The Council on Academic Affairs voted to suspend its bylaws at its meeting Thursday until the Illinois public access counselor renders a decision regarding the CAA and the Open Meetings Act. 

The CAA proposed a bylaw change, backed by Eastern’s general counsel Laura McLaughlin, that would make it no longer subject to the Open Meetings Act, an Illinois state law. 

The Daily Eastern News pushed back against the proposed bylaw change and filed a grievance with the Illinois’ public access counselor at the Attorney General’s office, to get a ruling on the CAA’s bylaw change. The CAA has now decided to suspend all its bylaws until the ruling is delivered. 

The idea to suspend the bylaws was proposed by council member Stacey Ruholl. 

A public history minor was also approved by the CAA. The minor was approved unanimously. The minor was created due to high demand among undergraduates for the program, one that aims to give students application for their history degree beyond teaching. 

Three courses were also created in light of the minor. HIS 3000: Intro to Public History, was created as one of “several” courses that will tie into the public history minor, HIS 4930 will be deleted from Eastern’s catalog. 

A public history internship and a public history practicum were both approved by the CAA. History faculty member David Smith will be the head of the internship, Eastern currently has no public history internship course specific to undergraduate students. 

The public history practicum course was designed to prepare students to do work in areas like museums or archives after graduation. 

Two courses within the communications department were amended, one was created and the advertising minor was also amended by the CAA. 

The advertising minor was changed from a 27-hour program to a 21-hour program. The program was originally created in 2001 and was amended on Friday because of how much has changed in advertising since 2001. The elective list for the minor was also “cleaned up” for the minor. 

CMN 3075: Television Studio Production was changed to be more workshop based. This course was originally used as an intro course for T.V. and radio production, but a different course took its place. This course was amended to fit a new role in the program. 

The new course in the communications department will be CMN 3930: Message Strategies and Influence. This course was developed based on a need for macro-level creative direction and the need for students to understand how media impacts its audience. 

An advanced production course CMN 4755: Television Genres: Production and Development was revised to delve more into advanced exploration into production. The course also intends to lend itself well to thesis and research. 

A new independent study was also created in the Honors College. Honors 4444 was developed to give students in the honors college who cannot find an independent study that fits well in their department the opportunity to participate in an independent study. 

JJ Bullock can be reached at 581-2812 or jpbullock@eiu.edu