Accreditation

Section III: Evidence for Meeting Each Standard

STANDARD VI: UNIT GOVERNANCE AND RESOURCES

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Standard VI. Element 1: Unit Leadership and Authority

(The University's organizational structure is displayed at http://wwwnew.towson.edu/main/images/orgchart3.pdf. Also see the Faculty Handbook (pp. 2-5~2-9), for more detail. The organization of the Academic Affairs Division, in which the Professional Education Unit resides, is displayed at http://wwwnew.towson.edu/provost/provost/orgchart-0407.pdf.)

At Towson University, the preparation of teachers and education specialists is an all-university responsibility. Based on that fundamental belief, the dedicated organizational unit responsible for professional education unit is the Teacher Education Executive Board (TEEB; Exhibit 4). A long-established standing committee of the University Senate, the TEEB is changed with University-wide coordination of policies, procedures, and assessment associated with professional education programs, its decisions are recognized as official policy for all professional education programs at Towson. (The University Senate Constitution and By-Laws, By-Law Q-11, identifies the specific roles and functions of the TEEB.)

Chaired by the Dean of the COE, the TEEB includes representatives from all undergraduate and graduate education programs at the University in the oversight of development, delivery, and assessment of unit programs. As a Senate Standing Committee, it meets monthly to fulfill its roles and functions. As a governance structure which provides a supportive and inclusive system within, the unit has been able to fulfill its approved mission. (The TEEB membership for 2006-2007 may be found in Exhibit 4.)

As chair of the TEEB, the Dean of the COE is the unit head with responsibility for the overall coordination of preparation programs and for facilitating the communication and collaborative decision-making among academic units, programs, and faculty in the University who contribute to the total array of the institution's professional education programs. The Dean of the COE is supported in these efforts by the Associate Dean, the Assistant Dean, the Coordinator of Assessment and Accreditation, and the Director of the Center for Professional Practice.

In addition to the multiple academic departments, the unit relies heavily on the contributions of key support committees and committees:

• Unit Assessment Committee: a TEEB subcommittee analyzes and provides feedback from the previous AY standard-based performance assessment data. (Prior to 2006, this function was performed by the NCATE Steering Committee.)
• The NCATE/MSDE Accreditation Steering Committee (12 unit and 2 external, P-12 representatives); provides P-16 leadership to address the unit's commitment to standards-based professional education, and supports the writing and editing of the Conceptual Framework and the Institutional Report, etc. (Exhibit 125).
• The Center for Professional Practice (CPP) and Professional Development Schools (PDS): While administratively located in Hawkins Hall, the CPP provides a range of unit-wide services to unit-wide candidates and faculty, including:
  - declaration of major, assignment of advisors, screening for admission, etc.,
  - Praxis information, exams, access to PLATO software for Praxis I preparation,
  - coordinating diverse and inclusive field and clinical placements for candidates ,
  - coordinating the PDS Network, - providing professional development for all unit and P-12 clinical faculty, and
  - collecting, analyzing, and disseminating all candidate assessment data.
• The Professional Development Schools Committee: Led by the director of the CPP and including all PDS Coordinators, it meets twice each semester to support the standards-based activities of the PDS Network (Exhibit 70).
• P-12 Professional Development School Councils: P-12 practitioners participate actively in unit program design, delivery, and evaluation. Numerous P-12 school system partners (e.g., Howard County, Baltimore County) have PDS Councils. The unit is represented by the CPP Director and/or Assistant Director of the CPP and unit faculty (Exhibit 63).
• Curriculum Oversight Committees: Faculty "have a primary role in the development of academic policies," including program planning. Made explicit by the Faculty Handbook (p. 2-18). Appendix D, the Curriculum Process, describes the process for all additions or changes to the university curriculum, and specifies the steps and potential involvement of various faculty curriculum oversight committees.

Recruitment and admissions practices, academic calendars, grading policies, identification of and access to student services are clearly described in the Towson University 2007-2008 Undergraduate Catalog and the Towson University 2007-2008 Graduate Catalog. These publications are updated and checked for accuracy on an annual basis; copies may be found on Bookcase 1, Shelf 2.

