Georgia Southern University: SACS Accreditation Web Site

Standard Number 3.4.5: The institution publishes academic policies that adhere to principles of good educational practice. These are disseminated to students, faculty, and other interested parties through publications that accurately represent the programs and services of the institution.

Full Compliance

The Board of Regents promulgates academic policies which are made available to faculty, students, and other interested parties through the Board of Regents Policy Manual (§ 300 et. seq.) and the Academic Affairs Handbook (§ 2.00 et. seq.). These policies both govern University System of Georgia institutions as well as conform to Southern Association of Colleges and Schools (SACS) guidelines. Indeed, as stipulated in the General Policy (cited in § 301 of the Board of Regents Policy Manual ), the board of Regents requires each institution of the System to maintain accreditation with the Southern Association of College and Schools, Inc., as well as other program accreditations as appropriate.

Consistent with Board policy, Georgia Southern University has developed its own academic policies that adhere to principles of good educational practice. Section 200 (et.seq.) of the Faculty Handbook (beginning on p. 27) opens the discussion of campus academic policies by stating the University's commitment and adherence to the principles of academic freedom, referencing the 1940 Statement of Principles on Academic Freedom and Tenure issued by the Association of American University Professors (AAUP) as well as other statements issued by this widely recognized organization. AAUP data provide benchmarks by which the Faculty Welfare Committee —a standing committee of the Faculty Senate—measures University conformance to best practices within the academy and recommends policy changes.

Other groups and documents provide comparable benchmark data to inform the policy-making environment at Georgia Southern University. For instance, the National Postsecondary Student-Aid Study (NPSAS)—a comprehensive nationwide study sponsored by the National Center for Education Statistics of the U.S. Department of Education—informs campus decision-making on student financial aid issues as well as provides demographic and other characteristics of enrollment at a variety of institutions. The Personnel Advisory Council (PAC)—a University committee comprised of a wide representation of staff—provides similar benchmark data for staff-related concerns to ensure that Georgia Southern's policy decisions follow best practices.

Furthermore, it is standard procedure for most committees tasked with reviewing and/or drafting policy to initiate their work by researching comparable policies developed at other institutions—especially those institutions recognized as Georgia Southern's peer and aspirational peers . An excellent example of this process is the University's Task Force on Faculty Roles & Rewards . Tasked with the assignment of reviewing the campus' systems of faculty effort assignment and rewards to better align these systems with the University's mission, faculty activities, and reward structure, the Task Force began its work by a review of Ernest Boyer's groundbreaking work, Scholarship Reconsidered: Priorities of the Professoriate, and by the seminal work by Charles Glassick, Mary Taylor Huber, and Gene I. Maeroff, Scholarship Assessed: Evaluation of the Professoriate . Having thus grounded itself, the Task Force then began to address its charge—the final piece of which was to study and recommend a model(s) for faculty effort assignment. In its work, the Task Force examined over 60 faculty effort assignment models (of which 37 contributed to the development of the recommended model) including those of other System institutions, Georgia Southern's peer and aspirational peer institutions, as well as institutions identified as comparable to Georgia Southern based upon the Carnegie system of classification.

The process described above ensures that policy development at Georgia Southern University is guided by best practice as identified within the academy. The University widely disseminates its policies both in print and through the Internet. In addition to the Faculty Handbook , faculty, staff, and student policies are published in the 2004-2005 Undergraduate and Graduate Catalog , the Student Guide: 2004-2005 , and the Georgia Southern University Classified Employee Handbook. Additionally, the Office of the Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs posts numerous academic policies on its web site , as does the President's Office . The Vice President for Student Affairs lists student-relevant policies on its web site . Many of the departmental/unit web sites contain policies and procedures relevant to the operation of that office (e.g., see Office of Institutional Compliance ) and the colleges maintain similar types of information on their web sites as well (e.g., see College of Business Administration ).

¹⁶As defined in the Bylaws of the Faculty Senate (see Faculty Handbook , § 108.03, Article IV, Section 25), the primary duties of the Faculty Welfare Committee include, in part, conducting an on-going study of campus, University System of Georgia, state and national policies affecting faculty benefits and working conditions.

¹⁷Faculty Roles and Rewards: Recommendations on a Faculty Effort Assignment Model for Georgia Southern University , April 2004, p. 18.