Final Approved 5/6/2010

Faculty Association

Meet and Confer Notes

April 15, 2010

Administration: John Palmer, Mitchell Rubinstein, David DeGroote, Larry Chambers, Judith Siminoe, Dennis Nunes, Kristi Tornquist, Glen Palm, Earl Potter, Devinder Malhotra

Faculty: Mark Jaede, JoAnn Gasparino, Balsy Kasi, Tom Hergert, Judy Kilborn, Susan Motin, David Warne, Frances Kayona, Michael Connaughton, Debra Leigh, Michael Tripp, Bill Hudson, Polly Chappell (note-taker)

Approval of Minutes

1. April 1, 2010

Admin: Good afternoon. Let’s get started. We have a busy agenda and we’ll start with the approval of minutes. Did we go through these?

FA: I was just consulting with Polly and she assures me that I approved them, and she should know.

Admin: And we approved them too. Okay.

FA: Polly and Greta say they’re okay, so what more can you ask for?

Admin: That’s right. We approve the minutes.

Unfinished Business

1. Performance Review of Deans (FA)

Admin: You had asked for this last spring and I think Judith had consulted with the folks at MnSCU, which we informed you of last time. At this stage we have no plans to engage in the performance review of deans but as we move forward we are going to look at all the institutional evaluative structures and in that context we look at administrators, faculty, everybody in that context.

FA: So we should remind you again later?

Admin: No. (Laughter) What we’re saying is don’t call us, we’ll call you. But feel free to remind us if you’d like.

FA: It will be somebody else’s job.

Admin: It might be yours.

Admin: At the pace at we work.

FA: Someone was going to find information?

FA: I have asked but have not yet gotten an answer from my FA President colleagues on other campuses about their experiences with faculty involvement in review of performance reviews of deans.

Admin: Any such information, please feel free to share with us.

2. Summer School: Timing of Contracts (FA)

FA: I think that we talked it through pretty well in our last meeting. Do you now have a sense for the contracts?

Admin: The determination was made that courses in which enrollment was 12 or more undergraduates or eight or more graduate students, contracts would be sent to the faculty. Those courses that did not meet those enrollment standards would be held by the Associate Dean and potentially cancelled. The date for the decision is two weeks before the beginning of classes for summer sessions one and two: May 24 and June 28. The majority of our classes begin in summer sessions one and two. The enrollment-contingent contracts would not occur during the intersession for the small number of classes and it would be held harmless. But contracts for summer session one that begin on June 7, and summer session two that begin on July 12, at that point, the numbers would drop to nine and six for numbers associated with our low-enrollment penalty. The reason for higher numbers of 12 and eight proceeding those dates is because of relative high attrition in summer session. More students are often job driven and such, and we have a higher attrition rate than we do in fall and spring. So 12 and eight would be in effect until May 24 and June 28. On those days nine for undergraduates or six for graduate students would be sufficient to have a contract for the course.

FA: Are you holding all contracts until two weeks before?

Admin: No.

FA: What would be the date?

Admin: The person who does this is ill. April 26, I believe, and that may be a day or two off.

FA: Understood.

FA: If the 12 and eight is met between those dates, we have a contract?

Admin: Yes.

Admin: Even though the past practice has been nine and six, I want to revisit that but didn’t want to change the rules of the game in the middle. But the reason we went to 12 and eight is that sometimes students sign up and then they drop. We wanted to keep a little cushion and it is in that context.

FA: Contracts will go out roughly the 26^th for those who have already met 12 and eight. If the other classes should met that level the contracts would go out as that occurred and then two weeks before?

Admin: Right.

FA: Is it possible one week before to send an email to faculty of the likelihood so they can do last minute recruiting?

Admin: Yes. The Associate Deans will have frequent contact and updating enrollment so there are no surprises. I met with the Associate Deans at noon today and asked them to have a process with frequent contact with faculty.

Admin: This is a rhetorical question, if the faculty have the ability to influence the enrollment why wouldn’t they be doing that from the onset?

FA: There are rolling ways to do it. You do recruitment at certain levels as things get closer and you think of other things you might do to ramp things up. Sometimes we don’t do enough recruitment, I do acknowledge that.

Admin: In an era when people are suggesting that the faculty take voluntary furloughs to save jobs and many other things it would seem to me that exercising the capacity we have to influence enrollments should be something actively pursued.

FA: I will be happy to send out an email to faculty encouraging us to make use of the resources we have and to recruit students for summer school.

Admin: I’m not suggesting extraordinary effort or things that would require major life changes but it’s the capacity you describe in due course that can be turned on when there is need.

FA: Can you still use the post cards for courses that are starting in July and August?

Admin: I believe so. Annette contacted faculty. There is a limited number at some point. Please feel free to contact her.

FA: Thanks for working on this.

Admin: Thank you.

Admin: Thank you.

3. Academic Year Calendar 2011-2012, 2012-2013 (ADM)

FA: We are taking it to Senate Tuesday and we’ll report back. We want to mention a concern about the start date for spring term creeping closer to New Year’s Day, and the impact that has on a variety of factors including preparation for classes and International students traveling home and returning. I know the common start date is set by MnSCU and we’re not so sure they’re making the wisest decision.

FA: I think one thing that is helpful would be to do some informal surveying. Then we could share with MnSCU the unnecessary hardship for International students. I’ve also heard of a technology hardship issue with staffing in the library.

FA: In the summer.

Admin: Yes, in the summer.

FA: Another note, we took this to Senate but we’re waiting for departmental responses.

Admin: Your Senate meets Tuesday?

FA: Yes.

Admin: You’ll have something then?

FA: Yes.

FA: The minutes indicate the President encouraged Wanda and Devinder to bring that issue to the Council they sit on. The issues surrounding that start date in January.

New Business

1. Students First Advisory Work Group (ADM)

FA: We are happy to be involved. We have a couple requests. We would like to increase the number from one to three representatives from the FA. We would also recommend a faculty from the Faculty and Staff of Color Caucus be included.

Admin: Included in the three?

FA: No, in addition to. The Caucus is not an instrumentality of the FA. We believe there should be more diversity.

Admin: So just to be clear one additional faculty from the Color Caucus, and three FA representatives?

FA: Yes.

Admin: How many are on the committee right now?

Admin: If MAPE and MUSAASF have one rep each there will be 12. If they have more people that want to come I think that would be great. I don’t know if Dr. Potter cares?

Admin: No.

Admin: Okay. We’ll set a time on Wednesday afternoons so hopefully those who volunteer can make that.

FA: I’m assuming this is time limited. Do you have some sense when the work would be completed because that would help for the call to faculty to volunteer.

