evolution and engagement

THEME ONE - institutional culture

THEME TWO - teaching and learning

THEME THREE - management and enhancement of resource

THEME FOUR - new directions

Letter to the University Community

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The culture of the institution is the context critical to an understanding of how we are able to carry out our educational mission. Culture is broadly conceived to include the policy framework, bureaucratic organization, hierarchical and occupational structure, communicative behaviors, political economy, standard procedures, typical relations between vertically and horizontally connected units, inter-personal dynamics, attitudes, beliefs, and other traditions and customs commonly found on the campus. The institutional culture provides the growth medium for the learning that takes place (or does not, as the case may be). If that culture is an impoverishing or unstimulating one for some individuals or groups, the institution needs to make the appropriate changes. The vigor of institutional culture is also a function of the relationship between the institution and the surrounding community milieu within which it is embedded.

To learn is to accept the challenge of intellectual growth, which involves the admission of ignorance in some or many matters. Even to ask a question is a daunting adventure in social risk. The fundamental idea of all education is that the development of the person’s mind and capabilities requires the expansion of his or her world beyond their individual experience and characteristics, family background, local history, and provincial culture. Today, the educational heritage of every child is the wisdom and praxis of the species, as much of it as can be acquired. A second notion inherent in the idea of education is that it is a collective effort, engaged in by communities in an organized fashion. Community is a requirement for the continuity of culture. Risk-taking and the abandonment of a limited, parochial perspective demand a secure environment and a community frame of reference for the learner. This is the crucial importance of institutional culture to learning.

Universities expect at least two basic kinds of behavior of both their workers and students: independence and collaborativeness, plus the judgement to know which is appropriate when. We need people to be able to manage a good deal of their own work and time without constant, close supervision, especially faculty and administrators, but also students and staff. We also need them to cooperate with others for the execution of some tasks, for some decision-making, and in some ritual activities. Institutional culture also creates a comfort zone for the establishment and constructive use of these patterns … or it does not.

This theme considers the recent history of the institution and the climate of the campus as the limiting conditions of our development and the setting within which to understand current events. The explosion of demographic diversity on our campus has created an exciting learning and social atmosphere, but many challenges along with it. A proliferation of training and extra-curricular programming, new curriculum, policy, and administrative activity greeted this explosion. The mixed results of these efforts have spurred a re-organization and re-dedication of officialdom to deal with diversity. Resolution of the leadership controversy of the mid- to late-nineties was impeded by disagreements about diversity issues.

The effects of the widespread use of information technology on the communicative culture of the university are also of interest in this analysis, as is the role and extent of orientation of faculty and staff. The primary finding developed in this theme has to do with the need for community building and validation. This is related to both the civility and continuous self-study recommendations of the self-study.

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The heart of the university is its educational purpose. Cal Poly Pomona has claimed for itself excellence and quality in academic programming as the prime goal of the university. The campus population believe we have high quality programs. There is, however, little agreement as to our definition of these characteristics, means of assessing our progress toward them, or means of making improvements. It is very clear that higher education is caught in a serious bind, where standards are concerned. On the one hand, parents and legislatures are justifiably outraged that students emerging from universities read, write, calculate, and think poorly, and hold us responsible; on the other hand, we are expected to cater to the demands of students coming to us from a consumerist, anti-intellectual culture that makes education into just another commodity. The university is expected to provide job skills, basic competencies, general and specific knowledge, inter-cultural sensitivity, self-esteem, group consciousness, international awareness, and a sense of volunteerism. At the same time, the very pedagogies through which these abilities and content are imparted are undergoing rapid transition.

Learning outcomes assessment techniques are the contemporary response of the university to questions about our educational effectiveness. Cal Poly Pomona has implemented a broad array of such techniques, emanating from our sound historical foundation in ‘learn-by-doing’. Specific curricular applications in general education, the remedial courses, and some other programs have eluded us in the past, but work of the Academic Senate, Faculty Center for Professional Development, Office of Academic Programs, and Schools and Colleges addresses these concerns. Adaptation of assessment techniques for purposes of program review is underway.

The mix of learners on campus necessitates a closer study of how the learning process and environment have changed in recent times. The rubric of ‘student-centeredness’ (not meant to suggest that we were not before centered on students and learning) evokes a team effort on the part of faculty, staff, and administration. It is the needs and characteristics of students that drive the curriculum and co-curricular experience, not traditional disciplinary or programmatic targets alone. Of course, responsiveness to students does not relieve us of the responsibility to expose them to the full extent and profundity of scientific and humanistic knowledge.

