Minutes of the Staff-Student Joint Committee held on

Monday 1 February 1999 at 2.15 pm in the Board Room

Present:

Dr A Al-Tabbaa
Ms Z M Arthur
Mr N G Bailey
Dr J H Brunton
Mr W J A Courtenay
Mr G P Croft
Mrs C Drummond
Ms D A Galletly
Mrs J Hawtrey Woore
Ms P M Hopkins
Ms L B James
Ms K McDonald
Dr R W Prager (Secretary)
Mr I Y S Vun
Mr K M Wallace (Chair)

 

99.01 Apologies for absence

Apologies for absence were received from Dr Godsill and Mr Lopez.

 

99.02 Minutes of the Meeting held on 30 November 1998

The minutes of the last meeting were approved.

 

99.03 Matters Arising from the Minutes

It was agreed that staff members of the committee will in future be offered the chance to comment on the minutes of the October meeting before they are approved in November.

 

99.04 The Language Unit

Ms Galletly described how it would be helpful if the Language Unit could provide support for students needing to prepare CVs and applications to foreign companies for work over the summer. Mr d'Angelo agreed that this sort of training could form a useful option in the language courses.

Mr Courtenay suggested that it might be useful if students could have some feedback from their teacher at the end of the first term in order to guide them on whether to move up or down a class. Mr d'Angelo encouraged students to talk to their teachers and seek advice where this might be helpful.

 

99.05 SSJC Booksale

It was felt that the draft timetable was broadly acceptable.

 

99.06 Provision of facilities for undergraduates

  1. Sandwiches. Mrs Hawtrey Woore reported that at the moment it is not possible to sell sandwiches to undergraduates for consumption in lecture room 4. She agreed to investigate whether sandwiches could be sold from the vending machines in the Inglis corridor.
  2. Dr Prager reported that the workshops were investigating ways to replace some of the concrete bike racks with the narrower metal racks.

 

99.07 SSJC Publicity

Ms James and Mr Vun described their publicity activities. They have written a web page and sent an email message to all 3rd year students.

Ms Hopkins and Ms McDonald said that they planned to put up some overheads between lectures and have special suggestions boxes at key times, perhaps at the end of terms.

A similar approach will be pursued by the first year students.

The Secretary agreed to prepare a short list of the recent activities of the SSJC. He also agreed to provide members of the committee with transparencies where required.

 

99.08 Comments on the Course

  1. Timing of Part I example papers and examples classes

    2. Most of the lecturers appeared to be reasonably well coordinated with their examples classes during the Michaelmas term, but there were one or two small problems associated with the 3rd and 4th Mechanics papers. Mr Wallace agreed to look at this for next year.

  2. Second Year Numerical Analysis course and examples papers

The second year students said that the course had been difficult to follow and the notes were hard to understand. Two sessions in the DPO were made less useful by the fact that students spent much of their time learning to master Matlab. The Teaching Office will look into ways of scheduling introductory sessions early in the Michaelmas term, particularly for Matlab.

 

99.09 The First Year Course

  1. It was reported that some cigarette smoke is being drawn into the LT0 air system. The Secretary agreed to write to the Safety Officer.
  2. Some first year examples classes cover only a small number of questions, when it might be better if a larger number of questions were covered in less detail.
  3. It was decided that "SSJC Advice to Lecturers" will be updated annually at the Lent term meeting. The Secretary will circulate the current document with the minutes. Members of the committee are invited to send comments or suggestions for improvements to the Secretary by the end of February 1999.

 

99.10 Any Other Business

  1. Problems with 3rd year Paper E3

    2. Ms James and Mr Vun reported that there were serious problems with the second part of the Michaelmas term E3 course. Many students decided not to attend the lectures and to read the textbook instead.

  2. Student Run Best Lecturer Awards

    3. The certificates are now ready. It was agreed that a presentation would be arranged.

  3. International Design Contest in Japan

    4. The Chairman outlined the arrangements for the International Design contest. He asked the committee whether it was thought that entry should be restricted to second year students, or whether 3rd years also might be eligible. Potentially six students from CUED will be able to participate this year.

  4. Changes in the 4th year

Ms James reported that several members of the current 3rd year were worried by the idea that a transcript might be introduced when they reach the 4th year. They felt that this introduced an element of classing into the 4th year, whereas they had previously been told that the 4th year would be unclassed.

 

99.11 Date of Next Meeting

Monday 10 May 1999, 2.15 pm in the Board Room.