Admin: That’s a good question. We have a Board change, a Governor change, a Chancellor change, and I expect other changes. They are hiring two additional project managers since the current ones have moved on. I could parrot the date but it’s not going to happen. We could limit the terms to two years pending the end date of the project.

FA: That would be helpful.

Admin: They expect to have a Students First Phase II.

Admin: That would be Students Second. (Laughter)

FA: When is the date they have given you for completion of Phase I?

Admin: A year from July. But that’s not going to happen but we could reappoint people when we come to that date.

Admin: Okay.

FA: Okay.

2. Drop for Nonattendance (FA)

FA: We approached you four weeks ago to explore a policy in which students who didn’t turn up for the first day of class to be dropped so other students can get into the class and we’re interested in your response.

FA: This should really be unfinished business. You may remember the information I shared with you on our other institutions like Mankato and Winona that map out policies dropping after the first day or second day, but giving the student the opportunity to contact the faculty ahead of time. This would promote good use of our class space, and many of us have stories about teaching high demand courses where four or five students don’t show up and they don’t drop until later so other students who can’t get in take other courses. This is not using class space very efficiently. Also we would like to move to an environment where students value the first day of class so there aren’t two starts. We asked for this quite a while ago for a different driver but one that still might be relevant. In many science labs, safety procedures are gone over the first day and there could have been safety impacts. But now we have a series of drivers for the policy.

Admin: We talked about it early, and then we discussed it later and thought to fold it in the work of the Academic Policy Working Group but they have just finished their work for the year.  

Admin: I have added this to the agenda of the Academic Policy Working Group for next year.

FA: This may have an impact on International students as we discussed in number two, because now they are going to be dropped. I just wanted you to be aware of that relationship if this goes through.

FA: They wouldn’t necessarily be dropped. I have a similar experience and International students have notified me that they cannot make the first day of class but they ask for the information up front. I think faculty value this kind of relationship. It could be built into that policy. There are other reasons to miss the first day if it’s in January, like an ice storm.

Admin: When they start these discussions we will take these sorts of circumstances under consideration.

FA: I just want to remind you this is a motion from Senate so any senators on the working group would be aware of the policy we’re suggesting.

Admin: Yes.

3. Teacher Preparation Initiative (FA)

FA: AKA Bush Grant, which is what I refer to it as. I wanted to make a request that we would appreciate an update now and ongoing updates. We have a couple specific questions we can ask after an update, if you are ready now.

Admin: In general when the minutes come out they are posted to the website. Go ahead, why don’t you tell them about the process of communication?

Admin: The communications have gotten better so those are sent out. It’s just a summary of what is going on with the coordinating committee. There is a fair amount planned for summer getting people involved in a two-day event in June being planned right now. We’re finishing up the memorandum of understanding with Bush. We’re moving towards work on the structure and we have been for a while for different kinds of work groups that will come out of this event.

FA: Are you sending out notices just to the college?

Admin: I think it’s going to the college… that’s a good question. I’m not sure.

FA: I don’t recall seeing anything.

Admin: We can put you on the list.

FA: I’m wondering if there are ways of identifying other places it should go as well since this doesn’t just affect the COE.

Admin: That’s true and a good suggestion. We do send it in some places but we might not be as comprehensive as we ought to.

Admin: I think the whole communications process is not up to where it needs to be. Once we have an office manager in place which is the next step planned it will be easier to get some of that out. We haven’t been as good as we could.

Admin: We’ll make sure that Mark Jaede gets a copy of the minutes so he can share with the rest of Senate.

FA: If there is going to be a hiring decision, if the answer is yes, will there be a search?

Admin: There will be the regular routine we would go through, yes.

Admin: All the policies and procedures that currently exist from either HR or a bargaining unit related to hiring from grants would be followed.

FA: Very good. There were some concerns in relations to the COE climate perception to make it more transparent.

Admin: Yes.

Admin: In fact right now, I haven’t seen any requests for hiring. The coordinating committee is looking for developing a process by which they want to develop a plan. In that context they are asking themselves what kind of logistical support structure they need. So that conversation may be occurring but it is still a work in progress. I haven’t seen any proposal from them that we want to do hiring X, Y, Z. We have every intention of following all the existing policies and procedures for any hiring.

FA: Going back to you mentioned some reorganization of committees, I was also told by a faculty person that the original advisory council of these external members and it wasn’t an FA committee, and there was some controversy, that it was dissolved. Is that a true statement?

Admin: When I was here last time I was asked who was on the committee and I brought that list with me today. That will answer those questions. It hasn’t dissolved, it’s morphed. There are a couple of people who’ve been added to fill in what we thought were gaps. It went from a leadership team to a coordinating team.

FA: I was concerned about the faculty relationships with our partners out there.

Admin: Our relationships at this point, looking at the paper today, we’ll have a lot of new superintendants to work with.

Admin: Initially the group was focused on writing the grant and presenting it to Bush. Now they are focused on developing a process by which the actual plan can be developed, so it requires a different kind of structure.

FA: I’ve heard there’s an impression with faculty that you have a specific fixed term person in mind.

Admin: I really can’t address that since I have not received any proposals to hire in my office.

Admin: I’m not going to let that happen. I understand what you’re saying. We are discussing two positions of an office manager and a district liaison and they would have to go through an open search. I’m not planning on somebody being appointed.

FA: The other thing I’ve heard is that the minutes of what has been done and decided isn’t the same as the collaborative open process to figure out what’s going to happen.   

Admin: I think that open and collaborative process is what we have been trying to plan for. As I look at what’s going to happen with Bush and whatever kinds of changes there will be in our programs in our preparation for teachers it’s going to have to be done clearly in each individual program and that’s going to have to come up from faculty.

Admin: Right from the beginning we’ve been very clear when it comes to the teacher preparation initiative we view it as university-wide and we view the Bush as transitional costs from going from one regime of teacher preparation to going to another. All the work would be imbedded in the existing structure. We have no plan of creating new structures. If there are indeed new activities which don’t have current logistical structures we may have to do that but we will use all the existing structures. And in that context there is no other way to do this work but to do it in an open and transparent fashion if we want to use the existing structures.

FA: It would be good to reassure the faculty members in the college.

FA: The advisory board on this sheet is still functioning?

Admin: No. That was in conjunction with the first leadership team.

FA: When did it stop?

Admin: The last time we met was probably at the end of the summer. We met two, three, or four times. It was an advisory group. We met with lots of different groups during the summer.

FA: This represents the original and reconstructed group and the shift from a leadership team to a coordinating team?

Admin: Right.

FA: On the Phase II list there’s only one person of color. I was wondering if we could increase the diversity.

Admin: That’s a good suggestion. Part of the initiative is also to recruit and prepare teachers of color.

FA: Is it a 10-year project?

Admin: The timeline is 10 years.

