This is the Planning Committee's third report to Council regarding its evaluation of the Systematic Program Review results. This year the Committee is forwarding to Council an Interim Report. The Committee received 17 review reports in early January and has completed its review of these reports. However, the reports on five other programs also reviewed in 2001-02 have just been received and so have not yet been reviewed by the Committee.

 Background
One of the purposes of Systematic Program Review is to identify the overall quality of academic programs at the university. SPR demonstrates accountability for programs, provides information to assist in decision-making and resource allocations, and identifies outstanding programs.

 The SPR policy and procedures, which were approved by Council in 1999, require that each program be given a letter grade of A, B, C or D by the reviewers. The Provost & Vice-President Academic and the Dean of Graduate Studies and Research then evaluate the reviewers' findings and either agree or disagree with the evaluations. Finally, the Planning Committee determines whether it concurs with the overall evaluations

 SPR envisaged the following outcomes for program review (section XIII):

  Category A: Commitment to at least sustain the program at the existing levels and provide additional resources where justified. Examples of justified additional resources might include resources to serve more students; to develop interdisciplinary initiatives; to enhance significantly student experience in the program; to enhance a national and international reputation in the discipline.

   Category B: Commitment to sustain the program at approximately the current level and to consider additional resource needs in the context of regular university resource allocation processes.

  Category C: Requirement for development of a concrete and realistic action plan by the unit/College to address deficiencies within an identifiable time frame. Possible outcomes include:

 

  Commitment of College/university to provide essential additional resources to remedy deficiencies.

  Consideration of potential for reallocation of resources.

  Consideration of phasing out or consolidating subspecialties within a unit or between units.

  Consideration of an early date for subsequent review.

 

Category D: Requirement to consider initiation of approved Council procedures for program termination.

 

 2000-2001 Reviews

 The Planning Committee receives the SPR review and a ranking report, which consists of the Reviewer's Report, Department Head Response, Dean Response, and a summary of recommendations prepared by the SPR director. This year the Committee has considered 17 ranking reports for the 2001-2002 reviews.

 The Committee agrees that the following assessments of the programs are consistent with SPR process, the reviewer recommendations, and the response of the department and college:

 The Committee has recently received the reviews for Physics (BSc and grad programs), Engineering Physics (BE and grad programs), and Biomedical Engineering grad program and will be reporting on these at an upcoming Council meeting.

 Update on previous reviews

 Systematic Program Review has now been fully completed for 60 programs (29 in 1999-2000, 9 in 2000-2001, 22 in 2001-02) representing an enrolment of close to 5,000 students. These include the undergraduate and graduate programs in the Colleges of Agriculture, Pharmacy and Nutrition, Law, Engineering, Nursing; the graduate programs in Toxicology and Education; the Master of Business Administration program in Commerce; and some undergraduate programs in Arts and Science (chemistry, computer science, LUEST, RUD, Physics.

 The Planning Committee is monitoring how the recommendations from these reviews are being incorporated into college plans. Several significant program changes have already been made in response to SPR recommendations, including substantial revisions to the MBA program, and to the Post-Registration Bachelor of Nursing program, deletion of various majors and minors in Agriculture, and proposals for replacement of programs in Education

 Committee members:

 Lou Qualtiere, chair
 Donna Canevari de Paredes (Library)
 Cristine Echevarria (Economics)
 Glenn Feltham (Accounting)
 Hartley Furtan (Agricultural Economics)
 Linda Ferguson (Nursing)
 Ted Leighton (Veterinary Medicine)
 Larry Sackney (Educational Administration)
 John Thompson (Sociology STM)
 Tom Wishart (Dean, CGSR)
 Blair McDaid (USSU)
 Angela Regnier (GSA)
 Ruth Thompson (Sessional Lecturer)
 Ken Coates, Acting Provost & Vice-President Academic
 Tony Whitworth, Vice-President (Finance and Administration)
 Bruce Waygood (representing VP Research)
 Bryan Harvey, Acting Vice-President (Research)
 Barrie Dubray, Integrated Planning
 Rob Schultz, Institutional Analysis
 Pauline Melis, Office of the Provost & Vice-President Academic
 Cathie Fornssler, secretary