College: Agriculture and Life Sciences
Department: Agricultural Leadership, Education, and Communications
Type: W
Status: Approved
REPORT ON RECERTIFICATION OF W COURSE: AGSC 402
CERTIFICATION PERIOD: 1/1/21 to 1/1/25
We recommend that AGSC 402 Designing Instruction for Secondary Agricultural Science Programs be certified as a writing (W) course. We have reviewed a representative syllabus and have determined that the course meets or exceeds the following criteria: (1) 62% of the final grade is based on writing quality; (2) the total number of words is 8250; (3) the instructor to student ratio is 1:20; and (4) the assigned writing is appropriate to the major.
Assistants may be assigned to this course, depending on enrollment. Students write six lesson plans, each followed by a critique and revision based on self-evaluation, student critique sheets, and instructor evaluation and feedback (the critique not counted in the word count, but counted in the percentage of the grade based on writing). They also write a scope and sequence assignment and a complete unit of instruction. Writing instruction includes examples, discussion of formatting, and in-class writing activities to practice writing various components of a lesson plan. Facilitated class discussions are used when graded assignments are returned with feedback.