Admin: Most of the work of initially recruiting is ramped up in the first four or five years. This project is unique in terms of teacher preparation because it also follows and provides support structure once the graduates are in place. That obviously will take some time and that is why the timeline is longer.

FA: Are Kathy and Becky going to be there throughout the 10-year?

Admin: They currently are. It’s hard to predict. I have no plans to change the leadership of the coordinating committee at the present time.

4. General Education

FA: We have different agendas. I spoke to Greta on the phone and thought only item six was added. This will just be a brief item. We wanted to know if there is any additional information about MnSCU’s views on General Education. We also wanted to note that the General Education Committee has completed the process of reviewing the proposals that have reached them through the end of February. So we just wanted to note that and express our gratitude to the General Education Committee.

Admin: I’m scheduled to meet with the Senior Vice Chancellor next week. In the meanwhile I have sent her another letter suggesting that we need to resolve this as quickly as we possibly can and also suggesting that until this is resolved we will continue with our existing populating of courses in the goal areas so we can service the students as we move forward.

Admin: I had a conversation with Linda Baer last Friday in which she indicated they still had concerns and this will be the subject of the conversation with the Provost.

Admin: We did get an email today about an existing course which was perhaps misclassified into the goal area. We had already dealt with that issue. I followed it up with Mitch. It is no longer in that goal area. Next week I’ll be able to tell you more.

FA: The information forwarded to their office, does that include all the new forms of the General Education Committee since they just completed their work and forwarded it to the UCC? Do they see those course outlines and the objectives that are on those kinds of things or what documentation do they use to make the determination we’ve misplaced a course?

Admin: They look at our website. Is that right?

Admin: In this case an institution objected to a course that was placed in the wrong goal area. That course will not be in there next year. It’s there now.

Admin: They do send us a report which is based on their looking at our website.

FA: Our course descriptions in the undergraduate bulletin? Or do they have access to the whole General Education site that we see on campus?

Admin: When they look at courses?

FA: Yes.

Admin: My understanding is that there is a staff member who does an “audit” of General Education and it’s done by examination of the website and the course descriptions.

FA: I was unaware this was part of the process. So thanks.

FA: Am I hearing they wouldn’t have access to changes that might have been made? What many departments have been doing if they propose a Gen Ed course in whatever category it might be in, they might have modified what would be on the list so it does have that correlation. I’m worried that something could be discounted based on an old course description.

Admin: They do ask for our response.

FA: Okay.

Admin: Mitch is in the process of getting a response ready to send to them.

Admin: We all need to remind ourselves in the transition period that there are going to be some rough edges here and there. I hope by this time next year most of that will disappear.

FA: We are able to provide them with new information so that they are looking at correct stuff and not old stuff?

Admin: Ideally. The problem is we’re dealing with students transferring now using our old General Education curriculum, the bridge curriculum, and now we’re proposing a new liberal education curriculum. So, it’s going to be messy for a while.

FA: I’m okay if they provisionally say no, but when they look at the new information they change their mind if in fact it’s a difference in the old and new description.

Admin: There are two questions here. One is transition from provisional to the new, which Mitch is referring to. The other issue is that they generate a report by looking at it and they want us to respond. They say we have concerns here and here. They sent us a report two or three weeks ago. Mitch will prepare a response and send it them. They have five, six, or seven courses they show their concerns and we’ll provide them with a response.

FA: Okay.

FA: Can we get it in the minutes that we congratulate the General Education Committee. I think they would appreciate to hear that from Meet and Confer that they covered 600 courses.

Admin: I will echo that sentiment. They have been very cooperative and very collaborative. I really deeply appreciate their partnership.

5. Class Size Adjustments (FA)

FA: We have a number of concerns related to this. The first is a formal labor relations kind of concern that when there is as it appears to be in several colleges a set of instructions for large scale increases in the population of the class sizes of a number of courses which rises to the level of being a matter of terms and conditions of employment that ought to be brought to Meet and Confer.

Admin: The initial impression I get from you is that you thought there was some general policy that we will increase class sizes.

FA: It isn’t clear. It is clear that there is practice reported by our members, in at least two colleges I know of, of very substantial increases in class sizes in a number of courses including Philosophy and Math. We see that rising to the level of being a change in terms and conditions of employment. There are also a number of other issues related to pedagogy and student learning outcomes that we are concerned with as well.

Admin: It’s hard for me to respond to vague sort of information. Let me tell you what we are doing in terms of how we are approaching this. Then we can have a discussion.

Admin: For over six months I’ve been doing an analysis of the actual enrollment in classes as it relates to class size. It did result in the cancellation classes in spring that saved $128,000. I’ve finished the analysis for the entire year. There are 76 lines on my Xcel spreadsheet and each line represents an opportunity to reduce the number sections and not reduce the number of credit hours produced. In some cases there are classes that are offered every year that have low enrollment that if offered every third semester would result in higher enrollment. There are some cases where there clearly was one, two, or more empty sections in composite. And in the third case there are classes that scheduled to be very large classes that do not attain large enrollments.

FA: These are not the things we are concerned about. We have no quarrel with trying to get more students into classes within the existing caps on enrollment. Our concern is that there are two specific areas I’m aware of and my colleagues may have some more information than I do, that is Philosophy classes and Math classes having had their caps raised dramatically. Tom, you may remember some of those numbers better than I do.

FA: In Chemistry as well. Classes more than doubled in size.

Admin: I have asked the deans to take a look at class sizes. It goes back to the analysis that John was referring to that if the same number of students are being distributed over classes and we cut some sections then the average class size would increase because those students would go where there is capacity. And if the room has capacity and if it is appropriate to increase those classes then I think we will go there and increase those class sizes. Because it is not very clear to me also how initially these class sizes and caps came into be. Some are dictated by the space facility available. There was a case where there has been a policy here that to get a faculty that teaches a class of 90 or more they would get extra load credits. What was happening in some colleges was they said we would like to teach a class of 90; however there was no room available for 90, so we taught a class of 70 and got six load credits. To me asking them to go from 70 to 90 otherwise I will not give six load credits I don’t think is changing the terms and conditions of employment. To answer the question from a pedagogical standpoint what ought to be the class size. I understand one size doesn’t fit all. But my question is who is the arbitrator of determining the argument being made? To deal with that issue I informed you on a previous occasion we are going to do this summer a whole course analysis where we will look at these in a discipline specific benchmarks which are national and regional. When that information is gathered it will be available. We will have in the context in our existing frames. We will share it with you and we can talk about a process. In the meanwhile there is a lot that goes under that rubric where we think there is a possibility of increasing the class sizes without adversely impacting the integrity of the delivery of the curriculum and there we are being diligent.

FA: One thing that I just recently heard at another university would be something that we could look at for students when we talk about pedagogy as to have pull, extract students who are withdrawing from the courses or the Ds or Fs in these big courses, to look at the fail rates.  