Standard VI. Element 2: Unit Budget

The University budget has continued to grow in the period FY 2005 to FY 2007. The large increase in FY 07 was due to a new USM formula for funding per additional FTE over FY 06 enrollment. Total University budget figures are listed in Table 83.

Table 83. Towson University’s Total Operating Budget

Unit budgetary allocations are sufficient to ensure faculty teaching, scholarship, and service that extend beyond the unit to P-12 education and to support unit faculty in the development of collaborative, high quality, unit-wide programs. The budget for curriculum, instruction, faculty, clinical work, scholarship, etc., supports high-quality work within the unit and in collaboration with its school partners.

Budgetary decisions supporting the unit are made at multiple levels and reflect various sources. Salaries for all personnel in the Academic Affairs Division are set annually by the Provost in consultation with Deans, Chairs, Program Directors and other Administrators. Other budgetary allocations are allocated to the various colleges by the Provost reflecting priorities such as enrollment growth and needs such as start-up programming; college-specific unit programs are funded within the overall college-specific budget. Table 84 identifies budget (salary and operating) by college for the six colleges with faculty for FY 05-07, documenting that funding for the academic colleges has increased between 14-21% in the last three fiscal years. Candidate enrollment numbers (FTE) at the undergraduate and graduate levels are also provided for comparison. As noted in the Overview, there has been only a 2% increase in unit enrollments in the last three years.

Table 84. Academic Affairs Budget and Professional Education Enrollments

However, Table 84 does not provide a complete picture of unit funding. Given the nature of the TEEB as the campus-wide unit, determining all resources allocated to professional education is challenging. As noted above, college-specific unit programs and courses are funded within the overall college-specific budget, and individual departments and colleges contribute resources differently as enrollments fluctuate and priorities emerge; for example,

• the Foreign Language allocates funding for faculty training and certification and candidate testing fees for the American Council on Teaching of Foreign Languages (ACTFL)-required Oral Proficiency Interview,
• English teaches two courses exclusively for Secondary English majors, as well as several literature categories required of Secondary majors but open to all University students because they meet the University's general education requirements, and
• all initial candidates are required to take PSYC 201, Educational Psychology; estimated costs are approximately $3450/course, and the number of sections varies each semester with enrollments.

Moreover, in addition to the funds reported in Table 84, University budget policy provides additional unit resources. For example:

• Graduate assistants are funded by the College of Graduate Education and Research.
• The Administration and Finance Division provides funding for technology support (e.g., CIAT, OTSD), for classroom technology infrastructure upgrades, and funding to the CPP for mileage reimbursement to University intern supervisors.
• The Provost responded positively to requests for additional resources to support new initiatives. In FY 06 and FY 07, the Provost provided funding for "one time" equipment and renovation requests to each college, Cook Library, and to administrative units. Funding ($240,105) was provided to the COE to update and expand computer equipment, upgrade technology in smart classrooms and provide field-based supervisors with laptop computers and projectors.
• To ensure further the integrity of programming, University funds were merged with unit funds (e.g., English Department, all COE) to reduce the number of courses offered by part-time faculty by creating additional lecturer positions. (University funding for forty courses to be offered by part-time faculty was combined with unit/COE funds to create five additional, full-time Lecturer positions).
• All initial certification candidates are charged a lab fee for the capstone internship; these funds are used to provide stipends for mentors, as well to provide funding for ongoing P-16 professional development (e.g., professional library resources, the CPP workshops for P-16 participants, summer PDS strategic planning).

