September 13, 2005
OFFICERS: Judy Kilborn, Annette Schoenberger, JoAnn Gasparino, Andrew Larkin
IFO BOARD: Jayantha Herath, Andrew Larkin, Annette Schoenberger; Negotiator: Bill Langen
BUSINESS: (Unit Representative) P.N. SubbaNarasimha; (ACCT) vacant; (BCIS) Susantha Herath, Ray Tsai; (FIRE) William Hudson; (MGMT) Larry Roth, vacant; (MKGB) Rajesh Gulati, James C. Johnson
EDUCATION: (Unit Representative) Stephen Hornstein; (CFS) Fati Zarghami; (CEEP) Nona Wilson, Robert Murphy; (HRESS) Mark Moore, Caryl Martin; (HURL) Michael Tripp; (LDR) John Rapp, Frances Kayona; (IM) John Theis; (SPED) John Hoover, Dory Beutel; (TDEV) David Heine, Geoffrey Tabakin, Ramon Serrano
FINE ARTS & HUMANITIES: (Unit Representative) Frances Condon; (ART) Nancy Weston; (CDSI) Margery Whites; (CMST) Scott Wells, Dan Wildeson, Jeff Ringer; (ENGL) Judith Dorn, vacant, Jim Robinson, vacant; (FORL) Gloria Melgarejo, Bill Langen; (COMM) vacant, vacant; (MUSIC) Marion Judish, Mark Springer; (PHIL) Yiwei Zheng, Carla Johnson; (THFD) Debra Leigh
SCIENCE & ENGINEERING: (Unit Representative) Balsy Kasi; (AVIA) Steve Anderson; (BIOL) Oladele Gazal, Heiko Schoenfuss, Matt Julius; (CHEM) Mahin Sadrai, Becky Krystyniak; (CSCI) Andrew Anda; (EAS) Tony Hansen; (EE) Ling Hou; (ETS) Tony Akubue; (ME) Steve Covey; (MATH) Dale Buske, Steve Walk, William Branson; (NURS) Sue Herm; (PHYS) Kevin Haglin; (STAT) Leonard Onyiah, John Gammell
SOCIAL SCIENCES: (Unit Representative) Mary Clifford; (CMTY) Rona Karasik; (CJUS) vacant, vacant; (ECON) Ming Chien Lo; Orn Bodvarsson; (ES) Jeanne Lacourt; (GEOG) Ken Wong; (HIST) Rob Galler; (POL) vacant; (PSYC) Leslie Valdes; (SW) Sandra Chesborough; (SAN) Tracy Ore, John Alessio; (WS) Elizabeth Berila
SPECIAL SERVICES: (Unit Representative) vacant; (OAA) vacant; (COUN) vacant; (LR&TS) Chris Inkster, Sandra Q. Williams, Tom Hergert; (MEN’S ATHL) vacant; (WOMEN’S ATHL) Jenifer Odette
1. Call to order at 3:20 PM.
· Kilborn asked Senate to email Monica to ask for new nametags if they do not have them at this meeting.
· The meeting this week is being held in South Voyageurs but typically it will be in Cascade.
· Kilborn introduced Polly Chappell, the new administrative assistant to the FA.
· Kilborn remarked that she has had ongoing conversations with the Provost regarding accountability. It is important for both faculty and administrators to follow the contract (listing office hours on office door, going to classes when scheduled, and finding someone to cover in absences). There was a brief discussion about office hours; when faculty are teaching classes that require heavy research, they can post that they are available for two hours in the library, for instance, or they can have email office hours. Flexible use of office hours are perfectly appropriate—faculty just need to post those hours on their door and to be available as they say they will be in order to show accountability.
· Kilborn discussed an email sent out today from Judy Litterst regarding the General Education website and she encouraged faculty to visit it and participate in the discussions about General Education revision.
· Elections today.