Admin: We should do that, yes.

FA: This decision to increase class sizes needs to be the result of a conversation in which you take into consideration student outcomes, pedagogy, class availability of space, prior agreements that would involve that agreement about the 90 seats, so you’re assuming that this would be the result of a conversation and that there wouldn’t be a directive out of nowhere?

Admin: What I understand is, and I see one Dean in the room, that when these schedules come to the deans, they look at the schedules, and then there is a discussion that occurs, and a consultation occurs, and the Dean explains why they think that these sizes need to be adjusted here. Is that fair description of the process?

Admin: It’s more complicated than that. Let’s pull up an example here. I’m curious to the non-quantitative substantially increase in size statement. Let’s pick Math 112, College Algebra. There were a number of sections that were put on the books, I went through, I looked at the evaluations in terms of how the students did enrolled in that course for the past four years in fall and spring to see how well the number of students in that historical enrollment pattern matched the number of seats that were going to be offered in fall and spring. And I asked for the department to consider increasing the course enrollment from 25 students in the class to 35 if rooms were available that would hold 35 students. They informed me that in some cases the rooms that they had would and some cases they would not. I said well, the arbitrator of this is the fire marshal. I was asking them to increase from 25 to 32 so that the classrooms were full. In doing so I was able to take and match that summed enrollment for College Algebra and reduce the number of sections being offered by one section, thereby saving. And that process went on repetitively over many schedules and many courses. That was the erring process.

Admin: What is important here is that David describes this as that it is not as if we arbitrarily say that. There is a conversation which occurs. The basis of that conversation is historical facts of enrollment.

FA: When the conversation has not happened and the chair was told to increase class size from 100 to 240. That’s a little different than 25 to 32.

Admin: That’s not true.

FA: That’s what I was told.

Admin: If we have this information before us we can check. Or still better if the chair has that concern then the chair should be discussing that with the dean. So, if there are indeed pedagogical reasons than the department should be discussing those pedagogical reasons, developing a response, and presenting it to the deans. There is an orderly process.

FA: I understand that.

Admin: Let me tell you the way that I want this conversation conducted. We are going through a year that’s going to be very difficult. I expect lots of complaints about this. I would like to establish a protocol whereby if you get a complaint, you get the facts then we have a regular conversation, we should be examining those facts in that regular conversation. And if we in our regular conversation determine that the Administration is taking an approach that is inappropriate then we bring it to Meet and Confer to discuss. To have a conversation with allegations going back and forth, with no data, and with no ability to check it, without understanding the issues, is not helpful or productive. I suggest we stop this and create a way of working through these issues together because in the coming year this is going to get more and more difficult as we try to squeeze things out of our existing capacity to not eliminate jobs.

FA: I think if we have a process for vetting information and for checking that would be very helpful. We talked in jest about the game Telephone. Rumors always happen, right? But not having a process, and I understand we can talk with deans too, but if people don’t feel as if things are working that way, if we have another process for having ongoing conversation I think that would really help.

Admin: I want to be clear. I recognize that we have processes built into departmental and college but what I’m talking about is a way that we work together to process complaints.

Admin: If you hear something we should have a process of how we are going to get that information. I am willing to talk to you and we can think through some way in which how you will funnel the information to us and how we can provide you with the information with regard what the facts are surrounding what you heard.

Admin: I am very open to having the conversation about complaints. I’m not trying to suppress the complaints. But I need an approach which has us gather the facts before we are in a general forum where we can’t validate facts and talk about practice. I want to build a way of working together which brings policy questions to this table after we’ve framed the real facts. Is that fair? Does that sound reasonable?

FA: I just wanted to offer a different perspective on this because of the job I do. A lot of my clients come in purely because they’re having difficulties in certain classes. A lot of it has to do with part of larger things that are going on. One of the things that I’ve noticed over the years is that they seem to have difficulty with the math courses. One of the things that seems to emerge from what they’re saying is that they go to professors for extra help and most of them talk about needing extra help because they don’t understand the material and they are really struggling. And they haven’t been complaining about professors but I think it is more supply and demand and maybe because the type of courses. Even with the enrollment at what they are now I couldn’t even tell you what specific math classes they are it seems like even for the ones that in those classes now they’re not always getting what they seem to feeling they need. I just wanted to throw that out there. It’s a little bit different than what you’re talking about.

Admin: You raise a good point.

FA: Has there been a blanket recommendation coming from your office or the dean’s office to essentially prod departments to provide some information on this as this semester winds down. My department only meets one more time. If somebody said we like to know how you’d like to go about increasing your class sizes by X% I think we’d be happy to do that, having just lost four colleagues.

Admin: I think those are the kind of conversations which David was referring to.

FA: If it was done in a general way then everybody would know what everybody is doing.

Admin: You’re right.

FA: Our department did this last fall looking at what courses we might be able to increase without affecting negatively student outcomes, what room availability we had, and so on. I wouldn’t be surprised if a lot of departments haven’t already looked at this and might have some perspectives developed.

Admin: What is happening is toward the end of last semester we started looking at scheduling, we started looking at some information. But you’re right. We’ve come to a point that we need clarity in terms of the process by which we engage the departments and colleges in making that information available and also in working with them and understanding as to how we go to a point where we can raise class sizes where it makes the most sense.

FA: My information is right here. I got the draft you talked about and I think you sent it to Mark also.

FA: I’m not sure.

FA: You can check. I told the chair of my department he should share with us and I’m not trying to make any judgments so everybody knows. Perhaps it is just a draft so the information is there. There is a lot of research and even big class sizes can work if you do it properly. But again I can see in my class myself if I have 25 versus 40 students depending on what I want to do it does make a difference. But I’m not saying that classes cannot go larger.

Admin: My comments should not be misconstrued in saying that pedagogical considerations are not important in determining class sizes. That’s not what I’m saying. We are saying the basic point that there is no blanket policy to increase all classes by X%. That’s all I’m suggesting.

Admin: I would ask you to come visit me because over the last two year we have implemented a number of initiatives to help math students with success. I think some education of the services made available for struggling students with Math so when students come to you who may not be aware of these programs you can advise them. So, please come visit with me.

FA: Okay. I’d like to do that. I know about the Academic Learning Center.

FA: I have two thoughts: a combination of the two might help establish benchmarks in tough economic times that are sound. Regional benchmarks may be based on the same class, but different pedagogical approaches so across the board changes in class size based on just benchmarks could be inappropriate. I believe that goes without saying. The second point may also go without saying, but I hope this conversation is continuing to be a two-way street. I know of some faculty who are working on trying to be efficient economically in the programs they direct, but get suggestions from administrators for saving money that come from practices appropriate in a different discipline. Those practices don’t make a lot of sense for the class content being considered and may actually be inappropriate for the content area under discussion.  Sensitivity to suggestions by faculty based context, content, and resources beyond just finances will make for better decisions.

