response

The university learned a great deal from its re-accreditation experience of 1990. Although some of the campus population questioned or rejected some of the recommendations from the WASC visiting team, the majority took them seriously, accepted them as meritorious, and began work on the new directions. Many elements of the campus consider the retirement of the former president and recruitment of a new president to have been among the responses to the 1990 report. A great amount of mythology surrounding the experience of the 1990 self-study, visit, and WASC report emerged during our conversations with people on campus. This mythology, mixed with factual information in the possession of a few persons, pre-conditioned the subjects of our research to a negative experience. We have been at some pains to separate our current effort from the previous cycle, therefore, and yet at the same time to target the points made by our external reviewers, which we considered useful ones.

One focal area of criticism had to do with the quality of decision-making. Our actions in connection with this area were the following, as mentioned in Chapter I. These and other undertakings are discussed in detail in Chapter V, Sections 1 and 3, and Chapter VII.

reorganization of the administration, including extensive decentralization,
implementation of strategic planning,
increased involvement of the Academic Senate in governance issues,
direct involvement of faculty in policy-making, budgeting, and administration of the Foundation,
establishment of the Faculty Center for Professional Development,
inclusion of student and staff representatives on many committees,
expansion of Cabinet membership,
expansion of program assessment to include non-academic programs,
pilot introduction of assessment seminars, portfolio analysis, graduate placement, and targeted student surveys.

Another of the most serious critiques was of our general education program. It was criticized in terms of its goals and mission, its accessibility, its cultural scope, and its coherence. GE is thoroughly explored in Chapter VI, Section B. The campus response was to:

analyze the General Education program in light of Executive Order 595, Academic Senate statements on the subject, and the university mission,
separate the GE Committee from the Academic Programs Committee of the Senate,
develop a new GE model "Track A" to offer alongside the existing "Track B" and existing Inter-disciplinary General Education track,
subsequent to the demise of Track A, develop another reform proposal for GE containing capstones and assessment, currently expected to be approved,
develop the Integrated Science General Education program,
adopt American Cultural Perspectives as a graduation requirement to be satisfied through GE.

The institutional climate for diversity was also criticized. A history and assessment of diversity programs on this campus is provided in Chapter V, Section 2. Actions have included, among others:

Design of two pilot surveys on climate, and later design and implementation of the Campus Climate surveys.
Central administration management of some programs, through a Special Assistant to the President, Educational Equity Services, and later Office for Diversity and Compliance Programs.
Establishment or enhancement of programs by faculty and staff, such as

President’s Commission on Enhancing the Campus Environment for Women and Minorities,
Task Force on Sexual/Gender Harassment,
Women Faculty Association, Women’s Council,
Cal Poly Pomona chapter of Women in Science,
University Diversity Committee.

Establishment or enhancement of various student programs, such as

Reaffirming Ethnic and Cultural Harmony (REACH),
Office of Student Life,
Center for Re-entry and Transition,
Multi-Cultural (now Cultural) Centers,
College-based programs.

WASC’s evaluation of our responsive actions was positive. Cal Poly Pomona was told our strategic planning process was a good step forward, the innovations in the diversity area (REACH, the cross-cultural retreat, the Diversity Committee’s work) were excellent, support for the Faculty Center for Professional Development, especially faculty involvement in assessment initiatives, was noteworthy, and the new Track A was exciting. We were congratulated on our outreach to primary and secondary schools. WASC commiserated with us about the budget cuts we experienced.

Particular topics of interest and criticism in the 1990 report also included:

the proper size of the university,
the establishment of a culture of evidence for our internal use and for future accreditation,
the best method of honest self-appraisal,
sexual harassment policy implementation (see Appendix B2),
assessment of subject matter competence of teachers (Appendices C2, C3),
program review, including review of off-campus programs (Appendix C4),
planning for technological development and innovation,
the status of the implementation of assessment methodology across the board.