2. Approval of Minutes
a. Faculty Senate Minutes of May 10, 2005 (FS 091305 2.a)
Motion to approve Faculty Senate Minutes of May 10, 2005—(Condon/Whites). Passed
b. Executive Committee Minutes of September 6, 2005; August 16, 2005; July 19, 2005; June 21, 2005 (FS 091305 2.b)
Motion to approve EC Minutes of September 6, 2005—(Ore/Tabakin). Passed
Motion to approve EC Minutes of June 21, 2005—(Karasik/Whites). Passed
Motion to approve EC Minutes of July 19, 2005—(Condon/Ore). Passed
Motion to approve EC Minutes of August 16, 2005—(Schoenberger/Gasparino). Passed
c. Budget Review Committee Minutes of May 10, 2005 (FS 091305 2.c)—filed.
d. Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) Committee, Report of 2004-2005: for filing (FS 091305 2.d)—filed.
e. TLTR Minutes of May 6, 2005: for filing (FS 091305 2.e)—filed.
f. General Education Committee Minutes of May 6, 2005: for filing (FS 091395 2.f)—filed.
3. Treasurer’s Report (FS 091305 3)
Report from EC September 9, 2005, Treasurer’s Report: the FA bought a $20,000 CD this summer; there is $5,000 plus in a money market account; and in the checking account, there is $1,381.27; however the IFO will be making a deposit this month. This does not include the agency account, and Kilborn pointed out that the 04-05 end-of-year report, which included the agency account, was in the Senate packets. The checking account will be balanced and accessed online from now on to ease the shift of new treasurers. There was discussion of the IFO and their proposed new accounting practices. There was a discussion regarding the FA budget.
6. f. Time Definite: 3:45 p.m. Negotiations Report/Action Report
Negotiations Report—Langen reported that the IFO Negotiations Team (“Team”) met last weekend with the MnSCU Negotiations Team and they will meet again this Thursday. The long-awaited economic package featured all old language, one step this year, and one step next year; the offer was prefaced with a break from past practice in an explicit effort to get down to bargaining. The IFO Team spent the day in a substantial rewrite of the last rewrite, which was turned in Saturday morning. Both Teams met at 11:00 AM, and the IFO Team expressed their disappointed that the offer did not come down that much; however, there were language provisions presented at this time: changing it so that department chairs no longer would be appointed by the president, but the MnSCU Team wanted to retain the proposal that Deans could assign chairs’ supervisory duties with no exclusion from the union. Kilborn asked about floating duty days. Langen stated they specifically wanted to focus on floating duty days for librarians, the Counseling Center, and coaches, which was a change from the earlier proposal where Administration could assign any faculty duty days. Langen stated that one thing that irritates him, tries his patience, and hangs things up was to see that the other side has a MnSCU accountant responsible for facts and figures because any offers need to be evaluated on economic costs, and over the years the IFO Team has turned up many mathematical mistakes (he discussed examples that result in the IFO Team’s proposals ending up looking astronomical when they are done due to the cost calculations). The MnSCU Team says that DOER will accept no other calculations for the costs.
When asked about the mood of the MnSCU Team and the likeliness of the contract being settled soon, Langen stated that his experience as a negotiator is different from others and that he finds the exchanges extremely formal, the IFO Team is addressed in a formal manner even though they do not often hear what they would like. He said that Chris Dale, chief negotiator of the MnSCU Team, would like to settle on their terms, but even so they have moved beyond their initial offer on Friday, even if the move was rather small. Movement and progress on the MnSCU Team’s side is a signal that the IFO Team has not run into a wall, and all in all their exchanges are very respectful. There was discussion about negotiations. Schoenberger stated that anyone can contact the MnSCU Negotiations Team with respectful letters and questions and that Langen does not need to do all the talking.
Action Report—“Stop the Slide” buttons and armbands were discussed. Michael Connaughton has armbands for faculty to wear and to distribute to fellow faculty members in their departments.
4. Consent Agenda—ballots were passed out and the agenda moved to new items (5.).
5. Call for new agenda items—Establish a Process for the Search Committees in the Hiring of Deans for the COB and COSS—(Larkin) (8.i.)
