1994-95 Course Audit
Executive Summary
The 1994-95 Course Audits show an overall decrease in the
number of courses and students taught by faculty in regularly
scheduled and individual studies courses. The total permanent
faculty payroll (FTE) also declined. The highlights of this year's
edition include:
After declining from 3.8 courses taught per permanent faculty
payroll FTE (full-time equivalents) in 1987-88 to a low 3.4 ratio
in 1991-92, the ratio increased to 3.9 courses per faculty and
remained constant for the last two years. Variations by divisions
over last year were slight. The Humanities and Social Sciences
Divisions remained constant at 4.2. The Arts and Natural Sciences
Divisions were within two percent of last year's figures. Arts'
ratio decreased while natural science's ratio increased. The proportional
drop in the total number of courses taught from 1,299 to 1,188
and the total number of faculty from 333 to 302 resulted in the
overall campus ratio remaining at 3.9 courses per payroll FTE.
Arts was the only division that showed steady increases in
their regular course enrollments for the last three years. Regular
course enrollments declined dramatically in the three other divisions,
especially in the Natural Sciences Division where enrollments
dropped from 19,306 to 15,437. The ratio of regular enrollments
to payroll FTE in natural sciences decreased by 9% (from 149 to
136.3). As a result, the overall campus ratio of regular enrollments
to payroll FTE decreased by 5% (from 163.2 to 155). This is the
first drop in the campus ratio since 1990-91.
Individual study enrollments have ranged from 13.7 to 14.9
per payroll FTE over the last eight years. When compared with
1993-94, the Humanities Division showed a slight increase in the
number of individual study enrollments per payroll FTE in 1994-95.
Their ratio increased by 1.4 from 9.9 to 11.3. The ratio for the
Arts Division, on the other hand, significantly dropped from 13.1
to 8.5. The ratios for the sciences divisions declined slightly.
Although their payroll FTE decreased last year, some boards
have managed to enroll more students in individual study and regular
courses. Enrollments in individual study went up in History of
Consciousness, Linguistics, the Writing Program, Anthropology,
Economics, and Politics. Computer Science increased their enrollments
in both individual study and regular courses. Computer Engineering
offered more regular courses and enrolled more students in their
individual study courses in spite of their payroll FTE remaining
constant.
Of the 1,349 general education courses offered in 1994-95,
30% were taught by the humanities faculty, 20% and 21% by arts
and colleges faculties, respectively. Social sciences faculty
taught 14% and natural sciences faculty taught 15%. Humanities
offered 96% of the courses that satisfied the composition requirement,
63% of the courses satisfying the Introduction to Humanities requirement.
Arts faculty taught most of the courses satisfying the Introduction
to Arts requirement. All courses that met the Introduction to
the Social Sciences requirement were taught by social sciences
faculty. The colleges sponsored the majority of the Topical courses.
Natural sciences faculty primarily taught courses that satisfied
the Quantitative and the Introduction to Natural Sciences requirements.
The boards that offered the most classes with enrollments
below the minimum class size criteria were Music (20), French
Language (11), and Mathematics (12).