II. RESPONSES TO WASC RECOMMENDATIONS OF THE 1990s
Introduction Principal Recommendations 1992 Response 1994 Report	EVOLUTION AND ENGAGEMENT A Self-Study in Preparation for an Accreditation Review by the Western Association of Schools and Colleges October, 2000
Introduction	Introduction: Cal Poly Pomona and WASC in the ‘90s
Intro	The university learned a great deal from its re-accreditation experience of 1990. Although some of the campus population questioned or rejected some of the recommendations from the WASC visiting team, the majority took them seriously, accepted them as meritorious, and began work on the new directions. Many elements of the campus consider the retirement of the former president and recruitment of a new president to have been among the responses to the 1990 report. A great amount of mythology surrounding the experience of the 1990 self-study, visit, and WASC report emerged during our conversations with people on campus. This mythology, mixed with factual information in the possession of a few persons, pre-conditioned the subjects of our research to a negative experience. We have been at some pains to separate our current effort from the previous cycle, therefore, and yet at the same time to target the points made by our external reviewers, which we considered useful ones. One focal area of criticism had to do with the quality of decision-making. Our actions in connection with this area were the following, as mentioned in Chapter I. These and other undertakings are discussed in detail in Chapter V, Sections 1 and 3, and Chapter VII. reorganization of the administration, including extensive decentralization, implementation of strategic planning, increased involvement of the Academic Senate in governance issues, direct involvement of faculty in policy-making, budgeting, and administration of the Foundation, establishment of the Faculty Center for Professional Development, inclusion of student and staff representatives on many committees, expansion of Cabinet membership, expansion of program assessment to include non-academic programs, pilot introduction of assessment seminars, portfolio analysis, graduate placement, and targeted student surveys. Another of the most serious critiques was of our general education program. It was criticized in terms of its goals and mission, its accessibility, its cultural scope, and its coherence. GE is thoroughly explored in Chapter VI, Section B. The campus response was to: analyze the General Education program in light of Executive Order 595, Academic Senate statements on the subject, and the university mission, separate the GE Committee from the Academic Programs Committee of the Senate, develop a new GE model "Track A" to offer alongside the existing "Track B" and existing Inter-disciplinary General Education track, subsequent to the demise of Track A, develop another reform proposal for GE containing capstones and assessment, currently expected to be approved, develop the Integrated Science General Education program, adopt American Cultural Perspectives as a graduation requirement to be satisfied through GE. The institutional climate for diversity was also criticized. A history and assessment of diversity programs on this campus is provided in Chapter V, Section 2. Actions have included, among others: Design of two pilot surveys on climate, and later design and implementation of the Campus Climate surveys. Central administration management of some programs, through a Special Assistant to the President, Educational Equity Services, and later Office for Diversity and Compliance Programs. Establishment or enhancement of programs by faculty and staff, such as President’s Commission on Enhancing the Campus Environment for Women and Minorities, Task Force on Sexual/Gender Harassment, Women Faculty Association, Women’s Council, Cal Poly Pomona chapter of Women in Science, University Diversity Committee. Establishment or enhancement of various student programs, such as Reaffirming Ethnic and Cultural Harmony (REACH), Office of Student Life, Center for Re-entry and Transition, Multi-Cultural (now Cultural) Centers, College-based programs. WASC’s evaluation of our responsive actions was positive. Cal Poly Pomona was told our strategic planning process was a good step forward, the innovations in the diversity area (REACH, the cross-cultural retreat, the Diversity Committee’s work) were excellent, support for the Faculty Center for Professional Development, especially faculty involvement in assessment initiatives, was noteworthy, and the new Track A was exciting. We were congratulated on our outreach to primary and secondary schools. WASC commiserated with us about the budget cuts we experienced. Particular topics of interest and criticism in the 1990 report also included: the proper size of the university, the establishment of a culture of evidence for our internal use and for future accreditation, the best method of honest self-appraisal, sexual harassment policy implementation (see Appendix B2), assessment of subject matter competence of teachers (Appendices C2, C3), program review, including review of off-campus programs (Appendix C4), planning for technological development and innovation, the status of the implementation of assessment methodology across the board.
