Meeting Minutes
ACADEMIC SENATE MINUTES
February 1, 2010
Call to Order
The regular meeting of the Academic Senate, held on January 11, 2009 was called to order at 3:03 pm by James A. Anderson, Senate President. The meeting was held in room 115 C. Roland Christensen Center.
Roll: Jacob Adams, Elizabeth Adoyo, David Ailion, Peter Alfeld, Bob Allen, Tim Ameel, Richard Barton, Shmuel Baruch, Amanda Barusch, David Blair, Kumiko Boike, John Bowman, Francis H. Brown, Connie Bullis, Steve Carson, Vincent Cheng, Gwen Latendresse for Margaret Clayton, Tayler Clough, John Conboy, Suzanne Darias, Larry DeVries, Tina Diekmann, Marianna DiPaolo, Nadja Durbach, Eric Eddings, Marlene Egger, Richard Ernst, Richard Forster, Jessica Gilmore, Michael Goodman, Pat Hanna, Michael Hardman, Sandra Hasstedt, Henryk Hecht, Bob Hill, Katie Hobbs, Lauren Holland, Harriet Hopf, Martin Horvath, Jay Jordan for Tom Huckin, David Kiefer, Jocelyn King for Cameron King, Bruce Landesman, Stephen Lessnick, Edward Levine, Joelle Lien, Laurence Loeb, Brad Lundahl, Paul Tikalsky for Peter Martin, James Metherall, Joseph Metz, William Michel, Aaron Moore for Alysha Moore, Courtney Ferrin for Katie Moore, Marta Heilbrun for Kathryn Morton, Allyson Mower, Chris Nelson, Maria Newton, David Pendell, Kevin Perry, David Plumlee, Mollie Poynton, R. Lor Randall, Steve Reynolds, Andrea Rorrer, Nelson Roy, Donn Schaefer, Bam Dev Sharda, Antonio Serrato-Combe, James Sibthorp, Erica Sellers, Sam Thomas, Jon Leano for Irving Torres, David Viskochil, Margaret Wan, Donna White, Bryce Williams, Lindsay Williams, Seth Welborn, Braden York, Nick Wolfinger.
Excused: Eric Hinderaker, Vladimir Hlady, Todd Kramer, Paula Smith, Michael Young
Ex-officio: James Anderson, A. Loris Betz, Paul Brinkman, Richard Brown, Robert Flores, John Francis, James Graves, Nancy Lines, Paul Mogren, Robert Newman, Susan Olson, David Pershing, Chuck Wight
Others: Ann Floor, Pamela Perlich, JoAnn Lighty, Carolyn Bliss, Martha Bradley, Ed Buendia, Maureen Mathison, Gerda Saunders, Kathryn Stockton, Stephen Alder, Tatjana Jevremovic
Approval of Minutes
The minutes of the Academic Senate meeting of January 11, 2010 were unanimously approved following a motion from Larry DeVries which was seconded by Suzanne Darais.
Request for New Business
The ‘White Paper’ was presented by Pamela S. Perlich, senior research economist for the Bureau of Economic and Business Research, entitled “Utah’s Demographic Transformation: A View into the Future”. This fascinating presentation was a shortened version of her paper which appeared in the Utah Economic and Business Review and can be found on the Senate’s website.
Consent Calendar
The resignations, retirements, faculty appointments, auxiliary and limited term appointments, appearing in the Appendices dated January 25 and February 1, 2010, received approval to forward to the Board of Trustees for final approval.
Executive Committee Report
Jim Metherall, Executive Committee Secretary, summarized his written report of the January 25, 2010 Executive Committee meeting.
Report from Administration
Senior Vice President David Pershing commended Governor Gary Herbert for taking a strong stand for higher education during this legislative session. In addition, the co-chairs of the higher education senate committee, John Valentine and Mel Brown, pushed for the higher education joint appropriations committee to oppose additional budget cuts. The vice president explained his views of what is going on. First, President Young is stressing to the powers that be how serious additional cuts would be for the University, at the same time the senior vice president is trying to send a message to the University to not panic and stay calm in spite of the seriousness of the pending cuts. He explained that for the current 2009-2010 budget year, there will may be a 4 percent holdback on the U’s budget which the Legislature should pass in the next ten days. Academic colleges won’t see that much as the administration will overcut on the administrative side again.
SVP Pershing said that last year’s base budget cut was huge but was halved because of President Obama’s Stimulus Act. There is little hope for new money to cover this year’s $25 million dollar hole. The administration is addressing this in several ways. First, they have commissioned an outside group to help them understand the administrative efficiencies to see what can be done cheaper, what can be outsourced, and what can be cut. Secondly, increase student tuition again which would help some but not cover anything like the full amount. Finally, there is some chance that the legislature may feel compelled to pass another base cut for up to 5 percent to balance the budget, but they will hopefully back-full it with rainy day funds for at least one year. He also noted that the University is not expecting to eliminate entire departments or tenure track faculty nor are they planning to do furloughs unless absolutely necessary. He noted that other places are worse off.
