FACULTY ASSOCIATION
No. 2 North Office Center - St. Cloud State
University - (320) 255-3979
MEET & CONFER NOTES
November 14, 2002
Faculty Association: Andrew Larkin, Theresia Fisher, Judith Kilborn, Annette Schoenberger, Sandra Williams, Terry Peterson, Tracy Ore, Chris Inkster, Robert Johnson, Bill Langen
Sunshine Shaney, Notetaker
Administration: Michael Spitzer, Rex Veeder, Anne Zemek de Dominguez, Diana Burlison, Larry Chambers, Dennis Nunes, Lin Holder, Steve Ludwig, Nathan Church
ADM: I think that we could wait until the next Meet and Confer to discuss this issue.
FA: But this committee will be meeting before the next Meet and Confer. Would it be possible to have a small meeting regarding this issue before this meeting takes place?
ADM: I would agree to that.
FA: All right we’ll do that then.
FA: There is one change in writing to put in these minutes.
ADM: Do we want to agree that these minutes accurately reflect what happened?
FA: Yes, we will agree to that.
FA: Do we have representation and are we ready to begin?
ADM: Carol Tembreall has been appointed by Middle Management. The other Unions have said their appointments are forthcoming. Except for MAPE, which sometimes takes a little longer. We have sent another message to the students and are just awaiting a response from them. My sense is that once the members are named we will go ahead and try to convene a meeting immediately with the members that are available at that time.
ADM: The Nichols study is available to the public and I think that this committee will look at that report, the EEOC report, the JCRC report and the Rankin report and come up with a set of recommendations.
FA: The Faculty Association did not get invited to the Rankin report on Monday. I made a suggestion that we could possibly come in at the same time as the Administration.
ADM: By all means, you’re certainly welcome to join us.
FA: I will let them know we will be there at the same time then.
FA: At the last Meet and Confer you offered some interpretation of the phrase that we were concerned about.
ADM: Your argument was that we would only go to adjuncts when those conditions exist. Subdivision 3a states that adjuncts can be used only when departmental faculty cannot cover the assigned courses including overload. I spoke with Chris Dale and he said that MnSCU did not interpret it that way, and if it were there would have been no reason to change Subd 3.9.3 because it would be superceded by that item. Basically the MnCU interpretation does not mean that adjuncts can be hired only within the permanent faculty, including overload. Having said that, with regard to the COE, several overloads have been approved. Not all, but some, certainly the ones that save money.
FA: We have a near verbatim account of negotiations and I will check that to see if it is the same, thank you.
FA: One of our questions is in terms of the current people. We were told previously about the rostering and a question was raised as to whether the EPT process was started
ADM: I talked to the Dean and will be talking with a few others in the beginning of next week. I don’t believe the Dean is personally involved with this.
FA: That is, in part, what is confusing. Today in the Dean’s Advisory a list of partnerships that the COE was involved in was distributed. At the top of the list were the arrangements with the Traffic Safety as being a main function of the COE. Also on the listserv that the Dean puts out regularly she suggested that some very good PR was coming out of having traffic safety involved with COE. I don’t know what can be done but we are looking for clarification.
ADM: When we look at what happened to this particular unit there are still issues that need to be discussed (e.g. no name, nowhere to house). They are performing functions in conjunction with the COE. I am talking with others to be sure that they get proper due process and that is the number one concern.
FA: I would encourage you to continue to investigate because there is a lot of confusion in the COE as to what the status of traffic safety is and these people sort of exist in a shadowy way (the ones rostered in academic affairs). Some of their work is in COE but their supervisor is not in the COE so there is an awful lot of confusion
ADM: I am collaborating with Nancy and she has been their supervisor for some time. I believe we have one person who is a department unto themselves. We need to keep talking and work it out.
FA: Thank you. It is my understanding that you are their second level evaluator so the Dean won’t evaluate them. Will it come to you? Three of them are going to participate in the Deans Advisory Council is that right?
ADM: I am not sure about that one and how that works. But like I said we can work on this to clear up some of these issues. There are some options that we have as ways of talking this out so everyone is clear.
FA: We looked at the letter regarding the audit and we are pleased.
ADM: I believe it has begun. I got a call from Melissa asking some questions so that indicated to me that they have started. We are paying for it because we requested it. It will probably have to come out of the reserve.
FA: Is there a target date for a report?
ADM: Not that I know of, but I am sure they will finish in a timely manner and have it out to us as soon as it is done.
FA: The last issue is the student applications and we would like to know exactly what the issue is with the Board of Teaching.
ADM: The Board of Teaching will not certify students for licensure based upon courses that are not credit bearing. Our suggestion is to give the students the choice of registering here and taking the courses at a discounted rate. They do need those credits in order to receive their license.
FA: Couldn’t we do something like the credit by experience?
ADM: It is a conflict of interest and we need someone who is certified to do that. But we could look into the possibility of doing the credit by exam. Perhaps that would be able to clear up at least some of the problem.
FA: I am pleased about the problem solving approach to this.
ADM: We will look into the feasibility of doing that.
