Consortium on Quality Education Campus Statements

State University of New York at Stony Brook

A. Campus description

Size

• Total Campus size: 19,924
• 13,257 undergraduates
• 6,667 graduate/professional students

Structure

• Public Research 1 University with Colleges of Arts & Sciences and of Engineering and Applied Sciences, Marine Sciences Research Center, and Schools of Medical, Dental Medicine, Nursing School, Social Welfare and Health Technology and Management

Funding source

New York State: $143.5 million

Research Foundation: $137.9 million (grants, contracts, patent revenues)

Stony Brook Foundation: $29.7 million (private endowments and contributions)

Miscellaneous: $33.6 million

Students served

• 11,934 full time
• 1,323 part time
• 2,781 freshmen
• 1,268 full-time new transfers
• 7,885 full-time continuing
• 50% female
• 50% male
• 38% white
• 9% African American
• 22% Asian American
• 7% Hispanic American
• 3% foreign
• 4% other
• 17% unknown
• 40% first-generation college students
• 35% immigrants whose native language is not English
• 35% from families with incomes less than $30,000

Freshman to sophomore retention rate

• Averaged at 82% between 1993-1999
• 85% in 1999

Six years graduation rate

• For full-time freshmen, about 52%
• For lower division transfers: 53%
• For upper division transfers: 44% (in three years)

Where students go after leaving your campus

• 35% continue their education in the year after graduation (70% in professional programs [medicine & dental medicine: 12%; education: 11%; law: 10%; nursing: 9%; social work: 2%] 23% in arts & science programs; 7% in other types of programs)
• 49% hold jobs they consider career positions in the year after graduation (31% in health care or other human services) 14% in engineering or computer-related jobs 10% teach 6% in retail 4% are in research jobs 30% in other settings 10% in this group are also continuing their education)
• 12% hold a job they feel may lead to a career
• 13% report not having a career-job or educational commitment

Information on student movement (into, out of, and within your institution)

• 43% of new students/year are transfers, split 50:50 between upper and lower divisions. They perform as well and graduate at approximately the same levels as students who enter as freshmen (53% for lower division transfers, 44% for upper division transfers [within three years]). 31% of undergraduate alumni continuing their education enroll at Stony Brook.

B. Innovative practices related to Greater Expectations

USB has adopted a multifaceted approach to becoming an effective learning environment. It includes:

• Revision of the general education curriculum, as well as individual courses. The review, carried out this past year, involved every department, the Directors of Undergraduate Studies, Undergraduate Council, Undergraduate Steering Board, CAS and CEAS curriculum committees, and University Senate. The goals were to bring greater coherence to general education, strengthen its liberal underpinnings and provide more rigorous and skill-based experiences in order to facilitate the integration of general education with the students' other studies.
• Enhancement/creation of new courses and programs of study. There has been a widespread reconsideration of the content and mode of instruction for introductory and advanced courses to emphasize problem-solving, critical thinking and interactive teaching and learning. Major revisions have taken place in introductory Calculus, Chemistry, Economics, Biology and Writing courses, among others, as well as in the largest majors, Psychology and Biology. These reforms impact 2,0000 incoming students annually, as well as 1,500 majors in Biology and Psychology. New courses of study that cross disciplinary boundaries have been introduced. These include majors and minors in Bioengineering, Latin American and Caribbean Studies, Cinema and Cultural Studies, and New American Studies, which examines various groups in the diaspora. The latter responds to USB's heterogeneous undergraduate population.
• Special programs. USB offers different types of learning communities in which small groups of students and faculty share in educational, and social experiences organized around a theme or broad interest. These include the Federated Learning Community in which faculty and students take common courses relating to a specific subject; Living Learning Communities, which are residential; Learning Communities in which first-year students take a block of two required courses and a "linking" seminar; and the Women in Science and Engineering Program, which targets undergraduate women interested in science or engineering.
• Expanding opportunities and giving greater visibility to undergraduate research and creative activity through increased summer fellowships, mini-grants to defray the costs of student projects and to enable them to attend professional meetings where they are co-presenting, sponsorship of an annual Celebration of Undergraduate Achievements, and annual publication of abstracts or summaries of students' research and creative activities.
• Faculty development. The Center for Excellence in Learning and Teaching (CELT; est. 1998) routinely offers workshops to faculty and graduate students to assist them in their teaching. Emphases include promoting an understanding of the context in which students learn; developing ways to actively engage students in the learning process by introducing modes of teaching that encourage collaboration, utilize a problem-solving approach, and relate to the students' experiences; and effective use of technology. Faculty efforts to revise their courses in light of these interests are supported by RAIRE, Presidential and the CAS Dean's grant programs.
• Revision of promotion and tenure guidelines. Both CAS and CEAS have revised their P&T guidelines to ensure that effectiveness in teaching is factored into the review process. A schedule of junior faculty evaluations has been instituted that assures annual reviews of research, teaching and service, identifies potential problems and provides early warning and advice to junior faculty. CAS has introduced a junior faculty mentoring program in which every junior faculty member has two mentors: a departmental colleagues who offers guidance on research and professional matters, and a non-departmental mentor who offers guidance on pedagogy, specific aspects of teaching and ways to link research interests with course development.

C. Institutional learning goals and a brief description of the process followed to determine them

USB aims for all of its undergraduates to develop the following capabilities:

• Good skills in written and oral communication, problem-solving, interpretation and analysis
• An ability to understand and use quantitative skills
• An understanding of the connections and relationships among spheres of learning and an ability to use them creatively
• A global perspective and sensitivity
• Detailed knowledge within a specific field of study.
• Two goals underlie and link these objectives: 1) for our students during their undergraduate years to develop a lifelong commitment to learning, as well as attitudes of openness, flexibility and tolerance, and 2) for them to graduate well-prepared to be contributing members of society.
• USB arrived at these goals through major campus-wide efforts, beginning in 1992, to examine, assess and engender discussion of all key elements of the undergraduate experience. These efforts have involved faculty, staff and students representing every major undergraduate constituency. The initial examination was driven by declining enrollments and by a widespread concern among the faculty and administration that USB was not giving sufficient attention to undergraduate education. Since then, providing a quality undergraduate experience has become a campus priority, driving much discussion and activity, especially in the past five years, as well as a reallocation of resources. Efforts to achieve it have included administrative restructuring, enhancement of our general education requirements, revision of several majors, the development of interdisciplinary courses of study to address new knowledge and emerging needs, special undergraduate programs, revision of faculty promotion and tenure policies, faculty development activities, renewed attention to teacher preparation and the establishment of a Center for Excellence in Learning and Teaching. Throughout, the process for effecting this re-direction has been highly interactive--with the University leadership "nurturing" and providing significant financial support for reform and the active participation by an increasingly large number of faculty, who have been responsible for the range of reforms that have taken place.