S.89-27
As vrnded
SIMON FRASER UNIVERSITY
MEMORANDUM
To: ?
Senate
?
From: R. Saunders, Chair
SCAP
Subject:
?
Enrolment Limitations -
?
Date:
?
June 22, 1989
Department of Economics
Action undertaken by the Senate Committee on Academic Planning at its meeting of June 21,
1989 gives rise to the following motion:
MOTION:
r]
"That Senate approve and recommend approval to the Board of
Governors as set forth in S.89 - 27 , the proposed enrolment
management plan for admission to the Major, Honors and Minor
Programs in the Department of Economics and that for 1989/90,
a target of 200 new admissions to Major and Honors Programs
in Economics be established and that to achieve this target a
minimum CGPA of 2.4 be required for admission to Major, Honors
and Minors Programs in 1989/90."
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?
1. ?
The Department of Economics limits admission to its major/honors/minor
programs. Entry into the major/honors/minor programs in the Department of
Economics will be on the basis of a formal application made to the department. To
be considered students must have completed the following specific required courses
with at least a C- grade:
a)
Math 110, or Math 100 if BC High School Algebra 12 or equivalent has not
been completed with at least a Ci-
b)
Any 100 division ECON course
c)
MATH 157 or equivalent
d)
ECON 200 and 205
e)
BUEC 232 (MATH 101 is strongly recommended prior to taking BUEC 232).
1)
?
One: ?
000 level or 100 level ENGL or PHIL (not ENGL 099 or
ENGL 010)
And one: 100 level HIST or POL
And one: 100 level S.A. or PSYC
And one: 000 level or 100 level BISC, CHEM or PHYS
?
2.
?
On the recommendation of the Department of Economics and the Office of the Dean
of Arts, the University will establish a yearly quota - the number of students to be
admitted into major/honors/minor programs. This quota will be established on
the basis of projected available course space and department resources. In advance
of each competition, the department will announce the minimum cumulative
grade point average below which students will not be normally considered for
admission.
This includes joint honours and joint majors.
.
.
-2- ?
.
Students may apply for admission to the major/minor/honors program after
completing
45
semester hours. Students will be selected on the basis of their
cumulative grade point average (CGPA) and performance in specifically required
courses.
All applications for program entry (including joint majors) should be filed with the
Departmental Assistant. Students are required to provide the appropriate
documentation.
Application dates:
(Note: Application dates for each semester consistent with the schedule for advance
course selection, will be established for all limited enrolment programs.)
There will be the right to appeal non-approval of application with the department's
Undergraduate Program Chairman. Students not accepted upon initial application
may re-apply.
Students are permitted to undertake lower division economics courses without
program entry. Students other than those accepted
'
SSgO
,
into the major, honors or
minor programs in Economics may tak Economics courses as long as they meet the
CGPA entrance requirements.
Entry into Upper Division BUEC courses will be limited to Business and Economics
honors, majors and minor students, and to other students meeting the continuance
standards for Business majors.
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Students who receive WD withdrawals from courses where the demand exceeds
course enrolment limitations may lose priority in that course for the next semester.
.
?
-3-
5. ?
TRANSFER STUDENTS
Students transferring to Simon Fraser University will be considered on the basis of
their entrance cumulative grade point average (calculated on the basis of grades
received in courses transferable to the University). Transfer students must be
admitted to the University before they may apply for admission to the Department's
major/honors/minor programs. Students who meet these requirements will be
admitted to the program under a "provisional" status and will retain the
provisional status until 15 credit hours have been completed at SFU. To continue,
their CGPA for these 15 credit hours must equal or exceed the CGPA entrance
requirement for non-transfer students.
.
S
SIMON FRASER UNIVERSITY
DEPARTMENT OFECONOM/
C
^(
?
VP
Lawrence A. Boland
?
CANADA V5A
1S6
Professor
and Chairman
?
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?
fax: (604) 291-4045
tel. (604)
291-4487
?
tel. (604) 291-3508
Robert Brown, Dean
?
13 December 1988
Faculty of Arts
re: minimum
GPA
for Economics Majors
Prior to proposing the imposition of a GPA minimum for majors we made some rough calculations which should give an idea of
why we saw no alternative. Consider two questions: (1) what capacity does our department have on the basis of existing size of
the faculty complement? And (2) what effect would a reasonable CPA minimum have on the demand for our capacity?
Current Capacity:
Number
of
upper level classes per year:
Today on the books we have 23, CFLs (not counting joint appointments with home
I
departments elsewhere). Since in any year there is at least 3 people on sabbatical, we have in effect only 20 people.
