Faculty Senate Minutes: 12-12-2008

Attendance:

Faculty Senate Representatives	Name		College	Attendance
1.	Davis	D.	Arts & Sciences	present
2.	Fowler	T.	Education	absent
3.	Garick	S.	Health & Behavioral Sciences	absent
4.	Hamilton	J.	Education	present
5.	Haque	M.	Business	present
6.	Harris	M.	Education	present
7.	Jordan	T.	Health & Behavioral Sciences	present
8.	Kincaid	K.	Health & Behavioral Sciences	absent
9.	Linstrum	K	Health & Behavioral Sciences	present
10.	McCallum	M.	Arts & Sciences	present
11.	Owen	R.	Business	present
12.	Reavis	D.	Business	present
13.	Walker	L.	Arts & Sciences	present

     Others in Attendance:    R. Stripling.

Call to order: 9:50 am

VPAA’s Report:

Dr. Stripling reported that she had reviewed the F/S Executive Board’s recommendations for the Research Enhancement Awards. One of the five recommendations was in question. It requested partial funding for a personal computer. Dr. Stripling explained that Texas state regulations would not allow use of state money for a personal computer.

Dr. Stripling requested that FS review and give her feedback addressing four rule/procedures proposals including: 1) faculty workload, 2) employment of foreign nationals, 3) tenure & promotion, and 4) post tenure.

Dr. Stripling reported that the Deans council had approved a spring staff development (March 6, 2009). Faculty Senate agreed that this was a good idea. Further discussion resulted in the following recommendations

· Faculty were most interested in webct training with experts from outside the university and

· with flexible scheduling

· Faculty be surveyed for other ideas for breakout sessions (publishers fair, etc.)

· A speaker from SACS  be scheduled to speak for another staff development fall, 2009

· Administration is discussing allocating funds to GFS for staff development events

Old Approval of Minutes:

· Motion to table 11-14-2008 minutes by Harris; seconded by Davis. Motion passed unanimously.

o Due to computer failure, the notes from that meeting were lost in cyberspace.

o Everyone is to review the draft and give feedback to Harris by Monday, 12-15-08.

Announcements:

· There is a need to have FS meetings on a different week than the Deans’ Council is held so that we can have time to review any materials and to discuss issues.

· Spring meetings will be at 10 am on: Jan. 23; Feb. 27: Mar. 24: Apr. 15: May.

Business:

1. Monthly Meeting with Dr. Rathburn

· Hamilton & Owen met with Dr. Rathburn.

· Discussed problems with the online reporting of faculty’s scholarship /service activities. Dr. Rathburn was seeking better software to address this issue.

· Dr. Rathburn was in favor of a university committee to plan staff development.

· The Criminal Justice program has been asked to study the market for this program. 

2. Executive Committee:

· Seven research proposals were reviewed by Garick, Hamilton, & Owen. Five awards were recommended to the VPAA for funding with questions concerning one proposal that requested partial funding of a personal computer.

· Executive Committee will start meeting on a monthly basis prior to the FS Representatives meeting.

3. Faculty Status Committee & Academic Affairs Committee:

· No reports at this time

· Harris will send out a list of members for each of the committee.

4. Undergraduate Committee & Graduate Council:

·  This two committees will be working together on improving the process and the forms for curriculum review and communicating to the faculty.

· Meetings are scheduled for next week with chairs of the two committees and Pat Black.

5. Unfinished business from last meeting is assigned to the following committees:

· Faculty Status

i. Travel: expenses and reimbursement and release time

ii. Journal public fees

· Academic Affairs

i. Term limits for UCC & GC (Harris will post this issue on FS Discussion Board)

ii. Technology

New Business

Ø Issues

1. Dr. Stripling requested job descriptions for the FS officers, FS representatives.

a. Owen pulled these descriptions from the FS Constitution.

b. Motion to accept those as job descriptions was made by Reeves and seconded by Jordan. Motion was passed unanimously.

2. Review of the four rule/procedure proposals including: 1) faculty workload, 2) employment of foreign nationals, 3) tenure & promotion, and 4) post tenure.

a. Discussion:

i. We discussed how to proceed on Dr. Stripling’s request to review these proposals. It was felt that more time and scrutiny be given to the task.

1. Harris will post each document on the FS discussion board.

a. FS representatives will encourage all faculty to give feedback to the FS rep. or post on the FS discussion board.

b. Owen will send out an email to all faculty asking for feedback.

ii. Faculty Status will address: 1) faculty workload, 2) employment of foreign nationals

iii. Academic Affairs will address: 3) tenure & promotion, and 4) post tenure.

3. Problems with the online and paper student evaluations of faculty

a. Discussion:

i. Problems that have been reported include:

1. Paper format was not available until December 8^th.

a. Instructors prefer to select the date of the evaluations (not on the same day as the final).

b. Research suggests that the most valid evaluations should be completed a few weeks before the end of the semester.

2. Online format has significant security issues

a. The website is not hosted by the university

b. Although students must enter in their student id, students could record responses that are not in the class.

3. Some students are concerned about maintaining confidentiality of their evaluation of an instructor.

4. Some students did the online evaluations, even when the instructor had not requested (instructor was using paper evals only), therefore, it is possible for one student to actually do two evaluations without an instructor being aware of it.

ii. The significance of having valid student evaluations this semester due to the “double count” necessary as we switch to a “calendar year” evaluation system.

iii. Several faculty members have spoken to their respective fs representatives expressing their concern about the process this year.

iv. We need to look at the entire process and timelines for the student evaluations of faculty.

b. Motion:  The student evaluation process has significant procedural problems that may render the data invalid. We recommend that the process be reviewed.

i. Motion made by Hamilton; seconded by Haque. Motion passed unanimously.

Unfinished Business for next meeting:

Unfinished topics were assigned to committees:

Faculty  Status  1) Travel, 2) Administration funding for Journal publication fees, 2) Job Description & release time for program coordinators

Academic Affairs: 1) Technology (email reliability & classroom technology reliability),

Adjournment:

Motion to adjourn made by Haque; seconded by Jordan; passed unanimously. Adjourned at noon.

Submitted 12-12-2008 by M. Harris, FS Secretary/Parliamentarian