FA: I think we pretty much resolved this and are just waiting to hear what proposals come forward. It does need to come to the Faculty Association for the proper approval.
ADM: We will bring any proposal to you for your consideration.
FA: I believe you received a copy of the proposal passed in Senate. We would like to set up a small committee to look at this and be sure that it gets started. Maybe someone from the Faculty Association and from Human Resources could be assigned to this committee.
ADM: I think that would be fine I would suggest that Rex and Larry be involved and whomever the Faculty Association appoints.
ADM: I will convene the meeting when you let me know who the FA representative is.
FA: I will do it. This committee will get together to devise a process to do this. There are some suggestions in the report.
FA: The first thing is that the proposal from Senate requested that the prerequisite checks not be instituted until it can be done correctly.
ADM: We agreed at the last meeting not to do this until we can figure out how to have it done correctly. Which means Transfer students’ courses will be recognized as prerequisites, current enrollment will be recognized and co-requisites will allow registration.
FA: It wasn’t clear in the minutes; that’s why we need to know.
ADM: Yes, we agreed at the last meeting that we would not do this until it could be done correctly. We will continue to try to get this to work and we agree that we do not want to turn it on.
FA: I can help whoever is doing it.
ADM: We will recommend that MnSCU consult with Annette.
FA: This whole MnSCU computer thing has been a problem for years.
ADM: You are absolutely right we have struggled with a number of issues regarding the computer system for years.
FA: The next thing is holds on curriculum proposals; are their any more since the last ones?
ADM: No we sent a memo to [FA] underlining what was on hold and asking what you would like us to do with them. We are still waiting to hear from a couple of departments.
FA: The one I remember clearly was Humanities and that has been pushed all the way through. My understanding is that the proposer will send it to UCC after the changes have been made and then back to you.
FA: The next one is holding of minors. I have some catalogs and what they say is not the same as what’s on the web. Basically the credits for a Bachelors degree have been changed. Bachelor of Arts- one list has two items and one has four and nowhere does it say if you take a minor can’t it overlap into the major for credit. We want to know where is the rule written down?
ADM: First of all here is a packet of information and copies of the memo for everyone. I think we are mixing up a couple of things. What you are pointing out is confusion because of word changes from one catalog to the next. The policy that was set at the time of semester conversion says they need at least a 45 credit major or if they have less then they needed a minor or a Foreign Language for Bachelor of Arts degree. If you want to propose better wording that is fine with us. The wording change came to our office from the records office because they were experiencing some confusion also. I would be happy to consider a wording change recommendation that would make it more clear to faculty and students
FA: Can I have a copy of the minutes stating this?
ADM: Yes, I will send you those. I don’t think there is a statement in general that refers to overall major and minors. We tend to make it specific to Bachelor of Science, Bachelor of Art etc. Degrees. You can take it to whatever committee you want, take a look at it and bring whatever recommendations back to us. I will continue to work with individual cases until we can come to some agreement on how we want to deal with this.
FA: The problem is that you have been turning down individual students who have completed majors and minors. The minor in Economics has been around for more than two decades. It says you have to have 18 credits; it doesn’t say if you are a finance major you need more. That is in the bulletin.
ADM: I am trying to work on those individual cases. I think it isn’t the student that has completed the major and the minor as stated in the bulletin. The issue is that the student has asked to use courses that frequently are in the elective list. There are substitutions being made and by doing that it has raised a question as to whether this looks like the minor in the bulletin.
FA: One issue is independent courses.
ADM: Those do not cause a problem. If we see a student is choosing substitutions that aren’t on the list of electives, but it looks like a course that could be substituted, therefore it is not a minor that we would normally approve. It isn’t matching the curriculum that’s approved and it is so far off that the records office doesn’t know what to do. I don’t think it’s a huge problem but it is a problem for those individual students.
FA: If they are substituting then I accept and agree with what you are saying. I think one of the difficulties is that the letter people are getting is that they can’t do this.
ADM: It is denied unless we can fix it.
FA: People are getting the impression that they are not taking enough independent courses.
ADM: That’s not what I am saying
FA: Well that is the impression that people are getting.
ADM: The issue is this: A student wants a major in X and minor in Y –he takes all the courses for X and none for Y and wants us to award a minor in Y based on his credits from X. I don’t think we should do that. I don’t think that’s good academic practice.
FA: I think that this is something that needs to go through the curriculum process. Maybe we need to go back to the curriculum committee.
ADM: That is fine and that is what I have asked for also.
FA: I think the double counting definitely needs to be clarified. The other element I want to make sure we address is the idea of majors and minors in departments. E.g. Student wants to major in linguistics and minor in creative writing and she wants to translate scriptural works and poetry. So I think to have general statements that we can’t have major and minors in departments and that we can’t have it is wrong. There should be a hard number as to what we can double count and what we can’t. Where we need to draw the line.
Adm: I think that when its only one course that overlaps it’s not a problem, it’s when there is only one course that doesn’t overlap that it becomes an issue.
FA: I think we need to have some conversations to ensure that people are clear on what can overlap and what cannot. Currently we allow a complete overlap. Faculty Senate would have to make a change if they think it is necessary. We don’t have a policy that even discusses overlap.
