EGSA Meeting Followup – Please reply! (four-and-a-half in one)

English Graduate Student Association

EGSA Meeting Followup – Please reply! (four-and-a-half in one)

April 8, 2010 EGSA Digests 0

Dear EGSA,

Thanks to all of you lovely folks who showed at our meeting yesterday. Your feedback and intense interest in the graduate English program is extremely helpful and heartening! I apologize in advance for the lumpy nature of the following unfinished business that we want to take care of before our final meeting of the year. Since we had to rush through many items at the end of our meeting, here are several items for which we’d like your email responses. Please number (and letter) your responses to these items.

MARK YOUR CALENDARS! The final EGSA meeting has been set, by common consent of those at the meeting yesterday, for the second reading day before finals – TUESDAY, MAY 4 @ 11 A.M. We will hold elections for any open positions for next year which are not mentioned later in this email. Final reports/actions on the following matters (and other items discussed at our meeting yesterday) will also be provided.

1. We have reviewed the MA Rep and PhD Rep positions newly established this year as part of the EGSA Council. The two positions proved very beneficial this year, resulting in wonderful program spreadsheets, available on the website (www.bayloregsa.org), and fewer headaches for numerous students who are approaching theses/dissertations. The EGSA Council, with advice from these two reps, are proposing that we consolidate these two positions into one. Naomi Tober is vacating her position, but Laura Bedwell is willing to continue for a second year.

a. VOTE Yes or No – Consolidate these positions into one, as recommended by the EGSA Council b. VOTE Yes or No – Keep Laura Bedwell in that position for a second year

2. We would like to move forward on establishing the conference study committee as soon as possible. Self-nominations and other nominations are now open FOR ONE WEEK for conference study committee members. IMPORTANT! Check with the person you nominate to be sure that person is interested in serving in that position before nominating them. Nominations received thus far: Danielle Williams, Michael Milburn, Rachel Webster, Nathan Kilpatrick, David Clark…

a. Nominate yourself or additional people for this committee if you wish

3. We will email you a copy of the EGSA Purpose & Functions document a week in advance of our final meeting for your review. We will also email a list of open positions still to be voted upon. We are also proposing that the Professional Development Coordinators (folks who run our heteroglossia events) be elected at our last meeting of the semester rather than in the fall. In the past few years, PDC positions were open to new students to allow them a chance of getting involved but they have never been elected. Electing people to these positions will give them time to think about what professional development activities to plan over the summer and to have an event planned as soon as we return in the fall.

a. VOTE Yes or No – elect PDC’s for next year this spring

4. BRIEF SURVEY ON INDEPENDENT STUDIES / SEMINAR OFFERINGS: We (Mary and I) want to represent the graduate student body as closely as possible on these matters, so your input is very important.

a. There seems to be widespread confusion and/or miscommunication about independent studies – how and when to use them as well as when to save them for later (as well as their basic purpose). How and why have you been using them? What are your positive experiences and/or concerns about independent studies?

b. What is your understanding of how independent studies work, and what made you think as you do about them? (See page 281 of the current graduate catalog for a course description: http://www.baylor.edu/content/services/document.php/93407.pdf)

c. What kinds of seminars would you like to see offered? (Rem: The department faculty all have undergraduate duties as well as graduate, and most of them can’t teach every semester.) British I, British II, American I, American II, required seminars, other – be at least that specific and more so if desired. If you have been here at least two years, what courses have you rarely or never seen offered that would highly interest you?

d. What other questions/concerns/comments (if any) do you have about independent studies or seminar offerings?

Please send all your responses in one email if possible, directly to me (reply). Let me or one of the EGSA Council know if you have any additional input before the EGSA Council meets again on Monday, April 26. Bethany Bear is attending a conference right now, so you will probably not get the minutes from our meeting yesterday until she returns next week.

Thank you in advance for your response.

Sincerely,
Steven Petersheim

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