Changes made to Continuing Studies school

Changes are happening in the School of Continuing Studies. The department plans on decentralizing its organization to meet the various needs of students and communities. IU officials said there is no exact date for the changes to take place.\n"There is no official date of the decentralization," said Les Coyne, associate vice chancellor for academic affairs at IU. "It's an evolving process."\nThree major changes will take place in the school:\n• Each campus will now be responsible for doing the routine things necessary to offer a degree in general studies -- the only undergraduate degree offered by the school. This includes making sure students take the classes and certifying the courses students take.\n• IU-Purude University at Indianapolis now will handle all of the academic advising and support services for general studies students at a distance. \n• A new dean will be selected from one of the regional campuses and will be in charge of creating a management system that is equal, said Ronald White, director of the Bloomington Division of Continuing Studies.\n"It's the upper level management that's being refined in some ways," White said. "This is a transition, and it's going to take a year or so to organize and reorganize. It's sort of doing our own daily work, but at the same time thinking how to reorganize the system."\nCoyne said an additional benefit to the changes is students can now transfer credits from one IU campus to another without fear of credit loss.\n"The campuses will not be competing with one another because the need for each campus will be different in terms of the communities," Coyne said. "In fact, the campuses will be stronger because there will be communication and sharing of knowledge and information, which will strengthen as each campus spends money on the degree and specializes in it."\nThe belief is by decentralizing the school, the individual campuses will be able to better meet the needs of students.\n"The continuing education needs here (in Bloomington) are significantly different than in South Bend and Indianapolis, and by localizing these activities and putting them under control, we will be able to respond more quickly to the needs of the adults in the area," White said. \nOne departmental program that will not be affected by these changes is the Independent Study Program, a program that offers classes through mail or the Internet.\nHeather L. Bowman, an employee with the Independent Study Program of the School of Continuing Studies, said that she was aware of the upcoming changes but has not experienced changes in her department.\n"The independent studies will be managed by Bloomington because we only need one location to operate the independent studies," White said.