Furthermore, if we subtract 1.5 for administrative release, 2 for Grauer and Herzog who do not teach any economics courses,
and 1 for the retirement of Copes, then we will have effectively 15.5 people. At best this means that we can provide 62 cours'
per year. If we now subtract 15 for the number of lower level courses offered each year and a minimum 17 for the requirith
number of courses offered in The graduate program each year, then we are left with the ability to provide only 30 upper level
economics courses per year. Of course, this is a
conservative
calculation since in both our graduate and undergraduate
programs students need and expect more than the bare minimum number in order to be able to have some reasonable minimum
range for choice.
Number
of
upper
level classroom seats:
If
we say that the 30 courses are evenly split between 300 and 400 level courses, and
we recognize that we currently limit 300 level courses at 65 and 400 level courses at 40 (in an effort to provide an absolute
minimum degree of quality), then we have a capacity of 1575 classroom seats for upper level classes.
Number
of
majors
we can accommodate:
Since each major would have to take at least 2 upper level courses per semester (or 4
per year), then these 1575 seats could be occupied by 394 majors. But, currently we have about 60 minors who have to take at
least two upper level courses per year so the 394 will be reduced
to
364 available slots for economics majors, joint majors and
:honors. Of course, this is also very
conservative
since it makes no allowance for non-majors such as business finance majors
who are required to take econ
445, 310
or 301. In our upper division courses, econ honors/majors/minors/joints are often
outnumbered by non-economics students. If we are to continue to allow general access to any student who has the prerequisites,
then a more realistic capacity is about 250 majors, joint-majors and honors.
Current Number of Majors:
We
examined the registrar's 88-3 data concerning majors. The total number of honors, majors and joint majors is currently
457! This means we have 83% more majors than we have capacity for. This figure, too, is conservative since I need to include
the 87 intended majors which gives us a total of
544 --
or
over twice
our
capacity!
This is reflected in the 600-700 requests on
our waiting lists
every
semstèr.
Effect of the Proposed Minimum GPA:
Before proposing the minimum, Clyde made some rough calculations to illustrate the effect of limiting by CPA. If we were to
impose a minimum 2.33 CPA, then the total number of majors and intended majors would fall by 194 or by about 35%. This
would leave us with 350 majors/honors/joint majors which is still 40% over capacity.
You might ask how we have been able to service such an excess. Obviously we have been relying heavily on sessionals and
visitors. If we are to continue to be concerned about the quality of education provided our majors, then the reliance on
scssionals and visitors must eventually stop. Even the reduction to 350 will have to be phased-in over several years by
gradually raising the minimum continuance CPA as well as continuing to rely the use of visitors and sessionals. But again, in
terms of regaining the quality of education here at SFU that we promise students, at some point this excess of majors must stop.
Even to be able to give a quality education to the 350 majors remaining after the CPA minimum is fully implemented, it will not
be possible without either our receiving permission to hire more full-time faculty, or someone devising an additional way to
limit the number of majors.
CdC,
.
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SIMON FRASER UNIVERSITY
?
MEMORANDUM
TO:
Larry Boland, Chair
?
FROM: Walter J. Wattamaniuk,
Economics ?
Director, Analytical Studies
RE: Intake Targets for Economics
?
DATE: May 10, 1989
I'm responding to a request from Sherrill Ellis to model the flow of majors
through your undergraduate program given specific minimum GPA entry criteria.
Historically, your department has been approving about 100 to 120 new
majors in each of Fall and Spring as well as 50 to 80 in Summer. Your yearly
intake of new majors has therefore been stable at about 250-300 new majors with
a total of 450-500 majors registered for courses in Fall and again in Spring.
In 1988/89, the pattern changed . . . 87 students declared in 88-2, 84 in 88-3,
and 200 in 89-1 for a total intake of 371 new majors. This spring saw a total of 560
Economics majors registered for courses!
When I looked at the entry GPA distribution of all 371 new majors in
1988/89, I discovered that
80% had an entry CPA of 2.1 or more
74% had an entry GPA of 2.2 or more
66% had an entry GPA of 2.3 or more
57% had an entry GPA of 2.4 or more
45% had an entry GPA of 2.5 or more
38% had an entry CPA of 2.6 or more
30% had an entry GPA of 2.7 or more
Using this data, I put together the attached table which should allow you to
set your GPA cutoff depending on the number of majors you want to see registered
in your department. The table assumes several different intake targets of new
majors, provides the CPA cutoff that is estimated to achieve the targets and then
provides an estimate of the steady state headcount population of Economics
majors registered in courses in each semester. Keep in mind that it will take you
several years to reach steady state as the population of majors currently registered
fulfills their degree requirements.
...21
0
/
2
I hope this helps you expedite the decision-making process! Call me at 3600
if you have any questions.
I'm attaching the set of data I used to arrive at the numbers in the table.
Projections of student headcount are carried out using a standard cohort survival
model which I will be glad to show you if you are interested.
.7
WJW/acs
Enclosures
Copy: Sherrill Ellis
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