The University Faculty Senate will meet today at Penn State Harrisburg to discuss possible changes to both the Health and Physical Activity (GHA) and the bachelor of arts degree requirements.

Last Monday, the Undergraduate Student Government (USG) Academic Assembly discussed eliminating the GHA requirement for students in its entirety to conform to a Big Ten trend of other universities eliminating it.

Currently, Penn State students are required to take three GHA credits before they can graduate.

The Faculty Senate's Committee on Undergraduate Education will receive an informational report about possible changes to the GHA requirement, but there will be no vote on the changes today.

According to the report, some students have had problems with meeting the three-credit GHA requirement.

The report recommends changes, such as increasing the number and expanding the variety of courses offered and increasing the openings in "popular" courses.

Schreyer Honors College Rep. Rodney Hughes said that although Academic Assembly has not discussed details of the changes, he feels the topic will be more heavily addressed after today's Senate meeting.

Hughes also said that the assembly's academic research and action committee recently discussed surveying students about the GHA requirement to obtain student reactions to possible changes.

The Senate will also evaluate current bachelor of arts degree requirements, which require students to take 12 to 24 credits.

Nine of those credits must be split evenly between the categories of humanities, arts, and social and behavioral sciences.

The proposed changes would allow students to choose nine credits from six areas, adding foreign language, natural sciences and quantification to the current three.

The change would also eliminate the need to divide credits evenly between the areas.

According to the Senate's agenda, the change for the bachelor of arts would allow students to fulfill requirements for minors more easily and permit them to take additional foreign language classes.

"What they're proposing allows more flexibility for students," said University Curriculum Coordinator Sherry Walk, who helped gather student input on the proposed changes.

"The communication from the student population was they wanted more flexibility to the requirement," she added.