The Department of Political Science will provide and maintain high quality academic programs at the undergraduate and graduate levels.

The department will maintain high quality curriculum at the undergraduate and graduate levels.

Curriculum will be reviewed annually by the department's curriculum committee, a committee consisting of 5 members appointed by the department chair. Committee members represent the following areas: international relations, comparative politics, American politics, political theory, and public administration.

The political science courses curriculum will be comparable to curriculum found at universities and colleges ranked by US News and World Report as the top 10% universities and colleges for the study of political science and government. The basis of comparison will be in terms of hours required for the degree, the types of courses offered, and the objectives of the courses. By the end of 2012-2013, revisions to the curriculum will introduce thematic courses in comparative and international relations with an emphasis in democratization, domestic conflict, and identity politics utilizing the POLS 4381 (Special Problems) course.In the 2012-2013 academic year, the department will create a Texas Politics Course to complete the 2305/2306 6 hour sequence. POLS 2301, Introduction to American Politics will be moved to POLS 2305. The remaining 2000 level courses will be transferred to 3000 level courses in order to provide additional courses to our majors.

For the academic year 2012-2013, the curriculum committee found that it was difficult to compare the department's curriculum to top undergraduate political science programs since this was not a category provided by the US News and World Report.  The Report provided rankings for the top graduate programs in political science which is not an appropriate comparison. 

The curriculum committee conducted an internal audit of our offerings and found the following for each subfield:

Political Theory - Most of the top political science programs still require at least one course in political theory. Our program requirement matches this norm as we offer students three different theory courses to satisfy this requirement.

American Politics - While department offer courses that are similar to most Tier I and even Ivy League schools, the community found that several updates would be beneficial to the department. It is recommended that the department split the current Attitudes and Behavior course into two separate courses: Voter Behavior and Public Opinion. In addition, the department will explore the possibility of adding a course on political psychology.

International Relations and Comparative Politics - The committee found that some course titles needed updates. For example, the Conflict and Terrorism course was created at a time when terrorism was considered a subset of conflict.  With the increased occurence of terrorism, the committee decided it warranted its own course.  The application to create a new course focusing on Conflict (international wars) was submitted as well as a request to amend the current course on Terrorism to "Political Violence and Terrorism".   The committee also found that the department should pursue a minor, concentration, or certificate in international studies in order to be competitive.

Public Administration - Only five universities in Texas offer an undergraduate degree in public administration. The highest ranked program focuses on emergency management and does not offer a general PA degree. Our department has recently moved our PA courses to the 3000 levell in order to accomodate a public policy and management minor recently approved by the University. Our review found that we need to improve our course offerings by including those that focus more on the management of local and state organizations, as well as courses that focus on functions of management such as finance and human resources for public and nonprofit administrators.

Additional Findings:
The committee determined that the comparisons of our curriculum should be based on regional and public institutions for the next assessment cycle.
The department introduced themetic courses utilizing the POLS 4381 Special Problems course which included a National Security Course.  In scheduling for 2013-2014, a Film and Politics course and a Democracy course have been scheduled as Special Problems.

The department successfully converted the core courses to POLS 2305 (American Government) and POLS 2306 (Texas Government) and they will be implemented in the schedule beginning in the Fall 2014 semester. The remaining 2000 level courses were converted to 3000 level courses (3331 Local Politics; 3332 State Politics; 3335 Ethnicity and Gender) with the remaining course POLS 2336 (Public Administration) to be converted by the Fall 2014 semester.

The department will submit the appropriate paperwork to split POLS 4372 into two separate courses: Voter Behavior and Public Opinion.  The American politics faculty will also investigate the viability of creating a political psychology course.

The international relations and comparative politics faculty will provide a feasibility study for the creation of an international studies program at SHSU.

The Department will provide high quality teaching.

Faculty will be evaluated using the data collected through the Individual Development and Educational Assessment system currently used by Sam Houston State University as a tool for evaluating faculty teaching.

In the 2012-2013 academic year, 75% of the political science courses will be scored at or above the national average as identified by the Individual Development and Educational Assessment program. Faculty members who score below or near the national average on the Individual Development and Educational Assessment program for three consecutive semesters will meet with the department chair to discuss and implement an improvement plan that includes mentoring and use of the Sam Houston State University Professional and Academic Center for Excellence (PACE). The expectation is that scores will improve by .5 on the IDEA scoring scale for the 2012-2013 academic year for those who are identified as underperforming.

For online courses, the department set a goal of 70% compared to the national average. The department will create an internal survey to administer to online students utilizing Surveymonkey in order to assess online courses and teaching.