The impact of Cornerstones on the educational performance and routines of the university is something we cannot yet measure. The testing and remediation regimens instituted at the system level have had profound effects on the administration and presentation of academic programs. Faculty development has become a crucial matter in the current period, due to the rapidity of technological change, the change in the sociocultural context from which students arrive at the university, and the changes in the presuppositions connected with academic work. One very painful truth confronting faculty is that higher education has become less the means of making a well-informed person and more the means of making money.

This theme examines some of the wealth of data on student performance we have amassed at the university, and the various methodologies departments are devising for their assessment. We raise questions about the patterns revealed in remediation and retention statistics, academic advising, and the role of inter-disciplinary programs, such as Regenerative Studies, international studies, IGE, and ISGE. The primary recommendation of this part of the study is to enable increased collaboration between different divisions and constituencies and coordination of initiatives. Opening shared governance to students and staff could be an important mechanism; different management approaches to such efforts as outreach, GE, service-learning, technology, and research projects could also bring about a greater academic cohesiveness.

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This theme addresses the capacity of the university to manage its educational mission: the infra-structure, resources, methods, and design or plan of the institution. It is presumed that these are all targeted at the maintenance and improvement of services from which students and the community at large benefit. To assess the adequacy of this capacity is no easy matter. Mere measurements (of library volumes, of classrooms, of expenditures per department ... ) are not sufficiently revealing, though certain minima of costs and countable things must be present in order for the university to make any claims to excellence.

The sea change of privatization swept Cal Poly Pomona in 1991, when, in a recession year, the State withdrew an important portion of its support from the public universities. The conversion to state assistance from its former status was felt at Cal Poly Pomona as a crisis and a sacrifice, from which we are still recovering. In the wake of this change arose the Division of University Advancement, with its attendant development officers and programs. Re-engineering, right work, down-sizing, partnering, out-sourcing, and various other movements were also responses to the new scarcity that have had effects on educational effectiveness, some positive, some pernicious. The university behaves today much as any parastatal organization; that is to say, it is nominally part of the public sector, is largely funded by the people of the state and hence is theoretically accountable to them, but it must also exhibit enterprising, competitive behavior typical of a business so as to earn the rest of its support.

Another powerful current of change that swelled to a tidal wave in the early nineties was the impetus toward automation. The importance of computer technology was never in doubt at our polytechnic institution. However, it became pervasive and much, much more expensive with the implantation of campus-wide network infra-structure, a greatly enhanced multi-media capability, a spectrum of training programs, and the organization to match. Technology became another division, with a large technical staff. Some of the most hotly contested issues in the academy are connected to the philosophy and practices of the technology program on campus, such as distance learning.

The entrepreneurial activities of the university’s leaders have also created controversy on occasion. The tension between the necessity to attract additional money and the mission to provide education sometimes seems irremediable. The debate about the proposed golf course to be built on the Spadra site, for example, became a bitter experience for all parties. Some of the discussion about the Zimbabwe initiative invoked the conflict between pragmatism and educational principle. Faculty work load was affected by the increased emphasis on bringing external funds, and in some cases more students, into the university. The rendering of departmental budgets into the terms of FTES represented the academic process as quantitative economic reality. It might be hypothesized that the functions of governance and leadership came under stricter scrutiny during this period in part because of the divisive nature of scarcity. Any decisions about resource allocation have been vitiated by the subtle ideological contest underlying them. This has made nearly every act of administration into a power struggle. The participation of faculty in governance added again to their work load.

The planning and other management agendas of the university take on a larger role in this modern context. We seek a (strategic) academic planning model that conflates assessment, budgeting, and planning while incorporating feedback, into a continuous, unobtrusive cycle of self-study and response. Thus, the continuous self-study recommendation emanates from this theme, though it is a logical product of the others, as well.

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The future of the university clearly includes more international activity, more community outreach, more partnerships with business, more business with donors and contractors, more learning programs taking place outside the classroom, more curriculum development in highly technical and business-oriented fields, more inter-disciplinary collaboration and programs, more post-modern emphases in some fields, more multicultural programming, more interaction with K-12 and community colleges, more flexible use of structures and schedules, more collaborative learning, more off-campus programs, more graduate programs, more certificate and training programs. The burgeoning of new educational forms is well within the applied, active learning tradition of Cal Poly Pomona, but has impelled us to re-define our polytechnic identity along post-modern lines.