Admin: Good suggestion.

Admin: To conclude faculty recommended class sizes a low as five and to a high of 500. That’s the range as far as I can tell.

FA: Is it something to do with online courses?

Admin: The 500 is a face-to-face class. And the five is also a face-to-face class.

6. Scheduling & Hiring for High Demand Gen Ed Classes (FA)

FA: There are some classes we are concerned with like English, Democratic Citizenship, some Math classes, especially remedial math classes, Speech Communication Studies 192. That’s always an issue and one we’d like to think of ways to do better, but specifically under the present circumstances. I’m not sure to which the hiring pause will have an impact on this. Certainly the overall budget picture and the desire to save money on adjuncts is one that is going to complicate the situation more than usual this summer. And we wanted to open a conversation with you about how are we going to go about doing this? How can we plan for this as best as we can? And to make sure we meet the needs of the students because there is going to be a bottom line demand from students who really need these courses and before many of us who are in the room now were here there were some crisis in the past when we admitted more students than we could serve with those General Education classes and had students who were taking their first year Communication classes in their junior year because the classes just weren’t available and none of us want that to happen and we want to know how you foresee this process.

Admin: Okay.

FA: I would like to add one more piece to that before we start talking about it. In the past when we ran into high enrollment, I think it was about 18,000 and the numbers had really popped fast and what we ended up doing was we put a lot of money into CORE courses and what we found with that was a lot of majors weren’t able to get into courses and some people like the person sitting next to me took an extra year because she couldn’t get into major courses and I guess I’d like part of that to be in the context of how do we do this well while managing the need to move students through the system.

Admin: Sure. Mark and I talked about this on Monday while finalizing the agenda. After that I asked John to do some background work on this issue. John, do you want to share?

Admin: Hopefully this won’t be a false start like the last time.

Admin: We’ll be the judge of that.

Admin: Enrollment Management through its collaborative process has projected that our enrollment next year will be 14,850 students. That’s 200 less than this year. 200 less full-time equivalent students meaning we do not need to schedule the seats for 200. In addition to that if you look at where our growth has been in enrollment it primarily falls into Senior to Sophomore and Online instruction. Online instruction by its very nature as it’s conducted traditionally here grows and shrinks on demand of students.

Admin: It’s a safety valve.

Admin: Yes. Senior to Sophomore grows because faculty are interested in working with high school teachers in delivering curriculum. Both Online and Senior to Sophomore do not require the hiring of people in response to peak demand. There has been some concern that perhaps as the fall and spring schedules were built the deans in the interest of caution have not been using fixed term and adjunct faculty lines that they had this year. So, Devinder has asked that I look at that set of numbers of what we spent this year so we can release to the deans 85% of that number and make sure that the schedule currently out there reflects that level of funding.

Admin: So that the planning can start earlier.

Admin: So hiring can be done in a timely way. So, Larry and I don’t have to talk to people about why is this request to hire coming a month late because we can’t do that. So we would expect for a variety reasons we’re going to be doing hiring decisions for the fall earlier than we have in the past. And some of those decisions will start in May and June. Now I hope that answers the question and concern. We have to have the correct mix of classes available for the students to select from for us to make our target of 14,850 students.

FA: I guess part of my response is thinking about last year, and it was a fairly typical year I think, when we get a demand for seats from X, and I’m talking in this case about Freshman comp. So we have a wave of hires, then we don’t hire anybody, then we have a wave of hires, and so on, and by the time we finish we’ve over-spent. When we do that kind of rolling in hiring we do things like letting really good staff that we’ve have here go instead of rehiring. I think a more plan-ful kind of procedure from a budgetary and a pedagogical standpoint would be much more useful, and that’s what I’m hearing you say we’re going to be doing.

Admin: That’s a very good point. I’ve heard this from the deans also. They’ve actually been telling me for the last month and a half that they’re concerned that there were too many classes which there was not a person associated with it. So, what is happening is that now that we have a little bit better understanding of FY11 budget cuts so now we are at a point where we want to start very quickly releasing that information, giving that information about the availability of funds to the deans so that we can start filling those up. That is why the overall work relating to looking closely at the scheduling is part and parcel of that because that would inform this work also as we move forward. But your point is very well taken. We need to be intentional and also timely in dealing with this issue.

Admin: Another uncertain factor is the new liberal education curriculum where we move away from CORE areas to Goal areas, and we have more courses designated as General Education courses and courses that might fulfill more than one goal area. That might reduce the burden in some specific disciplines. We’ll have to wait and see what happens but it might have the potential to affect the courses of demand.

FA: I don’t think it will have much affect though on the English, Math, Communication Studies, Democratic Citizenship, and we may no longer be using Democratic Citizen but… and Racial Issues has become a Goal area; but nevertheless those are going to be areas where there are a relatively small number of courses that meet those requirements.

Admin: A couple of those areas like Democratic Citizenship there might some twofers.

Admin: There is data here. This year in the Communications and Composition required classes we were very close to being in balance with this group of students. We didn’t have a lot of empty seats. There were a few. In the case of Democratic Citizenship we had multiple sections of that class that were very low being subscribed to. It could be because that class is scheduled by a variety of different departments, departments that put out a lot of classes, and they don’t all necessarily fill, so some tightening up might actually occur with Democratic Citizenship. The advantage of having the ability to look backwards at least for one year is going to inform us about what that future is. I would hope that we build institutional capacity to track this over time so that in the spring of the year we get very good at predicting the number of sections of high demand classes and we recognize that we have to staff them sooner rather than later. Now what that does mean, and the President has identified that, is that people are going to be asked to change the way they do things. Some people may in fact have to teach a class of 15 instead of two classes of seven and eight. You may find that hard to believe but there are people out there doing that. It’s more common than you would ever believe. We can’t afford to keep doing that and then say we’re going to keep the same number of faculty.

Admin: Just a comment. I’m holding the Faculty Association to a high standard of putting the data on the table. I think we need to be careful with that too. So if we say that, and I know you’ve been looking at the numbers, it would be helpful to share the picture you’re looking at so we’re singing from the same sheet of music.

Admin: I’ll send the same item I’m sending to the deans to Mark.

FA: That would be helpful. I’ve already gone on record in terms of urging faculty to be looking at these very questions. It is all the more so in our interest as we face the prospect of retrenchment that we teach as efficiently as we can without  inappropriate pedagogical limits for class sizes and that certainly includes if a class can appropriately be taught with 15 students our goal should be to have 15 students in the class. We need to work together on that. Having specific information and numbers to refer to give such conversations among faculty more specificity and clarity I think than just a general statement that we have some particular objective.