6. Announcements
a. Senate schedule for 2005-2006—Kilborn discussed the schedule and stated that basically she used the same process as last year and that Senate should note that they do not meet quite every other week; there will be back-to-back meetings in November and April. Most meetings will be held in Cascade, but look on the agenda each time to verify the location.
b. Centers of Excellence—Item is also on new business. The proposals going forward include: Business, Allied Health, Nano/Biotechnology, and Engineering. Attachment 8.f. is the schedule that will be followed for selecting the centers. The EC has asked Administration for copies of the proposals to review. The Centers will be announced on October 18, and they will be picking three centers system-wide. Proposals for Centers must include partnership or collaboration with other institutions.
c. Doctorates—On September 28, in the Oak Room, at 3:00 PM, Mitch Rubinstein will be discussing applied doctorates in certain fields such as Educational Administration, Applied Psychology, Nursing, and Audiology. These doctorates must be done in collaboration with other schools or must include distance education. The timeline is moving very fast, and MnSCU expects that the first applicants may start school as early as fall of 2008. There is lots of work to be done in terms of the contract, workload issues, resource issues, etc.
d. D2L—Condon and Schoenberger were asked to discuss this issue. Condon talked about slowness due to so many MnSCU schools starting at the same time this past fall (SCSU started later than other campuses); the faculty were uploading, students were registering at the same time. She discussed how at one campus students were manually registered. Personally she had some problems yesterday but she doesn’t know what happened. Kilborn stressed the importance of faculty asking their colleagues to report to her any problems with D2L. Schoenberger explained that what happened at other campuses this past fall was a good reason for schools not to be on one calendar. People experiencing problems with D2L should report them to their FA reps, IFO Board Members, or the President since D2L issues are on the agenda for the IFO Board meeting on September 15-16.
e. Searches: Vice President for Student Life and Development, Dean of COB, Dean of COSS, Affirmative Action Director—Administration has asked the FA for representatives for these searches: they would like four faculty for the VP for Student Life and Development (which will be discussed later), six faculty for the Dean of COB, and six for COSS. Schoenberger stated that names were sent to Zemek de Dominguez last spring for the Affirmative Action Director and Kilborn will follow up with this.
4. Consent Agenda—those elected indicated by underline
· University Committees
Applied Research Committee: Nancy Bacharach (Teacher Development, COE) and Jim Robinson (English, COFAH)
Division of General Studies (DGS): Raymond Phillippot (English, COFAH)
Enrollment Management Committee: David Warne (COFAH)
IRB: Allen Habib (Philosophy, COSS)
NCA Assessment Committee: Joyce Simones (Nursing Science Department, COSE)
Task Force on Student Program Completion: Debra Leigh (CARE)
Test Scoring Service Advisory Work Group (1 from each college): Sandra Johnson (Math, COSE); Leslie Valdes (COSS)
· FA Committees
Admission and Retention Committee (1 COFAH): Carol Mohrbacher (COFAH);
General Education Committee (2 COE): Semya Hakim (COE), Luther Rotto (COE)
Government Relations (1 COSE): Jeffrey Johnson (COSE)
International Student Service Committee (1 COFAH): Marla Kanengieter (COFAH), Jim Robinson (COFAH)
International Studies Committee
(2 COSS): John Allesio, Chuckwunyere Ugochukwu (COSS), Eungmin Kang (COSS), Jason Lindsey (COSS), Abbas Mehdi (COSS), Zoa Rockenstein (COSS)
(1 from COB): Ray Tsai (COB)
Cultural Diversity Committee (1 COFAH): Janna Knittel (COFAH); Tami Spry (COFAH)
· IFO/MnSCU Committees
COPE (Council on Professional Education) Committee (1 from each university): John Hoover (COE)
Feminist Issues Committee (1 from each university): Zoa Rockenstein (COSS)
Government Relations (2 from each university): John Palmer; David Warne
Investment Committee (1): Annette Schoenberger (COSE)
Joint Taskforce on Graduate Education (1 from each university): Monica Devers (COFAH); Lisa Heinrich (COFAH); Amos Olangunju (COSE)
Motion to approve the Consent Agenda—(Condon/Gasparino). Passed
Motion to move to agenda items 8.b., 8.h., and 8.i.—(Larkin/Ore). Passed
7. Unfinished Business
a. Academic Bill of Rights—not discussed.
b. Draft proposal for Public History Task Force (FS 042605 8.a; FS091305 7.b) – will appear on September 27th Senate Agenda, time definite at 3:45—not discussed.
