Administrators have denied undisclosed accounts of the alleged discontinuation of the Interdisciplinary Studies Program (ISP), citing the information as a misinterpretation and asserting that the ISP will continue to thrive and assist students who need to create their own major and earn a degree through the program.
Associate Vice President for Graduate and Undergraduate Programs Cecile Lindsay said the ISP will not be discontinued nor has there ever been a motion to do so.
“I am puzzled that students would report the discontinuance of the ISP. There is a formal process for discontinuing a degree program, and no such process has begun or is being considered,” she said.
Margaret Costa, director for undergrad students for the ISP said the impression of a program discontinuation might be due to a misinterpretation regarding office relocations.
“I think what it might be referring to is the fact that we are losing our office and we will not have an office as of June 30,” Costa said.
She said that this could have led for information to be misconstrued and an assumption made that the ISP was being terminated. Costa said the location for the new program office has yet to be determined but asserted that the ISP will not be discontinued.
Former ISP graduate director Bruce Berg said the cancellation of the program is determined by numerous factors and not simply by the administration.
“ISP is a university program, [and] as such, it cannot simply be discontinued by any individual, or by the administration,” Berg said. “University programs are both created and discontinued by faculty. That means, if ISP were to be discontinued, the faculty senate would have to be the organizational voice to do so.”
Lindsay said the program has been assessed to better serve the students.
“Recently, the ISP underwent program review as is required of all degree programs in the CSU system. External and internal reviewers evaluated the program and made recommendations,” she said. “The program review process will be completed by a Memorandum of Understanding [MOU] that spells out actions to be taken by the program and the university to further strengthen the program. This MOU will be drafted this spring semester.”
The ISP enables students to create their own major and receive a degree, making it unique. Costa said the program plays an important role because it allows students to major in a degree Cal State Long Beach does not offer.
“The ISP allows students to develop their own major through a comprehensive field of study. By pulling different courses from different fields of studies, students can develop a cohesive and comprehensive major,” she said. “It is extremely useful for students who cannot find a major, and who cannot find ways to meet their goals and objectives.”
Costa said the ISP has been around since the early ’80s and has yielded many success stories. She said many majors currently available at CSULB had their start through the ISP, such as women’s studies and computer science engineering.
“It was all due in part to students who developed a new area of study and created a new major that it eventually became more popular and accepted as an actual major,” Costa said.
ISP student Michael Glassoff said, “After working effectively with Margaret Costa, I combined peace studies with English and journalism and named it ‘Literature for Peace.’ Where this will lead me, I am not quite sure, but I feel confident that I will have the knowledge necessary to produce social change.”
Administrators assured that the ISP will not be discontinued and will remain accessible to students who seek limitless objectives and wish to develop a unique major at CSULB.”