Introduction	Principal recommendations
<top of page	The Conclusions and Recommendations of the 1990 WASC Team Report are excerpted following. The full Conclusions section of the Report is to be found in Appendix A4. Each comment is followed by a reference to place(s) in this self-study where our progress on the issue is discussed or a supporting document is displayed. The University needs to develop more openness, candor, and self-evaluation in its institutional culture and to direct itself more to consideration of the larger issues it confronts in a time of rapid change. Although the University gives the impression of being "on hold", "closed" and focused on the past, it has a solid base of operation, fiscally and otherwise. (Ch. V — Section A, V — Section D, VII, VIII - G) In its regular operation, Cal Poly Pomona should consider a greater degree of delegation and decentralization at all levels. (V - A, V - C, VII) The faculty, including the Senate, should take a more active and involved role on campus, in particular in regard to issues affecting the University as a whole. (V - C) The concept of a "polytechnic university" needs to be reexamined in this time and place for Cal Poly Pomona so that the University citizens have a clearer vision of where they are headed and to guide decision-making on priorities. (VIII - A) Collaborative planning in the utilization of campus resources for the issue of growth and size needs careful and widespread address on campus. (VII - D) The centrality of the institutional push for diversity in regard to race, gender, and ethnic identities needs to be emphasized and the momentum from the recent flurry of activity maintained and coordinated, not only in the increase in "bodies" but also in regard to the attitude of funding and the general spirit of the climate. (V - B) Administration and faculty should jointly examine the role of scholarship and research in the University for the decade ahead and come to some sense of position. (VI, VIII) In a now familiar pattern, Cal Poly Pomona has in place many structures for assessment of students and programs but needs to make them more rigorous, to spotlight the findings more, and to set in motion activities building on the assessment in ways which lead to improvement. (VI - C) General Education very distinctly needs concerted attention from faculty and administration in the interest of producing a more integrated program specifically designed for a polytechnic university. (VI - B) Careful thought and planning should be given to the issue of co-curricular life as a result of the proportion of students who live on campus as compared to the proportion which commutes. (V, VII) Strong and vigorous attention needs to be given to the problem of an on-line student registration system, and non-availability, or non-timely availability, of classes–a very major student concern and frustration. Steps are already being taken but more needs to be done and reasonably quickly. (Appendix A7) While the library in general seems to be functioning well and providing good service, it should continue to receive priority attention to determine needs, usage, and funding. (Appendix A8)
	Response and Report
<top of page	WASC required us to provide a response to their comments additional to the usual interim report. That response (1992), WASC’s letter in return, the interim report of 1994, and WASC’s letter replying to it, are included in Appendices A5 and A6, and are also accessible on our web site at http://www.csupomona.edu/~wasc. The 1992 two-year report dealt primarily with the diversity and general education issues, and outlined the proposed programmatic steps mentioned, which were approved. The process of preparing the 1994 interim response required a convocation of a new self-study team, which then examined the remaining issues raised by WASC in 1990 and updated the analysis of diversity and general education. Openness, decentralization, shard governance, our polytechnic nature, growth and size, scholarship and research, assessment, availability of classes, library resources, budgeting, technology, and administrative structure were all discussed under the aegis of the quality of decision-making and future directions. That self-study committee found that the university had addressed all of the criticisms directed by the Commission to us with varying degrees of success. The current self-study reprises most of these same topics, with particular attention to those where least progress was noted in either 1992 or 1994 or where we have experienced setbacks since that time. Some of our reasoning on these successes or misses led to the decision to conduct a thematic self-study in 1998; this is captured in the self-study proposal (Annex A2) and explained in more detail in the following chapter on methodology.