Finally, unit fiscal resources from the University to support programs preparing candidates to meet standards and support professional development opportunities for faculty are supplemented with additional revenues from several sources:

• Towson Learning Network (TLN; Exhibit 73). Using a tuition redistribution formula, remaining revenues in excess of expenses generated by off-campus professional development course offerings are returned to participating departments. During the last three completed fiscal years, over two million dollars have been redistributed to participating departments (Exhibit 126).
• Endowment funds (Exhibit 127). Each college determines its own use of such funds. In the COE, the France-Merrick Faculty Endowment for Faculty Excellence was used to establish the France-Merrick Scholars Program to further support full-time faculty professional development/scholarship. Other endowment funds used to support faculty professional development include the Class of '45 Professional Development Fund (e.g., external research consultants, travel), the Cramblitt Memorial Fund (e.g., purchase of Inspiration software licenses), and the COE Endowment (e.g., external consultants).
• Grants and contracts. (See Table 80, p. 85, and Exhibit 112.) These funds have been used to support faculty teaching, scholarship, and service that extend beyond the unit to P-12 education (e.g., course release, travel, summer stipends for PDS strategic planning, and professional development for P-12). P-12 personnel have also been direct recipients of grant-funded professional development (e.g., E=MC2, Teacher Academy of Maryland-- high school academies (Exhibit 89), TIP grant: enhanced technology skills (Exhibit 18), PDS grants: action research, and mentoring; Exhibit 128).

In combination, the aforementioned sources clearly provide sufficient funds to support and enhance the quality of unit programs.

Standard VI. Element 3: Personnel

Full-Time Faculty
Detailed unit faculty workload guidelines, reflecting USM policy and University implementation, are found in Exhibit 129; in summary, they are as follows:

• USM and University policies define course units for a variety of professional activities. These include teaching, research involvements, administrative responsibilities (e.g., department chair/program director, directing Reading, Speech-Hearing clinics), supervision of interns in PDS settings, student advising, and other assigned duties (e.g., preparation of a SPA report as part of the NCATE review). The exact nature of faculty workloads is negotiated annually by the faculty member with his/her department chair and approved by the College Dean.
• Tenured and tenure-track faculty are responsible for six to seven course units per academic year. They can pursue two overlapping pathways in their professional activities, i.e., Teacher-Scholar and Scholar-Teacher. Tenure-track faculty members who choose to be evaluated relative to the Teacher-Scholar path will teach seven course units and thereby maximize the opportunity to display their instructional acumen. Those pursuing the Scholar-Teacher path will teach six course units to allow additional time for research and scholarly pursuits. (Similar decisions are made annually by tenured faculty as part of their annual reviews).
• New tenure-track faculty in their first three years receive a one-course reduction in teaching assignments for each of the two semesters, six consecutive units per year. This course reduction is intended to support their establishment of solid foundations in teaching and scholarship.
• Lecturers are responsible for eight course units per academic year. Lecturers serving as IHE PDS Liaisons are responsible for seven course units per year.
• Supervisory responsibilities for field and clinical experiences are considered on-loadassignments. A typical supervision assignment that is equivalent to one course is the supervision of four candidates. The maximum supervisory load for a full-time faculty member is sixteen candidates per semester.
• Course reductions may result from "buy-outs" of faculty time from externally funded grants/contracts. All faculty are expected to teach at least one course per semester.

Part-Time Faculty
Full-time faculty have responsibility for designing, delivering, assessing, and modifying highly effective professional education programs. Part-time faculty are selected for their experience and expertise, including current P-12 assignments, to enhance professional preparation efforts. All part-time faculty must have doctorates or, at the minimum, an appropriate master's degrees related to their specific teaching and/or supervisory role.

In the unit's programs, no course stands alone. The experiences and expectations in each course connect and build on experiences in other courses. For that reason, part-time instructors have special responsibilities to plan and deliver courses in the context of program expectations. Accordingly, participation by part-time colleagues in orientation sessions is required (e.g., the Conceptual Framework is introduced and explained; program standards and assessments are addressed; core, standards-based syllabi are shared; and professional expectations for teaching effectiveness are identified. Chairpersons and/or program directors assist and support part-time faculty in this process (Exhibit 119). (Vitae for fall 2006 part-time faculty can be found Bookcase 1, Shelf 2).