We find in the Fall 2012 semester that 85% (87% adjusted) of the traditional courses in the political science department scored at or above the national average for the summary score as reported by the Individual Development and Educational Assessment (IDEA) system (see Part 3 of attachment for Fall 2011). In the Spring 2013 Semester, the rate was 93% (100% adjusted). This was well above the 75% target for both semesters. This represents a 3% increase in the raw score from the previous year for the fall and 11% for the spring semester, while the adjusted score remained the same for the fall but rose to the maximum in the spring.  The percentage of courses that rated in the higher or much higher categories exceeded the expected distribution of 10% and 20% respectively when viewing the adjusted summary evaluation scores in Part 1 of the attachment for traditional courses (22% and 48%) for the Fall Semester as well as the Spring 2013 semester (24% and 56%). The average adjusted score of 4.5 (see Part 2) exceeded the national average of 3.9 in the both semesters.  This high score was maintained from the previous year.

The results of the online courses are also provided in the attachments. The results indicate that 70% (raw) and 60% (adjusted) of the courses scored at or above the national average reported by the IDEA system in the Fall 2012 semester, with 56% and 44% respectively in the spring. For the fall semester, this is an increase from the previous year's 57%. However, there was no improvement in the Spring 2013 semestre.  In addition, 40% of the courses rated in the higher category (an improvement of last year's 29%) in the Fall 2012 semester, and 33% in the Spring 2013 semester, exceeding the expected distribution of 20%. Last, the average score of 4.1 in both semesters still exceeded the national average of 3.9 in the adjusted summary evaluation score.

Given the high faculty scores over the last two years, the department will focus on improving online teaching for AY 2013-2014. The department will create an internal survey instrument (through Survey  Monkey) to administer to online courses to gather information beyond what is available via the IDEA system. We continue to set a goal of 70% for comparison to the national average.

The Department of Political Science will hire and maintain high quality research track faculty.

Research faculty will engage in scholarly activities.

Research faculty's progress will be measured by the number of publications.

Over a rolling 3-calendar year period research track faculty will produce an average of 1 peer reviewed article per year or 1 book during the 3 year period. The AY 2012-2013 will also include book chapters, substantial book reviews, and grants per year.

The chair will hold monthly meetings with junior-faculty to provide guidance and accountability in regards to research agenda and quarterly meetings with tenured faculty to ensure that faculty members are engaging in research activity.

In order to maintain consistency with the annual FES, the analysis was recalibrated to reflect calendar years rather than academic years. Thus, the three year period is from 2010-2012.

In the political science department, two of the 12 tenured or tenure-track research faculty met the criteria of an average of 1 published article (or its equivalent) a year or 1 book during the 3 year period. It should be noted that three of the faculty members have yet to have three full years in the rolling total (two junior faculty members and one tenured faculty member that switched from a teaching to a research track beginning in 2011.

During the three year period, two of the faculty members published 3 or more peer-reviewed journal articles with one of these publishing 7 articles.  Two faculty members published review articles.

Of the 10 that did not meet the criteria, one is a newly minted Ph.D. who began at SHSU in the fall of 2012 and has one article that has been accepted. A second junior faculty member (that began in the fall of 2011 has one publication, however, has two accepted for 2013 including one article in the prestigous Public Administration Review.  A third faculty member switched to the research track in 2011-2012 has two publications.

All but one tenure or tenured faculty members presented at academic conferences in the 2012-2013.  academic year.  The revised FES and departmental promotion and tenure manuals will provide further guidance to research faculty in order to promote faculty publications.  Like the previous year, we found that providing teaching schedules conducive to research was successful and will be ongoing.

The political science department will continue to support research track faculty members by offering teaching schedules that are conducive to their individual research activity. In addition, faculty members will be encouraged to attend academic conferences that will provide valuable feedback in order to facilitate publication submissions and acceptances.

The chair will hold monthly meetings with junior-faculty to provide guidance and accountability regarding research agenda and quarterly meetings with tenured faculty to ensure that faculty members are engaging in research activity. In addition, an offical mentoring program will be instituted in the department for junior faculty. 

Teaching track faculty will engage in service work designed to promote the department, college, and university.

Teaching track faculty's progress will be measured by the number of service projects completed in a year. Service projects include: membership in college and university committees, participation in department recruitment programs, organizer of major campus events, etc.

We expect our teaching faculty to complete at least 2 service projects per faculty per year. We anticipate to improve on the 2011-2012 results as well as take ownership of specific projects including Family Weekend, Homecoming, and other campus events in 2012-2013. We will also have all faculty members engage in service projects which includes graduate and undergraduate recruitment projects, alumni development projects, and internship development projects.

For the AY 2012-2013, the political science department had four faculty members on the teaching track with one of the three serving as a Clinical Professor in the department and one serving as a visiting assistant professor.

All four faculty members contributed to at least one service project, with three meeting the goal of two service projects per year.

All provided service to the department (Personnel Committee, Scholarship Committee; Curriculum Committee; DPTAC, Undergraduate Advising).