8. New Business
a. Time Definite: 5 p.m. Introduction of New 1B1 Investigator: Nancy Jessee—(after item 8.g.)
b. IFO Board Position—Kilborn announced that Theresia Fisher resigned due to health reasons. Based on IFO manual operating procedures, EC approved Schoenberger temporarily to replace her at the next Board meeting since the FA wants as much representation as possible at short notice. This is a temporary fix and a decision needs to be made on whether to hold an election at large, as stated in the constitution. Currently Andrew Larkin, Jayantha Herath, and Judy Kilborn are on the IFO Board. There was discussion. Kilborn will put out a call, and Schoenberger will serve until there is time for an election.
c. Academic Freedom Committee Report (Condon)—Condon apologized to Senate that she was unable to hand out a recommendation due to computer failure, but she reported that the Academic Freedom Committee met several times over the summer and they do have a recommendation to bring to Senate. She plans on having this for the next Senate meeting. Academic Freedom will be on the agenda for next time.
d. D2L—Kilborn asked that faculty get the word out to report any problems to her.
e. Centers of Excellence (FS 091305 8.f)—The timeline for proposals can be found in the packets and Kilborn pointed out that the timeline is moving pretty fast, with the date of announcement on October 18. Administration has promised EC to forward the proposals from this campus. Kilborn stated that Administration told EC at Meet and Confer that the proposals on this campus were worked on by both faculty and administration, and that any curriculum involved would go through the standard curriculum process. There was discussion about Centers for Excellence and the criteria, which turned into a discussion about doctorates, and workload and resource issues.
f. Local Equity Officer Orientation (FS 091305 8.g)—Schoenberger discussed how last year she asked for volunteers, but Senate had no idea if the people were qualified or not, so she asked Pat Arseneault if she would be willing to do a workshop on campus. There was discussion about having one local equity advocate and the obstacles she faces when trying to advise people making charges. We need to schedule the workshops and announce them now that we know what Pat Arseneault plans to include.
g. Grade Policy (FS 091305 8.h)—There was some discussion about the document in the packet.
Motion to refer the Grade Policy to the Academic Affairs committee, and to have them report back before the last Senate meeting of the semester—(Schoenberger/Larkin). Passed
a. Time Definite: 5 p.m. Introduction of New 1B1 Investigator: Nancy Jessee
Jessee introduced herself and spoke about investigating discrimination and harassment complaints. She is here and open for business in room 208 in the Administration building. She has practiced law for twenty-two years in TX, and she finds this change very enjoyable, and it is a privilege to work with SCSU. She stated that she reports to the President, that she has some independence, but not entirely. When asked to describe her position, she stated she is here to protect those on campus from discrimination and/or harassment and retaliation; she is objective as possible and careful with her reporting. She discussed the process of making a complaint and explained that after she reports, a decision-maker is appointed in administration and that she is not in the decision-making process at all. She informed Senate that decision-makers go through decision-making training held on campus, which is required and put on by MnSCU. She stated that she is available to anyone who needs to talk, that she will listen to anyone complain. She added that she was born and raised in Paris, TX, and that she practiced law in Denton, TX. She does not practice law in MN, she was not hired by SCSU to be a lawyer; she was hired to be an investigator. She has also been a judge.
h. Search Committee for Vice President for Student Life and Development) (FS 091305 8.i)—Kilborn stated that Administration requested four faculty members for the Search Committee, probably because last time there were four members. She explained how the request went to the wrong office, and by the time she received it, the deadline was impossible to meet, so Administration allowed them some extra time so they will need to move quickly. There was a request for Kilborn to request more students on the Search Committee and she will follow up with this with Administration. There was discussion about Administration using a search firm, and it was noted that a search firm was not used last time for this position.
Motion for the FA to agree to four faculty representatives for the Search Committee for Vice President for Student Life and Development: one from the Counseling Center, one from First Year Experience Advisory Committee, one from CARE, and one faculty who has a connection in an advisory capacity to a unit in Student Life and Development—(Schoenberger/Condon).
Motion to substitute—(Steve Anderson/Larry Roth). Passed
Substitute motion for the FA to agree to four faculty representatives for the search committee for Vice President for Student Life and Development: one from the Counseling Center, one from First Year Experience Advisory Committee, one from CARE, and one faculty representing the whole university, not just a directly affected area—(Steve Anderson/Larry Roth). Passed
i. Establish a Process for the Search Committees in the Hiring of Deans for COB and COSS
Motion to begin the process of establishing search committees to hire deans for COB and COSS, using the standard process and having five faculty representatives from the following make up: at least one minority, at least one female, no more than one faculty per department, and one faculty at large outside the college—(Larkin/Gammell). Passed
9. Adjournment at 5:09 PM.