At the first meeting of the winter term (7 January 2000), the Undergraduate Council approved the revised wording of US9900-6:

"University of Oregon courses which are to be group satisfying must carry at least 4 credit hours".



Undergraduate Council
Minutes of Meeting
November 4, 1999

J. Earl noted that he supported the motion, and was surprised to see how quickly it was brought to the Undergraduate Council. He also noted that the problem could be solved by just contacting the chairs of the departments concerned (Music, Linguistics, Physics) and asking them to either make them 4-credit courses, or remove them from the list of group satisfying courses. R. Zimmerman indicated that Physics has solved the problem and will modify the courses involved. J. Nicols explained that he is against the motion because of the lower division courses that do not meet the 4-hour contact requirement. He indicated there are some departments that have increased the number of credits offered from 3 to 4 but have not increased the contact hours or workload for the students. J. Earl explained that this motion would only involve the courses satisfying group requirements. Another point raised by J. Rice was the large number of courses that satisfy the group requirements. Do we want to keep these courses in that classification, or just leave them as 3-credit courses that do not satisfy the requirement?

J. Nicols indicated that he does not know how to deal with this situation and asked the Council's help. He noted that some departments will make claims to justify the additional credit hour, but may not police themselves. Another concern is routinely granting courses to satisfy general education requirements and having a very large list of group satisfying courses. After more discussion, a vote was taken.

Approved: All (but one) voting members present
Opposed: John Nicols
The motion passed and it will be sent to the Senate.


(Note: The wording was revised slightly and reapproved 7 January 2000  by the undergraduate council in the form cited above. See report by the Senate Rules Committee on the motion) 
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