The additional projects completed by the faculty at the college level include the Dean's Advisory Committee, the CHSS Undergraduate Advisory Committee, the American Studies Minor Committee, the EWCAT Committee, and the CHSS Alumni Advisory Board.

At the University level, the service projects included the Excellence in Teaching Committee, the Bearkats Read to Succeed program, the World Affairs Council, the History Pushpin Committeeand the Race for Life) while at the community level, service projects included membership on the Board of Directors of the YMCA, the Friends of the Wynne, the Huntsville Cultural District, and the County U.

Three of the four faculty members engaged in significant research activity during the 2012-2013 AY resulting in two articles published, two articles and a book chapter accepted, an article submission, seven conference presentations, and a total of ten conferences were attended.

The department teaching track faculty will assume responsibility for one major departmental task as well as continue to be engaged in service projects.

Teaching track faculty will also engage in teaching mentoring to junior faculty.

Improve the quantity and quality of graduates student applications.

The number of students entering the graduate programs will increase and the average GRE and GPA of incoming students will increase.

We will compare enrollment figures from fall 2011 - spring 2012 and fall 2012 - summer 2013. We will compare the average GRE and GPA of students who entered the program during the fall 2011 - spring 2012 period to the average GRE and GPA of students who entered the program during the fall 2012 - summer 2013 period.

We expect to see a 10% increase in graduate student enrollment overall. We expect that the average GRE and GPA of students will improve or stay consistent. During the coming academic year we will improve efforts to develop new prospective student recruitment pools for the MA program. We will target our efforts towards high school and community college teachers. We anticipate these recruitment efforts will increase the number of applicants beyond the minimum expectation of a 10% increase.

Students admitted under a conditional acceptance plan will go through a more rigorous application process (two writing samples, three letters of recommendation, and an interview with the graduate advisor), thus we expect to see the number of conditional acceptance move to permanent acceptance within one semester.

The number of applications accepted for F12 - SU13 increased by 8.89% which is short of our 10% goal. This is due in part to the fact that the MA marketing plan (targeting community college teachers) scheduled for  implementation in the spring of 2013 did not occur due to delays in building the database of potential candidates.

The average GPA and GRE scores for F23 - Su13 applicants are 3.26 and 1192 respectively which exceeded our expectations (that is an improvment over the previous year) for GPA, and GRE scores.

 For the coming academic year we expect to see at least a 10% increase in graduate student enrollment. We will also expect to see the average GPA and GRE scores of applicants improve or hold steady at current levels. The main actions for the coming academic year will involve efforts to develop new prospective student recruitment pools for the MA program. Recruitment efforts will target high school and community college teachers. We hope these recruitment efforts will increase the number of applications beyond the minimum expectation of a 10% increase.

We will improve students' overall satisfaction with the department.

Due to the inability to implement a mandatory exit survey for undergraduates, the department will initiate a new process to ascertain the placement of graduating seniors (graduate and undergraduate). Beginning in the fall of 2011, the department will identify graduating seniors and ask faculty to conduct anonymous surveys to students in their courses during the normal course evaluation (IDEA). In the Fall of 2012 we will designate a single faculty member to be responsible for administering the in-class exit surveys. The faculty member will contact instructors of upper division courses and schedule the in-class exit survey. We believe that having a single faculty member in charge of the process will ensure consistent implementation of the exit survey.


These surveys will be voluntary. The department believes this will provide a better response rate than a voluntary online survey. The same criterion will be utilized, that is, we expect 75% of undergraduates to be satisfied with the department.

The department has been unable to ascertain students' overall satisfaction with the department with an internal survey, even with a dedicated faculty member taking responsibility of the process. The returns on such a voluntary basis has not allowed the department to draw any conclusions.

The department will utilize a part of the standardized IDEA results to measure student satisfaction. A question on the IDEA (Item #42) asks the student the following: "Overall, I rate this course as excellent." The department will utilize this as a proxy to measure excellence. We contend it reflects an overall satisfaction with an integral element of the department - course offerings.

We initially set a mark of 75% satisfaction. On the 5 point IDEA scale, this equates to 3.75 on the IDEA scale. For the Fall 2012 courses, the department averaged 4.2, compared to 3.9 for the IDEA system, and 4.1 for the institution (raw scores; see Part 2 on pages 3 and 4). In addition, for the online courses, satisfaction registered at 4.1, compared to 3.9 and 4.1 for the IDEA system and institution respectively. The department exceeded the 3.75 mark (raw scores; see Part 2 on pages 3 and 4 for Fall 2012 Online courses).

The department will utilize a part of the standardized IDEA results to measure student satisfaction. A question on the IDEA (Item #42) asks the student the following: "Overall, I rate this course as excellent." The department will utilize this as a proxy to measure excellence. We contend it reflects an overall satisfaction with an integral element of the department - course offerings.

Additionally, the department will add a question to the IDEA evaluation for upper division courses designed to assess their overall perception of the political science department.