MINUTES OF THE EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE
OF THE FACULTY SENATE
MONDAY, APRIL 24, 2006 – Mason Hall, room D5; 1:30 – 2:30 p.m.
Members Present: Jim
Bennett, Rei Berroa, Rick Coffinberger, Dave Kuebrich, Jim Sanford, Peter
Stearns, Cliff Sutton, Susan Trencher.
Approval of Minutes: The minutes
of our previous meeting March 27, 2006 were approved.
REPORTS OF THE FACULTY SENATE STANDING COMMITTEES:
Academic Policies – Cliff
Sutton: A
motion to approve the academic calendar without changes for 2006-2007 will be
presented. Just before the last Senate
meeting (April 5th), Cliff learned that many science faculty were
concerned about changes to the starting dates of each semester which would
create additional partial weeks. This
negatively affects laboratory schedules, which must be conducted on a weeklong
basis; presently there are three partial weeks in the Fall term. The examination of proposed changes to the
academic calendar was a good exercise.
Susan Jones, Registrar, has requested a statement which clearly explains
why various proposed changes were not made to use when future suggestions
regarding changes to the calendar are made.
Dave thanked Cliff for all his hard work this year on this topic.
Budget and Resources –
Rick Coffinberger: The committee is working with the librarians in the
processing of Fenwick Fellowship applications.
The deadline is May 3rd.
Those who will receive awards should be notified before summer classes
start.
A motion to request a report from the Provost’s Office detailing equity/special
needs raises granted during the upcoming academic year will also be presented.
Faculty Matters – Jim Sanford: A second mailing to instructional faculty who have
not yet submitted Faculty Evaluation of Administrators surveys will go out late
this week or early next week.
Matt Kluger (Vice President for Research) has assured us that the
Faculty Senate will be included as a signatory to proposals developed by the
Research Council.
Nominations – Jim Bennett: No business items.
Organization and Operations – Rei Berroa: No business items. A general discussion regarding the
representation of ICAR took place.
Concerns expressed included Krasnow Institute faculty which have a
primary affiliation elsewhere; as well as one or two ICAR faculty with more
than one affiliation.
ANNOUNCEMENTS FOR THE AGENDA:
Faculty Handbook Revision
Committee – Rick Coffinberger: Our last meeting this semester takes place
this afternoon. We have spent a large
amount of time soliciting input on issues to identify for revision. A collective recommendation on summer
salary has been completed. In our last meeting, department study leaves and
emeritus status were discussed. The
committee will continue to meet over the summer and hope to meet more often
during the fall.
Faculty Task Force on Salary Issues – Rick Coffinberger: The
Task Force will schedule a follow-up meeting in the next ten days. The AAUP has just published on-line its
yearly report of faculty salaries.
OTHER TOPICS OF DISCUSSION:
Procedural Notes: Tracking of
Issues Submitted for Consideration by Senate Committees: Any issues to be considered by a senate
committee should be sent to O&O first, which should then refer them to
committee. In practice, folks contact
the committee directly. Only two
requests were directly sent to O&O this past year.
Strategic Vision Group Interview/Participation of Faculty: In
response to a question raised by Chair Dave Kuebrich, Provost Stearns provided
the following background information.
Several members of the Board of Visitors have repeatedly urged the
development of a set of criteria to become a world-class university by
2016. Paulien and Associates, a firm
with expertise in higher education assessment, has been hired to help develop a
statement. Dave was contacted to
participate in a survey; hopefully other members of the Executive Committee
will also be asked to participate. The
faculty wish to be involved at the beginning of the planning process; the
Faculty Senate should have the opportunity to review materials as well as to
vote on the vision. A better
understanding among faculty and administration that faculty will be immediately
consulted is needed. The Provost responded
that faculty representative attend BOV meetings; no one is trying to exclude
anyone. We delayed the Board’s request
to consider this in April until the fall so that faculty will have an
opportunity to address this issue. A
discussion of what measurements would be relevant is planned for the August BOV
meeting. Forums and workshops will be
held in September. The Provost wants to
receive faculty comments, and nothing will be finalized during the summer. Is a distributed university potentially
more likely to be a great university?
The Provost responded that the distributed university is a separate
concept, and no assumptions made whether distributed university supports this
goal.
Discussion about “Academic Goals” memo: Faculty produced these
goals; a world-class university must have world-class faculty; faculty to have
a lot to say about what these goals are. Diversity may yield problems with
newly-arrived students who speak English as a second language who may have
difficulty understanding institutional issues.
There are pluses and minuses to growth; quality implications need to be
weighed. The Provost acknowledged that
academic goals trend toward things which may not have as much academic
bearing.
Salary Issues: Will it be possible to send copies of the Salary
Task Force report as well as the April 19th meeting minutes to
members of the BOV prior to their May 10th meeting? They need to know that faculty are very
upset about this issue; particularly problems with hiring new faculty at market
rates in which long term faculty are paid less.
Respectfully submitted,
Meg Caniano
Clerk, Faculty Senate