FA: As Frances would lament: it is tax day. (Laughter) That simply means there’s about two and a half weeks left in the term. I would encourage well considered haste if faculty are going to have any input, and the renewal of those fixed term positions that may be renewable once the decision is made or to do anything other than emergency hiring of fixed term we probably need to have things turning here fairly quickly. I can’t say tomorrow, but I’m a bit concerned that we’ll end up in a hiring position where we’ll be hiring in haste and we could cut some of that time off on the front end it would be very helpful for my department if we have to make some choices and anyone who might be looking. Because some of the people we would have hoped to have brought back quite frankly are looking elsewhere and some of them have been made offers elsewhere. I know there’s a Catch-22 and there needs to be a balance to that, but anything that could speed up the process would certainly be helpful for faculty as we approach the end of the semester.

Admin: Okay. That’s what we’re trying to work on.

Progress Reports on Long-term Concerns

1. Strategic Program Appraisal (FA)

Admin: I think as we informed you last time I was at Meet and Confer we’ve had those sessions that occurred before the last Meet and Confer, which I wasn’t at. Since then the process has started to move forward. The Strategic Planning Committee has identified a steering group. Since one of the co-chairs is right here, Judy, can you help the group think through as to where the Strategic Planning Committee and the Steering Work Group process is?

FA: Our focus right now and you’ll be seeing an email perhaps as early as today inviting the campus to conversations about potential clusters that might help us map out affinities between programs. Those will be happening in the next two weeks, and by the end of the semester we hope to have established some sort of process to move forward through reorganization. There’s a bunch of work that needs to happen this summer and we’re actually getting our charge tomorrow from the Provost. But there’s a lot of data collection that needs to happen this summer so when you come back in the fall our discussion about reorganization can be informed by information such as what our current administrative structure costs and we have some comparative data—I should have my list in front of me—looking at other potential models and their piers and what are some possibilities. So we’ll be doing a lot of ground work this summer then be able to have more informed conversation in the fall. We had a question come up both through Faculty Association and through Strategic Planning that is a really concrete question. We understand that Strategic Planning needs to do some definitions of terms that we use when we’re thinking about models. Things like define what a school is because a school is used in different ways. Define what an institution is; what a center is, and there is one we’re finding a lot pressure to have defined right now and I don’t feel as if we can define it. Devinder, can you define what you mean by cluster?

Admin: Okay.

FA: By asking for a definition we’re not so much asking for a definition here and now, but rather some kind of public statement. A reason for this and some of us have already seen today and last night there appeared two statements on “Announce” from faculty members who were in various ways complaining about what they did not understand about the current process. I think that responses have been generated to those particular faculty members. To some extent there is going to be these things that pop up. While I think that we’ve done a good job of working together in the strategic planning process I don’t think, and I include myself in this, we have done as good a job of communicating with the campus as a whole about what it is we’re doing, what we have decided, what we haven’t decided, and how we’re going about the deciding process. This has led to not only the ones you saw on “Announce” but also at least one rumor reached us from a faculty member who had acquired apparently a very specific set of plans that had been developed that I had never heard of, and I’m not sure if you’ve ever heard of them either. But apparently included a count of the number of colleges there were going to be, the number of schools there would be in each college, and the number of total departments there would be in the university.

Admin: I would like my hands on it. (Laughter) It would save me a lot of time. Your point is very well taken. There is some intentional vagueness because I wanted to present this as conversation starters. But what you point out is a very, very good point. That vagueness should not be around the term being used. And if we’re going to use in our conversation the term discipline clusters or clusters of disciplines, I think that is probably more appropriate. At least we should have a shared understanding of what we mean by that from an operational standpoint.

FA: I think especially to prevent brainstorming, creative thinking from shutting down. I think people will somehow think there are 14 clusters, those are definitely units, and I don’t think they are.

Admin: No.

FA: I think people aren’t thinking about them in terms of kind of affinities that might lead us to some sort of structure but aren’t predetermined in terms of number or final say. I hope that makes sense. I’m more comfortable with ambiguity than I think many people are.

FA: I think it would be helpful if you would send out your Powerpoint with the reorganization timelines, and if you sent that to the campus that would help in communication. The other thing that Mark was alluding to, I had faculty members say they attended a meeting and that this information came from a dean, I wish we had this two days ago I had a way to convey this so it wasn’t here but it was very specific information. We’re going from five colleges to three colleges, each college there are going to be two schools, it is going to go from 70 departments to 40 departments, and there are 14 clusters and the person had a list of the 14 clusters.

FA: And of course we have 14 clusters.

Admin: What’s the ideology of that?

FA: This was at a meeting of faculty from across the campus that a faculty member came to me and was very…

Admin: And where was it reported that the document came from?

FA: That it came from a dean.

Admin: A dean?

FA: They named the dean but I …

FA: Was the document reported to exist or just a statement?

FA: A statement from the dean.

Admin: There is a document that you used to illustrate as a talking document. It’s possible that that illustrative document could have then been taken as the decision has already been made, and here’s the model.

Admin: Even in those documents I don’t talk about the number of colleges, departments. I tell you, I know that in any change or any flux there is a lot of noise. Our challenge is to stay focused on the work itself. Going back to what Judy was saying, I’ll come to how I came up with the 14. I think you all need to know that, but before I do that, here is how I’ve spent my last two weeks. We had open sessions that I thought were very productive conversations. I have met with each of the DACs, because I’m hoping then that there is an alternative channel than just the dean getting the information to the department or faculty. You know, because then I talk directly to the chair, and then the chair knows what I said, and in that room the dean is there, the chair is there, and so everybody is hearing the same thing. Out of that conversation it was very obvious to me that we need to improve the quality of our communication. Even though we had talked about it here, we talked about it at the Faculty Senate, we talked about it in the focus groups, but at no place had we laid down as to whatever organizational structure we come up with, what should that organizational structure accomplish at the minimum? Just to impart some purpose to this whole work I’m currently working on a draft with Lisa Foss to send out the campus to look at what the overall structure is, what outcomes are we trying to accomplish by this reorganization—whatever that reorganization is—and then what are some of the structural frames which will further that conversation. In that context comes the discipline clusters and those kinds of things. Then the process and the communication frame, which will be imbedded in the process itself. So, I’m working on that draft with Lisa, and I will send it out, and I’ve made at note that maybe at that point we will include that slide of the timeline also with it. How I came up with discipline clusters? Truly I wanted a conversation starter. So, I said okay rather than thinking in terms of departments and colleges, I just thought of broad programmatic structures by taking in all that we want to accomplish. Maybe it is part a curricular divide in a very broad sense it is part where there would be complementarities which faculty in these disciplines can leverage by both programmatic not just necessary geographic proximity; that would be another intent. So, really in terms of the operational of the discipline walls, if we took all of our academic programs and we take these 200 programs and want to some how categorize in some meaningful category which would leverage the complementarities that exist and would foster collaborative work programmatically. I’m not even talking organizationally here. What kind of clustering would I come up with from a discipline standpoint? And that is how we came up with those 14. It is possible somebody looks at those 14, somebody can read a college in it. I see business, one cluster, somebody can read that as College of Business, but it is also a curriculum structure called business. Social Science somebody can read that as College of Social Science, but it is also a curricular structure which has some affinity to start with for the kinds of programs which are in that area. So that’s how I came up with it. But you are right, I’ll try to work on a more precise way in which we can convey that as to what we mean by that clustering and how we arrived at it.

