Curtis also referred the committee to the minutes for a review of our last discussion. We have discussed the learning goals for Wellness and added some language that allows for more flexibility in development of the learning community concept. The next issue on the list is the increase in hours from 41 to 42 and whether or not this should be regarded as a hardship for some programs. A difficulty in this discussion is defining and distinguishing between major requirements, program requirements, concentrations, minors, and other requirement classifications. The role of each of these levels of requirements is so different in each major, department or program that it is difficult to generalize.
Some majors consist mainly of courses in one department, and some are highly interdisciplinary.
The interdisciplinary ones already assure much breadth, and can be of less concern to us. There are clearly situations where taking a Liberal Studies elective within the department of the major is justifiable, but we want to make sure that departments don't begin to prescribe Liberal Studies courses through program requirements. It is difficult to make a simple statement that covers all of the wide variety of possible cases. We need to be careful with wording that protects our intentions without limiting possibilities too much. We would hope that good advising would take care of many of these exceptional situations, but students find ways to circumvent the best intentions in this area.