meet and Greet Lunch” in her offices, with an open invite to students who made the Dean’s List this semester. This event was the second attempt to reach students after “Cookies with Cole” was hosted earlier this year.

Pizza and fruit water was provided.

About ten students were in attendance, along with the Dean and the Associate Dean, Kathleen Godfrey. Cole mentioned that she would like to connect with students from all concentrations and majors in her college. Students should be aware that Godfrey took many notes on the attendee’s concerns during the meeting.

Some of the issues that were briefly discussed included; the Undergraduate Research Opportunities Center (UROC)’s tendencies to award monetary awards to science-based projects, creative Capstone projects, and the lasting social impacts of schooling online during the pandemic.

Our Associated Student (AS) ICC Chairman and UROC Scholar, Nevan Bell responded to a comment about science being the main subject to receive financial rewards (instead of college credits) in the UROC program. He said the mindset of how projects are chosen for funding are seen on an “if we can relate this back to science” basis. This leaves little incentive for non-science related researchers to join the program.

Capstone projects are required for seniors, in any major, who plan to graduate with their Bachelor’s Degree. It is a tradition and requirement that needs to be revised now that students are back on campus.

Some majors, like Humanities and Communication (HCOM) allow their students to turn in creative projects, as opposed to the common research paper. Bell said he’s “not sure if creative work thrives under a time constraint [like Capstone]”. There are some majors that break their capstone projects into multiple semesters, and perhaps this is something HCOM Capstone guidelines can include, moving forward.

AS Senator Alin Hett was also in attendance. He added to the conversation by mentioning the lack of enthusiasm following the news that the HCOM Capstone Festival for 2022 was never considered to move offline. Even though other majors and UROC presentations were holding their festivals in person this semester. HCOM Chair, Sam Robinson is the person in charge of hosting the Capstone Committee. The reasoning behind keeping the festival online included lack of resources for poster building and difficulty hosting an in-person event.

Deans Cole and Godfrey took many notes during the course of this conversation between the students, only stopping them to ask for clarification.

A running theme throughout the meeting was the idea that miscommunication between the departments within CAHSS puts the burden on students to seek out solutions to problems they can’t name.

While the deans move to include more student perspectives into their future decision making, there are many connections that still need to be made within the college itself. Specifically in regards to the lack of delegation and workforce dedicated to concentrations within majors.

It goes without saying that the transition back to campus has been rocky, but the lack of communication needs to be addressed so CAHSS students can feel the same levels of productivity and connectivity to their peers and potential mentors. Near the end of the meeting, student Stephen Goff-Charlton asked, “What are we going to do for students who feel like they lost time [studying online during the pandemic]?”