Ag and Life Sciences ONLINE

COLLEGE NEWS



- New administrative structure



- Nominations for college positions



- Updated organizational chart



- First weeks crucial for new students



COMMUNICATIONS KIOSK



- New communications lab



- The right kind of team conflict



INFOGRAZING



- Selected college stats on Iowa, Midwest



EXTERNAL VOICES



- Are computers harmful to education?



MARGINALIA



- Info superhighway roadkill



HOW TO SUBSCRIBE TO AG ONLINE







C O L L E G E N E W S







NEW ADMINISTRATIVE STRUCTURE



At the college's fall convocation, Dean David Topel presented

a new



administrative structure, as proposed by the college's strategic

planning



committee. The new structure will be in place on July 1, 1995.



The structure has been approved by university administration,

except



for a proposal making the dean the director of cooperative extension

to



agriculture. That proposal is still under discussion. To review

the



proposed organizational chart and a report about it, contact Kim



Gaul in horticulture, 294-3718 or the Ag Information office, 294-5616.



Comments may be directed to Mike Chaplin, College Planning



Advisory Committee chairman, or other CPAC members.



NOMINATIONS FOR COLLEGE POSITIONS



The college is advertising for two positions in the new administrative



structure-executive associate dean and director for international



programs. Nominations for executive associate dean may be sent

to



Dennis Marple, head, animal science, and those for director of



international programs to Wayne Bidlack, chair, food science and



human nutrition.



UPDATED ORGANIZATIONAL CHART



A College of Agriculture organizational chart updated for 1994-95

is



available. The chart reflects the current structure of the college,

not the



one that will be in place July 1995. For a copy: Ed Adcock, Ag



Information, 294-2314.



FIRST WEEKS CRUCIAL FOR NEW STUDENTS



National retention research indicates that new undergraduate students



decide within the first six weeks whether they will leave an institution.



Data for the College of Agriculture indicate that 27 percent of

the



freshmen entering in 1985 left ISU without completing their degrees.



Of that percentage, 12 percent left during the first year. Each

department



has a retention plan that includes activities to help new students



adjust to ISU. However, all faculty and staff can help by providing



students with friendly, helpful offices and classrooms.







C O M M U N I C A T I O N S K I O S K









NEW COMMUNICATIONS LAB



The Communications Laboratory, 213A Curtiss Hall, is a new service



for ag students and faculty in need of free advice about written,

oral



and visual communication. It offers individual tutoring for



undergrads; short lessons for undergrad classes; and training

for TAs in



developing, presenting and evaluating communication activities.

The



lab is part of AgComm, a program sponsored by the college and



Department of English to incorporate communication-intensive



activities into the ag undergrad curriculum. Contact: Lee-Ann



Kastman, lab director, 294-7550 or lkastman@iastate.edu. Lab hours:

8



a.m.-noon, M-W-F and 2-5 p.m. T-Th.



THE RIGHT KIND OF TEAM CONFLICT



Rebecca Burnett, ISU associate professor in English and



communications consultant for the College of Agriculture, recently



spoke to campus information specialists on strategies to get better



quality from team projects. A key point: Eliminate interpersonal



conflict, but provoke substantive conflict. In other words, don't

let



things get personal; do let the debate be lively over content

and critical



factors such as purpose, audience, organization and design. The

result



should be higher quality collaborations.







I N F O G R A Z I N G







SELECTED COLLEGE STATS ON IOWA, MIDWEST



A few statistics culled from the Sept. 1 issue of The Chronicle

of Higher



Education Almanac:



- Percentage change, 1982-92, in Iowa college enrollment:

20



- Percentage change in neighboring states: MN, 27;

WI, 11; IL, 9;



MO, 21; NE, 30; SD, 7



- Projected percentage change, 1994-2004, in number

of Iowa high



school graduates: -3



- Projected change in neighboring states: MN, 20; WI,

13; IL, 12;



MO, 8; NE, 6; SD, 7



- Percentage change, 1991-92 to 1993-94, in Iowa state



appropriations for higher education: 11



- Percentage changes in neighboring states: MN, 1;

WI, 8; IL, 6;



MO, 6; NE, 5; SD, 13



- Percentage of Iowa college students who are minority-group



members: 7



- Percentage in neighboring states: MN, 7; WI, 9; IL,

26; MO, 13;



NE, 7; SD, 8







E X T E R N A L V O I C E S







ARE COMPUTERS HARMFUL TO EDUCATION?



From the Sept. 16 & 26 New Republic: Yale computer scientist

David



Gelerntner says the computer's potential to do good is modestly

greater



than a book's in some areas, but that its potential to do harm

is vastly



greater, across the board. "While we bemoan the decline of

literacy,



computers discount words in favor of pictures and pictures in

favor of



video. While we fret about the decreasing cogency of public debate,



computers dismiss linear argument and promote fast, shallow romps



across the information landscape. While we worry about basic skills,



we allow into the classroom software that will do a student's



arithmetic or correct his spelling."







M A R G I N A L I A







INFO SUPERHIGHWAY ROADKILL



Do you sometimes glare menacingly at your computer? Here's this



year's winning entry in the Bulwer-Lytton contest for unliterary



fiction: "As the fading light of a dying day filtered through

the window



blinds, Roger stood over his victim with a smoking .45, surprised

at the



serenity that filled him after pumping six slugs into the bloodless



tyrant that had mocked him day after day, and then he shuffled

out of



the office with one last look back at the shattered computer terminal



lying there like a silicon armadillo left to rot on the information



superhighway."







HOW TO SUBSCRIBE TO AG ONLINE







To subscribe: Send your name, e-mail address and the message "Ag



Online subscribe" to bmeyer@iastate.edu (if you're on the

college



server, just AGCOLLEGE/BMEYER).



To unsubscribe: Same thing, with "Ag Online unsubscribe."





Current subscribers and DEOs: Please inform other college faculty

and



staff about the newsletter. The editors will work on getting the

word



out in other ways, too. For now, Ag Online will continue to be

sent



automatically to department executive officers and center directors,



plus subscribers.



Besides subscriptions, people will have other choices to see Ag

Online.



The newsletter will be on the college's home page in the World

Wide



Web (by the way, the URL address has changed: it's now located

at:



http://www.exnet.iastate.edu/aghome.html). We're also looking

into



spots on other servers or electronic information systems on campus.



More on that later.



Comments? Write, call, e-mail or fax to the addresses below.