Attachment B
Faculty Senate Agenda
October 18, 2001

SUMMARY OF COMMENDATIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS FROM THE PROGRAM REVIEW REPORT FOR THE DEPARTMENT OF MECHANICAL ENGINEERING

Commendations to the Department:

The Review Team commends the Department of Mechanical Engineering for:

  1. the cooperation of the Department Chair, faculty, and students in providing information.
  2. the renewed commitment by the faculty to improve the quality and status of the MET program. The students report a strong relationship with the faculty and an abundance of support regarding their learning.
  3. providing a strong applied Mechanical Engineering program giving students the necessary skills to become versatile professionals.
  4. the development of the Accelerated College Entrance (ACE) program currently involving six high schools and some 300 students each year.
  5. its well conceived Program Assessment Plan and its first attempt to "close the loop" by choosing one of their student learning outcomes, in this case writing skills, collecting evidence of student performance of writing skill in the senior project courses, evaluating this student work as a department, and then agreeing as a Department to change instruction.
  6. the recognition of two outstanding faculty with two major award this year, Estelle Eke receiving the College Outstanding Teacher Award and Tom Liu the University Outstanding Scholarly Achievement Award.

Recommendations to the Department:

Governance

  1. The Provost, Dean, Chair, and Department faculty need to cooperate and jointly provide the leadership, resources, and hard work needed to make the Mechanical Engineering program a better place for students and their learning.
  2. The Program Review Committee recommends that the Department recommits itself to establishing a working Industrial Advisory Board.
  3. Given the short timeline to the next ABET accreditation process and a number of lingering program weaknesses that are identified in this program review, the Review Committee recommends that the Mechanical Engineering Department begin preparation for the impending ABET visit immediately.

Faculty

  1. The Program Review Team recommends that the College/University level administration end the decline in number of core faculty in the Department by allowing the Department to hire new faculty commensurate with developing quality mechanical engineering programs. Along with this recommendation the Department needs to articulate in some detail a five-year plan for hiring new faculty tied to program development and quality.
  2. The Department needs to develop a process to evaluate and respond to "low" student evaluations of teaching effectiveness of both full-time and part-time faculty. The Review Team recommends that the Department RTP Committee working with the Chair establish a system to make sure that the evaluation process is followed by all faculty. At an appropriate time each semester the Committee should then review all student evaluations of full and part-time faculty and based on careful consideration, recommend a plan to the Chair to correct situations where teaching effectiveness is considered low. This review should not be punitive in any sense but a positive attempt by the Department to improve instruction. If problems persist, the Chair and Dean should take appropriate action.
  3. The Review Team recommends that the Department articulate a plan which sets standards and expectations and provides incentives which encourage and support scholarly activities of faculty and students. The plan should focus in particular on new faculty that the Department will be hiring in the coming years and getting them off to a good start in establishing scholarly and creative work in both teaching and research.

Students

  1. The Department must reconsider and revise its advising plan to better serve the needs of students in planning their academic programs, dealing with life style and personal problems, and setting and meeting career goals
  2. The Program Review Team recommends that the College/Department needs to continue working on the problem of recruitment to increase the number of majors in all three of its degree programs. The team sees advantages of having recruitment organized at the College level with involvement of select Department faculty. The effort needs to be more systematic in which the Dean, Chair and/or faculty regularly interact with their prospective student constituency, records are kept of potential students, follow-up contacts are made, and students are hosted on campus. New majors must be recruited one student at a time.
  3. The Department needs to improve its communication with current junior and senior majors and graduate students. To accomplish this the Review Team recommends that a "Faculty/Student Council" should be established and used to identify student concerns and facilitate ways for the Department to address these concerns.
  4. The Review Team recommends that the Department, after collecting data on the retention of students in their academic programs and analyzing why students drop out, develop a plan to retain more students in their degree programs and increase enrollment.

Curriculum

  1. The Program Review Team recommends that the Department evaluate and modify the goals and academic standards of their ACE (Advanced College Entrance) Program with local high schools bringing it in line with University standards.
  2. The Program Review Team recommends that the Department evaluate the effect of on time graduation and the curricular justification for having 143 units (the highest in the University) in their BS in Mechanical Engineering degree program. In line with the consultant, the Review Team recommends that they decrease the number of units.
  3. The Review Team, agreeing with the recommendation of the consultant, recommends that the Department consider modification of their curricula in three ways: 1) streamlining of existing courses to reduce the number of units in the BS programs, 2) developing new courses in so called "hot" areas of engineering like advanced energy systems and sensors/environmental systems to attract more majors, and 3) develop these new courses with faculty in other disciplines to make them interdisciplinary to better meet the needs of today's engineer.

Recommendations to the Dean of Engineering and Computer Science:

  1. The Provost, Dean, Chair, and Department faculty need to cooperate and jointly provide the leadership, resources, and hard work needed to make the Mechanical Engineering program a better place for students and their learning.
  2. The Program Review Team recommends that the College/University level administration end the decline in number of core faculty in the Department by allowing the Department to hire new faculty commensurate with developing quality mechanical engineering programs. Along with this recommendation the Department needs to articulate in some detail a five-year plan for hiring new faculty tied to program development and quality.
  3. The Program Review Team recommends that the College/Department needs to continue working on the problem of recruitment to increase the number of majors in all three of its degree programs. The team sees advantages of having recruitment organized at the College level with involvement of select Department faculty. The effort needs to be more systematic in which the Dean, Chair and/or faculty regularly interact with their prospective student constituency, records are kept of potential students, follow-up contacts are made, and students are hosted on campus. New majors must be recruited one student at a time.

Recommendation to the Faculty Senate:

The Review Team recommends that