School-Based Clinical Faculty
As noted in Standard III, instructional programs are enhanced by the active participation of school-based clinical faculty. Clinical instructors (those who supervise year-long internships) and mentor teachers meet a high standard of selection criteria and participate in orientation, professional development and evaluation activities.

Support Personnel
Support personnel in the unit have increased in recent years and are appropriate both in numbers and expertise for the demands of the unit. In addition to technology support personnel, the unit is supported by adequate staff in all departments and operations. Each academic department has at least one full-time administrative assistant; the CPP's unit role is supported by two administrative assistants, and three dedicated graduate assistants. Additional administrative assistants have been added to the unit as necessary to support growth in enrollments, faculty and demands for off-campus and externally supported activities.

As noted, the Dean of the COE is the unit head with responsibility for overall unit administration; since the last accreditation visit, four new professional positions have been established in to support the unit, its faculty and programs:

• The position of Assistant Dean of the COE as a full-time administrative role was established in 2004 to provide support for graduate programs and off-campus programming.
• The full-time position of Coordinator of Assessment and Accreditation was established in 2005 to coordinate and manage a comprehensive assessment system and provide support for all programs within the unit for accreditation purposes (e.g., SPA reviews), as well as address all institutional, state, and national reporting.
• The full-time position of Academic Program Specialist was established in 2005 to support the unit's assessment and accreditation activities.
• The COE hired its first Accountant in 2005 to provide support to chairs, programs, and faculty in departmental budgetary grant management.

Standard VI. Element 4: Unit Facilities

The unit's facilities are adequate to support the preparation of teachers and other professional educators. Programs are housed in college-specific locations.

Hawkins Hall houses the unit's administrative offices, the CPP, and the Educational Technology Center, the Reading Clinic, and the classrooms and administrative offices for all COE programs. The majority of the COE courses are offered in Hawkins Hall, which has twenty-four classrooms (including art and science classrooms), twenty three of which are technologically enhanced, and five computer labs. Additional unit space for TLN is provided in the Administration Building.

Classrooms, departmental and faculty offices, technology centers, specialized facilities (such as the Speech-Language-Hearing Clinic, the test library, and two-way mirror counseling rooms for in vivo observation in School Psychology) are well equipped to support professional preparation. The Department of Mathematics relocated in 05-06 to the recently renovated 7800 York Road building, in which every classroom is a "smart" classroom. In addition, there are three computer laboratory classrooms with individual computers for each student. The Art and Music education programs are located in the recently renovated Center for the Arts and have dedicated computer labs for education candidates. On-campus space resources are enhanced by appropriate office and classroom space in the off-campus settings in which programs are offered through numerous partnerships.

In response to the University System of Maryland's (USM) desire for Towson University to increase its enrollment, a new Campus Master Plan was developed for the university and approved by the USM Board of Regents in December 2003.

Standard VI. Element 5: Unit Resources including Technology

Faculty and candidates are provided with ample and accessible resources, including technology resources, and library and curricular resources, including electronic information. Led by a Chief Information Officer and guided by its strategic technology plan, the University provides a strong technology infrastructure with numerous computer labs for courses, portable laptops and computers on carts to bring into classrooms, as well as human support and robust faculty development opportunities (Exhibit 130). Reflecting the University's technology plan over 70% of the classrooms on-campus are "smart classrooms." These Technology Enhanced Classrooms are part of an on-going effort to make available a broad and flexible set of tools to support instruction. Additionally, in Fall 04, the entire campus became a wireless environment, increasing the convenience and flexibility of computer-based communication, learning, and research for faculty and candidates (Exhibit 131).

All full-time faculty members have recently updated computers in their offices with connection to the Internet and a common suite of software. The University plan provides for replacing one-third of computers each year. Faculty who teach off-campus are also offered a laptop and projection device to use throughout the term in the off-campus location. These same resources are available to part-time faculty in the form of a laptop for use in their teaching.

