Communications disorders and sciences majors will no longer receive teacher certification after a revision to the major was passed by the Council on Academic Affairs Thursday.

A recent change in teacher certification requirements led to a change in the communications disorders and sciences major which allows students in the field to skip teacher certification requirements and “focus within the discipline,” Gail Richards, acting communications disorders and sciences department chair, said Thursday.

Teacher certification now requires all general education majors to complete three tiers of education instead of one: a tier of general curriculum and reading courses, a tier of special education courses and a tier consisting of discipline-specific courses.

The focus of a communications disorders and sciences major is “to become a speech pathologist, not a school teacher,” Richards said, and the enforcement of stricter teacher certification requirements “would have added another year to the already six-year major.”

Lifting teacher certification requirements from the communications disorders and sciences major will allow students to “take electives that they have an interest in and that may help them in the profession they choose,” Richards said.

“We are trying to change student-teaching experience into school and medical internships,” Richards said.

Communications disorders and sciences majors will “no longer be able to teach a class by themselves, but they can still teach under supervision at public schools,” Richards said, and although teacher certification is no longer required for the major, “it is still available if students want to stick around and get that.”

In other business, the CAA also approved a departmental honors program for journalism majors.

The program is for students with a grade point average of at least 3.5 and will allow journalism majors to take 12 hours of honors courses that may replace electives in the major.

Three credit hours for the program must come from thesis work. The remaining nine credit hours may be chosen from the following courses: Journalism and Democracy Honors, Jou 2091, which students may take zero or three credit hours in; Honors Independent Study, Jou 4444, in which zero to six credit hours may be completed; Honors Research, Jou 4555, in which zero to six credit hours may be completed; Honors Thesis, Jou 4644, which also allows zero to six credit hours to be completed; and Honors Seminar, Jou 4666, in which a student must take three credit hours, with the option of completing up to six hours.