Admin: Let me emphasize, the thinking that Devinder has just described is stuff that we would have to do whether we had a budget crisis or not. In fact that thinking has nothing to do with the budget crisis. It is actually taking a next step in the strategic visioning, and saying what are the areas of strength and complementarities that we have? Strategically how do we feel focused? Reputation, power, etcetera. The reason it gets overlapped with the budget crisis is we’re going to have to make such substantial changes to deal with the budget crisis that if we do those changes without a strategic vision for our focus and strength of our intellectual disciplines, we will screw up the university for a very long time going forward. So we’re forcing this thinking to make sure we don’t do something awful in the budget cutting. A cluster could be a strategy for saving some support costs. So, if one could think in free form, if we were Hampshire College or some other kind of place and could think in free form and did not have mandated departments and agreement we have with the faculty, one could think of organizational structures that are very different from what we got. I can’t imagine there are complementary departments and disciplines that adhere to each other because of sheer related interests and skill sets and markets and whatever things you use to shape a cluster that you could change the way we support those through clerical support and so forth in a way that could save money without violating departmental structures. That’s how those reorganizational and budget savings come into play. It’s very complicated; you are in fact changing a tire while you’re riding a bicycle. It’s tough to do. I do want to say a couple things. Going back to the two messages broadcast last night. One of them is particularly interesting because the faculty member posed a question and said, “What’s this stuff about academic reorganization? Nobody’s told me about this.” The response being framed is not a combative response but it just says, “Here are the messages that have been sent to all faculty since the middle of March.” In that case this person honestly and really had heard nothing about this and that just befuddles me. I don’t expect any action on that other than you all know that there have been broadcast messages and lots of communication that we were about to undertake this work. It would be helpful if you would think with me about what happened that this person missed all that, and what do we do about this. There are other folks too I’m sure. She was just courageous enough to broadcast the message and I have no trouble with that. What’s broken that that could happen? The second is where I want some action. And that’s an assertion in a long message that the raw data was never shared with the faculty, that decisions were based on information that was invisible. And that’s just not true. So, there are some things the Administration and the Faculty Association need to maintain as fundamental truths if we agree on them. If we agree that the data was put out there, Lisa was available to talk to anybody, and people asked for different data, and that data was provided. We really worked hard to get real information to people, so that confuses me. If we were to agree that the information was available, it was there, and it had been shared, and there was a responsive capacity available to get even more data, then those are questions that we should all be answering, if we agree. If we don’t agree that’s a different matter.

FA: I agree that it is difficult to understand how people could miss all the messages that have gone out. I’m making an assumption that this person isn’t very well connected to email. But that got me to thinking are there other things that we need to do? Maybe since we are going through such a rapid process change, we ought to set up some regular conversation time where people expect updates or sharing of information. I don’t know what that might look like. Maybe something more informal so that people start the conversation that I think becomes a little broader with more kind of regular opportunities to ask questions. Different kinds of information; different kinds of networks might be tapped that way.

Admin: Frankly, I’ve had some conversations with Lisa purely from my perspective. I was thinking the same thing. For communication is there some kind of ongoing thing where we set aside some time, we just meet, and we update? There’s obviously the website. But if some person is not checking email they are probably not looking at the website either. Your point is well taken. And that’s where I would like to engage the steering committee in trying to figure out how well we can do it.

Admin: It’s not very often that I have the opportunity to correct the President. (Laughter)

Admin: I’m glad to help John. (Laughter)

Admin: What the President did is common to what we do. We project the practice in what the agreement says. The President has the power to determine what a department is. You have all the power to determine what a department is. There is nothing in the agreement that defines what a department is except to say “the President after Meeting and Conferring with the Association redefines departments and programs based on the needs of the university.” So you’ve got that power to directly address the composition of the departments/administrative units. The only thing the contract or master agreement requires is that every faculty member will be in a department/administrative unit. That’s all it requires.

Admin: A department is a small cluster. (Laughter)

Admin: However you want to define it.

FA: Let’s not forget that these minutes are posted. The comments we make, we will hear about it again.

Admin: You’re quite right.

Admin: I’m pretty sure the President is aware of what he can do within the contract. I think the whole idea here is that we want to develop a shared understanding and seek to engage the broader campus because in the end of the day we’re all in it together. So, that is the whole idea.

FA: It’s nice to read your interpretation of the facts. Thanks for being helpful to the President. I think the problem is a lot of times for example the clusters you talk about or cluster analysis.

Admin: I have taken a course in cluster analysis. That’s not what I was thinking on these clusters. (Laughter)

FA: I saw the working draft of this on March 14. I got a final document yesterday from my dean sent to the departments. I think the issue is often not what the clusters are. You and the President will say we never said that. The problem is often including Faculty Association and the deans, and those in positions of power, we may have our own opinion, but if they’re in a position of power and responsibility, sometimes you have to say the consistent message. You can always say I have a right to have my own opinion. But that message given by the faculty leadership as well as the administrators are not consistent. I can say I have my own opinion. But that doesn’t help.

Admin: That goes back to communication process and strategy. That if we do the communication work well it would lead to consistency of message.

FA: I feel like I’m preaching to the choir here. We are speaking of communication and how to convey information and those of us who have studied organizational development, systems theory, and lines of communication, I think email and focus groups—that works to a certain extent, but it is only going to get a certain number of folks. I think we do need to investigate other forms of communication. Email is easy. We can pull people together and have conversations face to face. But there is going to be those folks on the peripheral who are going to claim they don’t know anything or hear anything. I do think we have to investigate other forms of communication. It’s going to take more time, more resources, more cost—not money but more effort on our part to communicate to those folks who have their hands [covering their ears.]

FA: Two things. I think if we can focus on a variety of messages and kind of pull ideas that way I think that would help. I know one thing that Strategic Planning is looking at is as the conversation unfolds have a means of internally discussing through some sort of conversation maybe on our website, ideas about reorganization that might be another piece. I’m going to shift the topic just really quickly here and just raise another thing people have been asking about. We’ve had questions about what the relationship is between General Education and SPA, and when General Education and service courses are going to be reviewed as majors and minors have been. So, that’s a question that needs to be answered at some point.