As detailed below, the technology needs of the unit are served through multiple University resources, including:

• The Center for Instructional Advancement and Technology (CIAT) provides Towson faculty with the opportunity to investigate and apply sound learning theory and technology to instruction (Exhibit 123).
• The Office of Technology Services (OTS) provides ongoing professional development workshops for faculty and staff. The OTS also sponsors Faculty Online (a faculty resource site for online, hybrid, and web-supported courses) and faculty use of the new (in 2006) Digital Media Classroom. The OTS is currently working with each college to determine the needs and to consolidate college-wide priorities into a revised technology master plan (Exhibit 124 and 130). Additionally, the OTS operates Student Computing Services (SCS) providing candidates with a help desk, open lab, technology training, assistance with discipline specific software, and graphic and multimedia production.

The technology needs of the unit are also served through unit-wide and college-specific support for the classroom computing and instructional media needs of faculty. Available to all professional education candidates in Hawkins Hall are:

• The Educational Technology Center, an open computing lab with forty workstations is available to all unit candidates and faculty, with over sixty hours of service per week. This lab is staffed with two full-time professionals and a cadre of student support workers.
• The Multimedia Production Lab is equipped to support those application courses that emphasize the use of digital media for instruction.
• The Assistive Technology Lab serves to demonstrate hardware and software to support learning for individuals with exceptionalities.

Support for Assessment System
 The Unit Assessment System has been developed by unit faculty and administrators, with participation and/or review by P-12 representatives. Multi-year support from the OTS enabled the development of the web-based TIMS system (see Standard 2, p. 48.); the OTS also provides system maintenance. These assessment technology efforts are supported by a dedicated Graduate Assistant position in the Center for Professional Practice. Assessment efforts are also supported by University resources such as the Office of Assessment (Exhibit 55), and the Office of Institutional Research (Exhibit 132).

Library and Curricular Resources
(Exhibit 133) Reflecting the 2000 BOE Report's cited weakness regarding insufficient resources for the Library, the University and the unit worked aggressively to secure additional library and curricular resources to support faculty, staff, and candidates at both on-campus and off-campus locations. Towson 2010, the University's strategic plan, includes the following specific focus: Expand our resources for the library and campus technology as a critical resource in support of existing programs. The academic affairs budget for Cook Library has increased 16% in the last five fiscal years; this does not include at $4,000,000 renovation nor $172,000 in recent targeted allocations from the Provost (FY 2006 and 2007)

The Albert S. Cook Library resources have grown over the past several years to meet increased demands, and especially for doctoral-level and technology-based applications. The Library contains (http://cooklibrary.towson.edu/collections.cfm) about 570,000 volumes and 17,800 non-book items, and subscribes to more than 1960 print journals, 2000 electronic journals, and 96 online databases (e.g., Naxos Music Library, ARTsor Charter Collection, Children's Literature Comprehensive Database). Additionally, Cook Library houses numerous curricular and instructional resources for faculty, staff, and candidates; these include curriculum guides (Cook has the Maryland State Depository collection of curriculum guides.)

Cook Library's faculty and staff offer a variety of instructional services (http://cooklibrary.towson.edu/facultyServices.cfm) that help unit faculty and candidates develop and refine their information literacy skills. The Library strives to develop and maintain an instructional program which enables candidates not only to locate needed information and resources-including campus as well as University System of Maryland and affiliated institutions (8/2/2007Each department has a departmental Library Representative to Cook Library who coordinates the department's selection of materials and submits orders to the library. Additionally, the Library Liaison Program promotes a partnership between the academic departments and the Cook Library to improve learning and teaching in the University. The liaison librarian also recommends new materials and informs faculty members about changes and additions in library services.

Off-campus and distance learning candidates and faculty are highly supported in their access to the library; specific distance learning support is provided for candidates and faculty. Interlibrary loan services are also available.

Candidates can also receive assistance through various means, including a direct telephone line and instant messaging. All books, reserve materials, journals, etc. available to on-campus students are available to off-campus students. Materials are conveyed to students by a variety of methods including (but not limited to) electronic transfer, fax, mail, and expedited delivery services.

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