Minutes of the Faculty Senate

Meeting convened at 1:00 p.m. by David Worrells, President.

ROLL CALL

Members present: James S. Allen, Kola Ajuwon (for Gary Apgar), Robert Benford, Peter Chametzky, Terry Clark, Jon D. Davey, Paula K. Davis, James E. Duggan, John M. Dunn (ex officio), George Feldhamer, Carl R. Flowers, Mark L. Francis, Maureen Francis, Sanjeev Kumar, Aldo D. Migone, Karen Renzaglia (for Stephen D. Ebbs), Don Rice (ex officio), R. William Rowley, Pamela A. Smoot, Peggy Stockdale, Spyros Tragoudas (ex officio), Russ Trimble (ex officio), Susan E. Tulis, R. Viswanathan, Jan Waggoner (for John D. McIntyre), Matt R. Whiles, John R. Winings, Todd Winters, Kevin Wise, David S. Worrells.

Members absent: Allan Karnes (ex officio).

Members absent without proxy: Mark A. Amos, Carol A. Bauer, Peter Borgia, Joseph Brown, Uday Desai, Bradley F. Schwartz, Gerald R. Spittler.

Visitors and Guests: Rickey McCurry (Institutional Advancement), Glenn Poshard (Office of the President).

MINUTES

The minutes of the meeting on February 13, 2007, were approved as presented.

REPORTS

1. D. Worrells reported that the search process for a chancellor is ongoing.

2. President Poshard reported on some of the feedback he and Interim Chancellor Dunn received as a result of the meetings held around campus to address the University's declining enrollment. D. Worrells asked what the plan is to increase international student enrollment. Interim Chancellor Dunn responded that an enrollment management team has been formed, and one of the critical components of recruitment efforts will be a focus on international students, as well as the office of International Programs and Study Abroad. R. Benford asked if there is a comprehensive plan to deal with retention. Interim Chancellor Dunn responded that enrollment management relates to recruitment as well as retention of students. The first year experience group is making good progress on that front. Other areas that have been addressed are the monitoring of student attendance and the six-year graduation rate. J. Allen suggested that close attention should be paid to the comprehensive self-study undertaken by the University in its efforts for reaccreditation by the North Central Association. He believes the program reviews and accreditation self studies are a good basis for the University to examine seriously what it is, what it does well and what it can do better. President Poshard responded that the feedback he is providing is merely meant to reflect back to the Senate the concerns that have been expressed through the various colleges and people and to put in place at least some responses to those concerns.

3. Interim Chancellor Dunn reported: a) the House Appropriations hearings went well. The basic message was that they had not done well with higher education for some time. The IBHE recommended a 1.5% increase on the operating side, although after the Governor made his announcements, the percentage went to 1.9%. This translates into $2.1 million for the Carbondale campus (excluding the School of Medicine). In addition, the Governor picked up the IBHE's recommendations for the Transportation Education Center, assistance with the library deficit and design funds for the Communications building. However, all this is dependent on the gross receipt tax discussion being successful. It is not very popular with the business and corporate entities. The Senate Appropriations hearing is scheduled for April 26; b) at the February 28 Board of Trustees meeting, the proposed tuition and fees were presented. They will be voted on at the April 12 meeting in Edwardsville. He believes some thought should be given to the approach on fee recommendations with respect to involving the USG and GPSC earlier in those conversations; c) it has been a banner year for athletics, in both men's and women's basketball, swimming, track, baseball and football. All have been getting good reviews in many publications, including Sports Illustrated, TV Guide and USA Today; d) enrollment numbers are up slightly compared to this time in 2006; there is still much work to do in meeting the challenge of netting students; e) John Nicklow (Engineering) will chair the new enrollment management committee; f) Media and Communication Resources has a new name, University Communications. There is also a new web design that will be brought out soon. The design requirements for the logo for letterhead, embroidering, etc., are being examined to allow a little more freedom. Community involvement is needed to make that happen. T. Clark is helping to get the marketing initiative off the ground, and that is moving forward; g) it is anticipated the Board of Trustees will approve the Faculty Association contract on April 12. Work on the term faculty agreement is nearing completion; h) the budget is still about $4.2 million out of sync, even with $2.1 million the University will receive. Plans are being worked through to mitigate any type of impact on academic units in particular, but there will be some hits. The Senate will be kept fully informed and involved as that happens; i) the Grievance Procedure, with some minor editorial changes, has been approved and will soon be in place; j) the Mathematics Department recently celebrated the 50th anniversary of Math Field Day; k) undergraduate student Sara Reardon, whose paper was selected by the Council of Undergraduate Research, was one of 60 students selected out of hundreds of applicants to have her poster presentation at Capital Day and Hill Day; l) John Benshoff (Rehabilitation Institute) has been working on a program, El Valour, which is an outreach effort to take a masters degree to the Chicago area.