ADM: I think that this is different than previous years and I think its an indicator that there is a problem and its time to take a look at why these things are happening. I think that the issue of what you can substitute and not needs to be clarified also. I am wondering if this has something to do with the semester change over that some students couldn’t get the courses needed in a particular semester in order to graduate so therefore substituted.
FA: I want to conclude that we didn’t change any policy so we are still under the bulletin and no one can make any rulings about majors and minors until we have developed a process.
ADM: Yes.
FA: We will take this issue to the curriculum committee and get advice from them.
FA: Now about Schedule 25: last week’s minutes said something about doing the committee because you’re getting ready to do Schedule 25. So where is that committee at?
ADM: That is not what we agreed to at the last meeting; we are not ready to implement Schedule 25 next semester but we are ready to implement the committee. [FA] will go the Senate and ask for members.
SPECIAL ADMINISTRATORS, APPOINTMENTS, BONUSES, ETC.
FA: We are supposed to get a response today.
ADM: We discussed the issue in terms of excluded management so we have a list of them, their salaries and vacancies. Other than that I think that there are some specific individual questions and we would be happy to answer them as they come. I can bring the Academic Affairs flow chart at the next meeting if it would be helpful.
FA: Yes, please. We can take this under advisement and get back to you as to whether this answers our questions. There was a motion with a list of questions that came out of Senate. I do not know if that has been forwarded to you.
ADM: There was a list of questions we feel that we have answered. Accountability is a little unclear to us as to what you are asking.
FA: We will look at the information you’ve given us and come back to you with any further questions we may have.
FA: Is there a way that we can get a list like this for MnSCU?
ADM: Why don’t you request it of MnSCU? It should be public information but just as a recommendation, request employees of the chancellor’s office and make sure you include excluded management and make sure you request it in two parts, the Office of the Chancellor and the campus service unit.
FA: We asked for the data on MSUAASF and MnSCU to be separated.
ADM: We did agree to do that in the future but without an Affirmative Action officer it’s a little difficult right now.
FA: I think that we are asking for previous years so we can look at the numbers.
ADM: I will check on how difficult that would be but we can take a look and let you know if we can do that.
FA: It would behoove us to know why it happened that 1997-2001 MSUAASF and Administration went up by 53%.
ADM: Those figures are erroneous. We agreed to provide the information and reasoning if we can put it together.
FA: We may want to do an evaluation of chairs’ monthly meeting because there seems to be too little interest and because it could be confused with policy making. One suggestion is making them open to all faculty and turning them into informal meetings. The workshops seem to be working well but we are concerned about addressing troublesome faculty.
ADM: Where did you get the term “troublesome faculty”?
FA: From the last meeting I believe.
ADM: I thought it was “difficult people”.
FA: We would not like to have a joint FA-Administration session when personnel issues come up and references are made to personalities within a department. To what extent is there a cross between comments made in a workshop as they pertain to the evaluations and regular routines on campus?
ADM: There are people who specialize in training in having to work with people who are difficult. They can give you some advice from their experience; that is what I had envisioned this workshop being about. It wouldn’t be specific to faculty, administrators, etc, but specific to difficult personalities and how you handle them. I think it could be a very helpful session for the chairs and beneficial as to how they can deal with these types of personalities.
FA: Are you talking about bringing a consultant to the next workshop?
ADM: Yes.
FA: Our concern in part is a chair getting up and giving a testimonial that can be easily tracked to an individual faculty member.
ADM: We could ask the chairs to refer only to people they knew from previous jobs at other institutions.
FA: There were other concerns in terms of previous meetings. People were concerned about conduct at the meeting and the tone. Matters were brought to Senate and were appropriately brought here. I think there may be a question about expectation that if a meeting is called should people come even if they will miss something—what are the expectations regarding attendance?
ADM: I think this year at least we have studiously avoided talking about any subject that was a Meet and Confer issue. The meetings have been as much for my information as for the chairs. I think it gives the chairs an opportunity to talk about issues that are important to them that I am not aware of. I think one of the things we keep talking about is more and better communication on campus and I think this is a good mechanism for doing that.
FA: Should we announce that it is open to more than just chairs?
ADM: We can put a notice on the announce.
FA: So then what do they become? Are they still chairs meetings?
ADM: I think they are chairs meetings that are open to the faculty. It would just become an open session and we could change the name.
FA: We agreed last time about the control, but we’re not sure that we agreed on what we would do. The minutes are not really clear.
ADM: Who is on the assessment steering committee?
FA: One per college, and it is a university wide committee.
ADM: I suggest that we reactivate that committee
FA: So we follow the pink book and the only change is the Gen Ed Position –it’s assessment director?
FA: What is in place now really shouldn’t be in place. The steering committee should get into place, talk about this new model and work out how that should look (centralized and decentralized).
ADM: So we are in agreement to reactivate the committee.
FA: Yes.
ADM: I will copy the pages from the pink book that refer to the steering committee and get those to you.
FA: So we essentially need to get you the names of the faculty representation?
ADM: Yes.
Meeting adjourned at 4:49 p.m.