Provost’s Newsletter: News and Updates from the Division of Academic Affairs for July 10, 2024

July 10, 2024

Dear Baruch College Community:

The Provost’s Newsletter returns this week after its short hiatus with a focus on three important policy updates from the CUNY Office of Academic Affairs: The Learning Management System (LMS) Use Policy adopted by the CUNY Board of Trustees; Camera Use Guidance for synchronous Online and Hybrid Courses; and revisions to the Uniform Grade Glossary. We also introduce “Getting to Know Brightspace,” a new recurring subsection of the newsletter under “Teaching and Learning” devoted to the Brightspace LMS Transition.

Best summer wishes,

Dr. Linda Essig
Provost and Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs

Campus Updates

Learning Management System Use Policy Approved
CUNY’s Policy for Use of a Learning Management System (LMS) has been approved by the Board of Trustees of The City University of New York. The policy outlines the need for a digital platform to connect students with instructors and meet CUNY’s cybersecurity policies. The policy also ensures that students are actively participating in their online courses through the LMS. Click here to read the policy document.

Revised Camera Use Guidance for Online and Hybrid Courses
CUNY’s Office of Academic Affairs has revised its Camera Use Guidance for Online and Hybrid Courses to allow faculty to require students to turn on their cameras at the educator’s discretion, effective beginning Fall 2024. This policy was developed with input from campus provosts and in consultation with the University Faculty Senate as well as the University Student Senate. Click here to read the revised guidelines.

Revised Uniform Grade Glossary Policies and Guidelines
CUNY has released a revised Uniform Grade Glossary Policies and Guidelines document that will go into effect beginning Fall 2024. This document was revised following extensive consultation with stakeholders across the University. Some notable revisions include more flexibility for campuses to determine the last day for a student to choose the Pass/No Credit option, clarification on the assignment of a WU grade, and an adjustment of the last day to withdraw from a course to the pre-pandemic 60% mark. Click here to read the revised policies and guidelines.

Teaching and Learning 

Getting to Know Brightspace: How to Utilize Announcements Successfully
Announcements in Brightspace allow faculty to share timely class updates with learners. Each class has an announcement feature, and class announcements are also aggregated and displayed to learners on their main landing page when they first login to Brightspace. Here are a few tips to use announcements successfully:

• Announcements can be scheduled to post or be taken down at specific dates and times.
• Announcements can include videos, attachments, and externals links.
• Learners choose whether or not they receive announcements via email. If you frequently use announcements to communicate to your classes, encourage your students to turn on the “Announcements – New Announcement Available” notification setting so they receive an email, text, or push phone alert that a new announcement has been published.
• Announcements are NOT received by students BEFORE the start date of a course in Course Offering Info. If you want to send a message to students before the start of the semester, either use the Brightspace Email feature or change the course start date to an earlier date in the Course Offering Info section under Course Admin.

Research

Faculty Achievements
William (Billy) Organek, Assistant Professor, Department of Law, has recently had his article “Mass Tort Bankruptcy Goes Public” published by the Vanderbilt Law Review and featured on the Harvard Business Review Bankruptcy Roundtable.

Gang He, Assistant Professor, Marxe School of Public and International Affairs, has been invited to participate as an external expert in the energy transition sub-working group of the U.S.-China Working Group on Enhancing Climate Action in the 2020s, which is co-led by John Podesta, Senior Advisor to the President for Clean Energy Innovation, and Liu Zhenmin, China’s Special Envoy for Climate Change. As part of this sub-working group, Dr. He will be collaborating with experts from both the U.S. and China to conduct analysis on ensuring resource adequacy while rapidly integrating low- and zero-emission energy sources to aid in the electricity sector transition.

Linda Essig, Provost and Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs, was included in City & State New York’s list of Trailblazers in Higher Education for her work in launching the Digital Learning Hub, increasing research expenditures, and more.

Do you want to share something you published, exhibited, performed, or presented with the Baruch community? Submit your information here.

Stay Connected

Share Your Research and Creative Activity
Keep the College up to date with your research and creative activity by emailing facultynews@baruch.cuny.edu with the what, where, and when of your publication, presentation, exhibition, award, and so on.

President Wu’s Blog
Join the conversation at President Wu’s blog. Read and comment here.