The presence of IPoly High School on campus has also created a new direction for the university, and not a few problems along with it, though these challenges seem to be diminishing, as we learn how to deal with this population. As various forms of outreach become more deeply implanted in the life of the campus, we wonder what will be the appropriate manner of administering them, without creating yet more management infrastructure. Since outreach also implies fund-raising to some extent, one of the factors preventing us from coordinating such activities in a cooperative manner has to do with the competitive status of programs in an era of scarce external resources for education.

Staff, students, and faculty are an under-utilized source of connection with the communities surrounding the university, and indeed with the international community. Cal Poly Pomona is beginning to learn how to use this resource, as in the case of the Vietnam Initiative. Surveys and interviews indicate a great deal of interest in this kind of activity, but a commensurate need for training, information sharing, and coordination. ITAC, the International Center, the College of the Extended University, and other offices have a powerful role to play in these efforts.

This thematic research uncovered a plethora of initiatives and activities of the university that are not broadly familiar or well coordinated. Many of them are superbly managed and make good educational sense. We have begun the work of listing, defining, and classifying them under the rubric of Centers of Excellence, in the service of designing a coordinating structure that can give the whole movement character and direction. Our primary recommendation for this theme is a proposed new vision for Cal Poly Pomona based on a special feature of our polytechnic character: each ‘side’ of the house (the technical colleges and the liberal arts and sciences) grows from and strengthens the other, symbiotically. Our research shows that this is happening spontaneously and that it can become the motive force for our future development.

Dear Cal Poly Pomona Friends, Students and Colleagues,

We have written this report for you. We, the WASC Steering Committee, wanted it to be by you as well, in so far as possible. Since you number over 17,000 students, 1300 part- and full-time faculty, 125 administrators, and 1246 staff, it was tough getting in touch with all of you. Nearly a hundred of you staff and faculty have attended the focus groups we held in 1998 and 1999, and two hundred students. We surveyed all of you staff, administrators, and faculty, and 5000 of you students when we conducted the Campus Climate Survey. Dozens of you have served as formal consultants to the self-study process. We interviewed many more dozens, formally or informally. We went to a lot of meetings, workshops, and lectures with you. We know you engaged in lots of conversations and meetings on topics related to our research activities when we weren’t there, because you let us know what was said. We figure many more such conversations took place, of which we are unaware, but which were productive in wrestling with the matters that concern us all. Those meetings, too, we consider part of the work of self-study, even if they are not accounted for here. We got your feedback at the presentations we gave, from responses to the "Interesting Times" Newsletters, and from many unsolicited personal comments. We know you checked our web page for information because you called or wrote to tell us so.

It is hard to look at oneself. The mirror hasn’t been constructed that can reflect an institution the size and complexity of our own, and yet we have tried to do this as faithfully as possible without going through the looking glass. One of the things we have had to grapple with right away is the fact that we are not quite a community, in the traditional sense of a group of people who have a great deal in common from cultural traditions to residence. We are a community in the common current sense of a group of people united by a single factor, as in "the disability community" or "the business community". We are all affiliated to this one institution, but the nature of that affiliation is variable, and our other characteristics are jubilantly divergent. Our self-study has identified some shared trends and features beyond that one factor, so we have hope of some day being more like a traditional community with its powerful feeling of collective identity and direction and its equal care and support for all of its members, however different they may be.

Our not-yet-a community thus is more fractured than whole, more scattered than secure, and in continual transition. The "evolution" in the title of this report refers to this latter characteristic. We don’t have a consensus about every detail of our history, nor a broadly-shared notion of where we are or should be going. We have lots of those notions. None of us agree on everything. Some of us agree on a lot of things, and, even where we disagree, are beginning to manifest as a community a strong tendency to "engagement" (the other term in the title). By this we mean that Cal Poly Pomona students, staff, faculty, administrators are noticeably interested and involved in the academic, social and political life of the campus, perhaps contentiously, perhaps critically, but actively. We have shown tremendous loyalty to this institution, to our departments or disciplines, to our principles, over the years, through our vocal and active engagement in the educational process and the process of handling that process.

Please accept our work in the spirit in which it has been done: a sincere search for knowledge that will lead to solutions for whatever is troubling us, greater learning for students, and pride in what we have accomplished so far.

Sincerely yours,
Self-Study Steering Committe