4. Interim Provost Rice reported: a) at the Dean's Council meeting, there was discussion about a graduate student enrollment committee that will be formed with representatives from each of the colleges. The committee will be convened once the summary of the capacity analyses that were done in each of the colleges is released. The purpose of the committee is to help find ways to facilitate efforts on the part of departments and colleges to promote their programs. In addition, it will evaluate internal constraints that prevent timely offers being made to attract graduate students or that prevent the processing of graduate student applications in a timely manner; b) Touch of Nature will soon begin a national search for a new assistant director. A Touch of Nature Advisory Committee has been formed, the purpose of which will be to help bring Touch of Nature closer to the curricular missions of the University and to make it a place where programs can carry on both pedagogical and research activities; c) Jim Allen, Lori Merrill-Fink and Laurie Bell are to be commended for their efforts to try and increase the centrality and visibility of the Honors Program, both conceptually and physically. Over this year, his office will be working to help Honors develop the kind of personality and curriculum to initiate programs that will bring more and qualified students to the University; d) SIU has joined the Illinois Homeland Security Education Alliance. Its mission is to develop and instruct on best practices for dealing with natural and human made disasters. The idea is to have a certificate program that would have as its curriculum courses that would be developed or already exist at the partners of the Alliance. Certificates would then be awarded in the various universities, but the courses would be taken across a number of departments. It is currently in the development stages. His office will soon be looking for a coordinator for this campus, as well as a team to work with the partners in the Alliance in developing that curriculum; e) the deans met with representatives of the USG to discuss the undergraduate student elections on April 10-11. The deans have agreed to add an additional five polling places in the colleges.

5. Vice Chancellor McCurry provided a progress report on the comprehensive capital campaign.

6. S. Tragoudas reported on the March 8 Graduate Council meeting: a) resolutions were presented on the establishment of two Masters of Science degrees, one in Medical Dosimetry and the other in Biomedical Engineering. Those resolutions will be voted on in April; b) the Educational Policies Committee announced a resolution that the Graduate School require all theses and dissertations be checked by software such as Turnitin prior to submission to the Graduate School.

EXECUTIVE COUNCIL -- No report.

COMMITTEE ON COMMITTEES -- S. Kumar, Chair

S. Kumar reported a request was received for a representative to serve on the Search Committee for Director of Information Technology. The committee forwarded the name of Shai Yechayahu-Sharabi, Assistant Professor, School of Architecture.

GOVERNANCE COMMITTEE -- G. Feldhamer, Chair

1. G. Feldhamer presented for a first reading the Proposed Revision to the Operating Paper of the Faculty and Faculty Senate (included as Attachment A to the Agenda). S. Tulis asked where the proposed amendment originated. G. Feldhamer responded that a couple of members on the committee initiated the proposal. Although there was not unanimous support for the proposal in the committee, it was agreed that the matter deserved to be opened up for discussion and a vote by the full Faculty Senate. R. Benford indicated that he and S. Kumar co-authored the revision, which is a follow-up to a recommendation he made in his final report to the Senate as president (2005-06). He believes there is a conflict of interest because faculty interests are not always served when there is a strong administrative view on some of the matters that may come before the Senate. Concern has been expressed about disenfranchising some people on campus; his response is that chairs, directors, associate deans and other administrators already wield considerable influence on policies and procedures, allocation of resources and other important decisions affecting the faculty, so they in effect get to vote twice, making their power even greater. He would like the campus to move toward genuine shared governance rather than paying occasional lip service. That would involve having a Faculty Senate that represents the faculty's interests in all matters that come before the Senate. R. Benford would like the faculty at large to have the opportunity to vote on the proposed change.

C. Flowers asked whether the Governance Committee voted to approve sending the amendment forward to the full Senate for consideration. G. Feldhamer responded that there was consensus by committee members to bring the issue forward for discussion. Though no actual vote was taken, he received input from all committee members. J. Allen believed the matter should be sent back to the Governance Committee, noting it was a lack of procedure within the committee to not conduct a vote on the issue. K. Wise indicated that the committee conducts much of its business by e-mail, and everyone gave input. J. Allen believes it is the committee's obligation under Robert's Rules of Order to provide the full body with the result of its vote. After further discussion, J. Allen moved to send the proposal back to committee; seconded by C. Flowers.

Motion to send proposed amendment back to committee was approved on a voice vote.

2. G. Feldhamer presented for approval the Resolution on Guidelines and Procedures for Faculty Searches (included as Attachment B to the Agenda). He indicated that some committee members are in departments that do not have problems with faculty searches; however there are apparently departments that do, so it was the consensus of the committee to bring this issue forward. J. Allen asked if the committee conducted a vote to bring the resolution to the Senate. G. Feldhamer responded that again, no official vote was taken, but there was general consensus to bring the issue forward. J. Allen moved to send the resolution back to committee for proper handling, in addition to citing the sources of the model(s) from which the guidelines were developed; seconded by T. Winters. S. Kumar indicated that several e-mails were exchanged by committee members; he indicated to them that he would like unanimous support for the resolution. No comments were made against the resolution.

Motion to send the resolution back to committee was approved on a voice vote.

UNDERGRADUATE EDUCATION POLICY COMMITTEE -- T. Winters, Chair

T. Winters reported the committee is working on several issues and will be meeting next week.

FACULTY STATUS AND WELFARE COMMITTEE -- No report.

BUDGET COMMITTEE -- T. Clark, Chair

T. Clark discussed the marketing of SIUC and presented a clip of the ad video, "One Place."

OLD BUSINESS - None.

NEW BUSINESS - None.

ANNOUNCEMENTS - None.

ADJOURNMENT

The meeting adjourned at 2:54 p.m.