Admin: I don’t understand the question.

FA: We’ve been going through a really specific Strategic Program appraisal for majors and minors for both fall and spring, and people will say something like a lot of what we do is General Ed or service and it has nothing to do with majors and minors. Are we going to as part of the SPA process look at that?

Admin: I still don’t understand the question. The General Education program approach has been worked over and a model created by faculty. And we’re doing a course-by-course analysis to look at courses that might not work which will look at every course. What other analytical framework would you do to get at that concern?

FA: I think we have been doing a lot work to design the curriculum. We have not done a lot of work to examine how we deliver the curriculum, what resources we allocate to delivering that curriculum. Whether that is the wisest, best organized, most efficient way…

Admin: Correct me if I’m wrong. What I’m hearing you say is that in the Strategic Program Appraisal our appraisal has focused on departmental activities as they relate to major and minors, but not as they relate to the delivery of General Education. And the possibility exists that a group of faculty who are very vibrantly actively involved in serving our students, but yet if you just look at majors and minors it may seem as if that their work has limited impact.

FA: That’s part of where that’s coming from. And there’s a question if we’re revamping and moving liberal education now, when would that come? We would assume that we review the new programs. That’s just something that’s on some people’s minds.

Admin: Just to add to the conversation. The service aspect and General Education aspect, reviews usually occur within the traditional programming. I suspect that once we go back to a regular program cycle we’ll be looking at some of these questions.

Admin: I think if there’s nothing else we can move on.

2. Report on Budget (ADM) (10/18/07)

Admin: Vice President Ludwig is not here because he just became a grandfather for the first time this afternoon. President, do you want to share something?

FA: Congratulations.

Admin: There is not a lot of change in the budget picture. The Vice Presidents are making presentations and my direct reports are making presentations. The Athletic Director presented this afternoon for 46 minutes I’m told. It was a conversation about athletic funding.

Admin: Tuesday.

Admin: Oh, it was Tuesday. Those presentations are continuing. The Board will vote at its next meeting on tuition. We don’t expect any changes there. The biggest thing, the uncertainty there now is how is the Officer of the Chancellor going to deal with cuts to the Office of the Chancellor? What cost might be passed through to us? There is legislation that prohibits that, but there’s a great deal of uncertainty about how that might be handled. You do know we have the hiring pause in place. Our spending rates have progressed toward the end of the year. It looks good. We absolutely must finish the year operating with a positive sign in the operating budget. I think we will do that. So, the conversations with the Budget Advisory Group have been very helpful. So, at this point no new news. We’re proceeding on the work track we described.

FA: I simply have a request. As all of this budgetary gloom unfolds and we’re going through the reorganization, I’m simply requesting that members of the Administration be especially careful about signing things in terms of noting accountability. I’m referring specifically to the hiring pause email. That didn’t have any name on it. It wasn’t clear who it came from except from an Administrative unit. It was determined that with some of the passive language, which puts accountability in a black hole some place. I’m just asking for especially right now sensitivity to the fact that that kind of vagueness creates negativity.

Admin: I understand. Thank you.

3. Status of Administrative Searches (ADM)

Admin: I informed Mark yesterday.

FA: I think it was Monday, but whenever.

Admin: The email came out.

FA: The town hall email came out right before this for the College of Education Dean Search.

Admin: So, now that the faculty in the College of Education know, although some of the faculty here don’t know yet because they haven’t checked their email. But, I’m suspending the search of the College of Education Dean. I thought the search committee did a phenomenal job. But because of the lateness of the start, the pool itself was not very vibrant, and so when they sent their recommendations to me and I was looking at it, the kinds of choices I was able to narrow to which would be acceptable and present them to the college was very, very few. It was a very thin pool. I recommended to the President that we should close the search and then restart it early next academic year so that we can build up a vibrant pool and provide sufficient choice, and in that context I also asked Mark to convey my request to the Faculty Association that if the same search committee can continue because that would provide a certain element of continuity and stability in the search process to work through. I’m also thinking that this time around we may hire an outside firm to help us build a much more vibrant applicant pool. There were some very good candidates, this should not be construed as either the reflection of the work of the committee or the candidates which were the possibility set, but that possibility set itself was very, very narrow. The pool itself was very thin. So, in that context we will have an interim dean in the College of Education for the next year. Glen Palm has agreed to serve in that role. But I’m aware of your concerns that we should not have interims on an ongoing basis, and so I wanted to explain to you as to what exactly my thought process is and to why I stopped the search. I shared this same information with the College of Education faculty and staff this afternoon in an email.

FA: We discussed your request that the same committee be appointed. We will ask the members of the committee if they wish to continue to serve and in the case of any that would prefer not to serve, we will follow our usual procedures to replace them. But we don’t have a problem since they were chosen through an appropriate process with asking them to serve another year if they are willing to do so.

Admin: Thank you. We appreciate that.

FA: Did we have any more information on the Administrative searches?

Admin: Oh, yes. Thank you. The new positions which were created in my office, what is happening is we are at the stages where we are finishing all the paperwork. We sent it to HR, HR sent it back to us, I need to send a finalized copy to of the job description back to HR, and there is also some conversation with regard to salary ranges and other things which HR needs to have with the MnSCU folks. So, that process should be completed very soon. I hope in a matter of days. So, we can move forward with that. Whilst that happens I will let Mark Jaede know when I meet with him on Monday where that process is.

FA: Is it something that you can tell the people currently in the position in 90 days? Do you have to let them know?

Admin: Once we have the process going and we know who the new individuals would be in those position then we will follow all that needs to be done.

FA: We are running to the end of the term now, and we’re also running to the end of the hour, what are your plans with regard to faculty input into the choices of the interim…?

Admin: What I’m going to do since initially these are interim positions and they are going to be re-conceptualized, obviously what I’m going to do is what I did last fall when I hired Interim Assistant Vice President for Faculty Relations and Director for Center of Excellence for Teaching and Learning. I will send out a job description, I will ask for either self nominations or nominations of the individuals, interested individuals, I will talk with them, and then make my determination.

4. Students First Initiatives (FA)

a.  IFO Statement on Students First

b. SCSU SGA Resolution on Students First

Admin: Did you get John O’Brien’s email where he answered or responded to the various items that were raised?

FA: I got his email with his interpretations of the questions and his responses, yes.

5. Report on Late Withdrawals (FA)

Admin: I think next Meet and Confer, we will move this last item, number five to item number one under progress reports so we can finally get to it. Thank you very much.

Adjourned at 5:00 p.m.

Submitted by Polly Chappell, SCSU FA Administrative Assistant 5/20/10