In closing, the senior vice president stressed that everything is not bad news as the University received nearly $100 million in private donations during the first 6 months of the academic year and external research awards rose to nearly $245 million over the same period which is an amazing achievement. He also addressed the faculty activity reports that are starting to come out stating that these are not driven by the administration, rather the real origin is the venture capital people and international office.
President Young requested that SVP Pershing encourage a discussion on the auxiliary faculty appointments proposal to find better way of appointing, reviewing and rewarding them.
Report from ASUU
Lindsay Williams, ASUU Senate President, reported on the activities of ASUU including the passing of the mentoring partnership with the College of Education. The COSA conference will be held on Saturday from 9a-4p at the Utah Museum of Fine Arts which is free to the public. Finally, a design contest, ‘Reimagining the Plaza’ at the Marriott Library, the senior class gift, has been announced and the first place winner will receive a $5,000 award.
Notice of Intent
Susan Olson, vice president for academic affairs, introduced the ad hoc committee members who collaborated on the proposed changes to Policy 6-310 and the new accompanying Rule 6-310. They are Carolyn Bliss (LEAP program), Dean Robert Newman (College of Humanities), Maureen Mathison (Writing Program), Kathryn Stockton and Gerda Saunders (Gender Studies), John Francis (Undergraduate Studies), Martha Bradley (Honors Program), and Ed Buendia (Ethnic Studies). Vice President Olson explained the two sets of changes to University regulations regarding auxiliary faculty and other instructor appointments and evaluations procedures. The policy portion is a revision of an existing policy while the rule is new. The revisions came about after an accreditation review recommended the University do more to ensure the quality of teaching and encourage excellence across the board by rewarding good performance. In direct response to the recommendation for systematic evaluation, the University quickly enacted the original version of Policy 6-310 in May 2007. Accordingly, the new revision clarifies the procedures to better serve as the foundation for refining and continuing to implement the new combined appointment-evaluation-reappointment systems for credit-bearing courses taught by other than tenure-track faculty.
John Francis noted that the proposed new rule is designed to recognize a small set of people who are doing the same work as Lecturer faculty that departments are, but they are not currently able to receive such appointments in the units where they teach. This proposal discussion is actually divided into two parts: 1) the review process which is the policy portion that establishes the review process for all course instructors other than tenure-track faculty, and 2) the rule portion, which establishes Qualified Interdisciplinary Teaching Programs (QIDT program). These programs’ review procedures, criteria, and standards and individual appointments made under them would be reviewed by a new university-level committee. These programs’ procedures, criteria, and standards for doing reviews and the individual appointments made under them would be reviewed by a new university-level committee. The current programs involved would include the LEAP program, the Writing Program, Ethnic and Gender Studies, Honors College. Any other program wanting become part of this program must go through the University process of proposing a change to the rule and be approved before the Senate. The proposal will be sent to the Debate Calendar of the Academic Senate for the March 1 meeting.
Debate Calendar
The proposed joint Master’s degree in social work and public health was represented by Steve Alder, chief director of Public Health. The purpose to establish the joint degree program is to enable student to pursue a MSW degree and a MPH degree simultaneously in less time and with a lower overall credit requirement. It does not establish a new degree program rather takes advantage of the complementary intellectual benefit from study in both areas. Larry DeVries made a motion to approve the proposal and forward to the Board of Trustee for final approval which was seconded by Laurence Loeb and passed unanimously.
The proposed minor in Nuclear Engineering proposal from Tatjana Jevremovic, director of the Center for Nuclear Engineering, was created due to the rapidly growing interest in nuclear engineering and the void of this type of program throughout the state. The degree would allow the University to emerge as a leader in creating a hub for nuclear education and research while complementing a number of existing majors in engineering, health sciences, pharmacology, biology, physics, astrophysics, and medical studies to name a few. Students from various engineering disciplines petitioned for this new undergraduate minor. Larry DeVries motioned to approve this proposal and forward to the Board of Trustees for final approval which was seconded by David Ailion and unanimously approved.
Information Calendar
Paul Brinkman, associate vice president for academic affairs, explained the 10th annual faculty complement which is a report on the faculty makeup by category. Five tables are included which comparisons data for faculty headcount for tenure/tenure-track and full time faculty as well as part-time faculty, teaching assistants and teaching fellows, percentage of student credit hours taught, and distribution by college.
The vice president also commented on the faculty senate apportionment which compares the credit hours taught versus the number of faculty teaching and indicated that some colleges had a decreased in the number of senate representation while a couple of other colleges increased their number of senators. This is a bi-annual report.
The undergraduate council’s review of Gender Studies together with the graduate council’s review of the Department of Family and Preventive Medicine were accepted and will go to the Board of Trustees for their information.
New Business
There was no new business.
Adjournment:
The meeting adjourned at 4:20 pm.
Respectfully submitted,
Nancy Lines