Last night, Senate met to vote on changes to the Doctor of Medicine (MD) program, discuss UBC’s strategic plan and approve a non-credit program micro-certificate.
Here’s what you might have missed.
Changes to the MD program
The Admissions Committee presented three motions to approve changes that revise the calendar for the MD program.
The first motion was to approve a change to the MD admissions program to clarify that applicants can only apply to the MD program after finishing their degree and that deferral happens only under exceptional circumstances.
The second motion was to approve the accommodations that were applied due to COVID-19 be removed because students have had adequate time to complete the general admissions requirement without a need for special consideration.
The final motion was to approve changes that relate to applications for students with disabilities. The changes provide more comprehensive information regarding the application and reflect changes in additional information to align with the new core competencies for medical students entering the program.
All three motions were approved.
Awards and new courses ratified
Senate also approved 52 awards to be sent to the Board of Governors for final approval.
The Curriculum Committee proposed a motion to approve a new graduate course for the Faculty of Forestry, “Science and Expertise in Global Environmental Governance,” and a new non-credit program micro-certificate.
The course was created for thesis-based graduate students in "response to student demand," according to Senator Joanne Fox.
The new non credit program micro-certificate is about opinion polling methods and practice. This is in partnership between UBC Extended Learning and the department of political science.
“[The program] consists of five short modules, including a project that includes the faculty supervised collaborative survey design and data analysis project, and is expected to draw learners broadly from a wide variety of businesses and industry as well as public servants,” said Senator Catherine Rawn.
The motion was passed.
Refreshing UBC’s strategic plan
UBC’s strategic plan is being reassessed after five years and Provost Gage Averill said a lot has changed since the plan was first passed — including the rise of generative AI, the pandemic and evolving global challenges.
Averill said phase one was finished, which involved forming a project team and defining the scope and development of the plans, and phase two will focus on conducting engagement sessions and analyzing the outcomes of those discussions from September to December.
Student Senator Kareem Hassib said the refresh document did not address student affordability and wanted more emphasis on this issue. He asked what UBC planned to do to support these goals.
Averill said UBC will incorporate recommendations from the Student Affordability Task Force.
Senator Santokh Singh raised concerns about UBC's budgeting challenges related to the provincial funding model and the "revenue shortfall" caused by visa limits on international student admissions.
Averill said UBC has a strategic recruitment and admissions task force to enhance recruitment efforts and emphasized their strong relationship with the province.
Fox asked about when the provost will have an update on the plan for Senate. VP Research & Innovation Gail Murphy said the Provost Office aims to provide an update in January for Senate feedback.
Student Senator and AMS VP Academic and University Affairs Drédyn Fontana asked how the strategic plan will align with changes to UBC's budget, such as the tuition allocation model.
“It's always the best practice to think about strategy first. As you prepare to have the budget conversations, and [if] strategy is established, we can use the budget process to align budget and strategy. So these two processes are running in parallel,” said UBC President Benoit-Antoine Bacon.
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