I. Minutes Approval
The minutes of the January meeting were approved as written.

II. Presentation by GPSA
Margaret Stevenson, Vice President of the Graduate and Professional Student Association, made a report on GPSA’s activities this year. She noted that GPSA has been responding to the results of a survey done by GPSA and GSPAN approximately three years ago; while some of the issues brought up in the survey results were school-related, others were institution-wide. GPSA worked this year to address the latter with the following activities:

• Placement Services: a series of help sessions will be offered during the week of March 17.
• Education Policies Committee of Senate has asked GPSA for input on useful examples of how chairs should interact with graduate students (toward the committee’s work on chair training in general).
• Soccer Tournament; MERGE Socials with CMU: GPSA is sponsoring a series of recreational/social events for students.
• CPR Classes will be held, organized by GPSA at students’ request.
• The Pitt Program Council receives some of the graduate student activity fee; GPSA is trying to work with them to make sure that activities geared toward graduate students are held.

Stevenson added that elections for GPSA officers for ‘98-’99 will be held April 1st.

Elizabeth Baranger, chair, added that, at a GPSA Assembly meeting in the fall, members had shared concerns with her about the quality of advising received by graduate students. In response to these concerns, the Student Affairs Subcommittee of UCGS is working on a document outlining the responsibilities of faculty and students in the advising process.

Merrilee Salmon noted that workshops on placement issues have been held in recent years, notably through the Graduate Studies Office of FAS and through the Survival Skills Program. She recommended that GPSA’s ongoing efforts on this issue with the Placement Office be supplemented by notice to Placement and to students of the Survival Skills workshops targeting graduate and professional students’ placement needs.

Baranger asked Council if it found the report from GPSA useful. There was consensus that such reports would be interesting; Christopher Bissada, one of the graduate students appointed to Council through GPSA, indicated that he would be willing to make such reports at future meetings.

III. Proposal for MS in Pharmacology
The MS in Pharmacology would be available as a safety net for students in the PhD program who cannot continue due to academic or personal reasons. No budgetary impact is expected, and students would not be admitted into this program. Students would not be able to get the MS on their way to the PhD; this degree is a way out of the program only.

Council approved the degree unanimously.

IV. Report of the Graduate Procedures Committee
The committee recommends two changes to Regulations Governing Graduate Study:

1. The explanation regarding two independent degree programs taken simultaneously and the dual and joint degree programs should be clarified to include mention of a need to register at some point in the "other" program as the primary program: "The schools and departments must agree as to which program will be the primary and which the secondary academic program for each term of enrollment and should communicate this to the student. A student who obtains a graduate degree in an academic program should register at least once with that academic program as the primary program. The students is billed at the tuition rate of the primary academic program."

The rationale behind this addition is that students are billed for the school entered as "primary" and schools’ enrollments are measured by the number of students registered with that school as its "primary" academic center.

Council had other suggestions for amending this section of the regulations, including deleting the qualifiers "a very few exceptional" from the opening sentence identifying those students who pursue two independent degrees simultaneously and deleting mention of the need for faculty approval in pursuing two independent degrees simultaneously. There was also discussion of the larger implications and whether or not accounting systems could be changed so that cost doesn’t appear to be driving decisions about policy.

The final decision was to eliminate the qualifiers from the opening sentence and to insert later, merely as an informational point, the sentence "The student is billed at the tuition rate of the primary academic program."

2. Changes in the wording of the section on certificates to indicate that this is a "coherent set of courses and related work."

The committee continues to look at issues related to certificate programs as there is a rapidly expanding demand for certificates, some of which are taken after a graduate degree is in hand while others are taken as part of the degree program.

A national look at certificates by the Council of Graduate Schools indicates three different types of certificates provided:

• the specialty certificate (a bachelor’s may not be required)
• the professional credentialing certificate (a masters required; an enhancement to one’s profession)
• graduate certificate (augments an Arts and Sciences graduate program and consists of courses taken toward a masters)

The committee recommends keeping our regulations fluid at this stage since this is a changing field. In the next version of Regulations, mention of credit requirements beyond the degree will be deleted. Stephen Hirtle asked that we include something to indicate that the certificate is different from the masters.

In other action, the committee recommended approval of a full-time master’s research study option for masters level students; this would have advantages similar to full-time dissertation study (delay in repayment of student loans; continued registration providing access to library and computing facilities). After some discussion, including a recommendation that a statute of limitations of one year be related to use of this option, Council approved recommending that the University consider making this option available to appropriate students. Baranger will take the proposal to the budget people for review:

Master’s students who have completed all credit requirements for the degree, including any minimum credit requirements for a thesis, a research paper, or a research project, and are working full-time on their research may register for no more than one year for "Full-Time Master’s Research Study," which carries no credits or letter grade but provides students full-time status. Students so enrolled are assessed a special tuition fee. All required fees for full-time students apply.