FACULTY SENATE
Tuesday, February 6, 2007
3:30- 5:15 pm
Senate Chamber, Old Capitol
Present: D. Asprey; J. Beckman; J.
Carlson; D. D’Alessandro; D. Drake; G. El-Khoury; S. Fagan; R. Herman; B.
Justman; C. Kletzing; J. Leddy; T. Loew; K. Marra; S. McGuire; F. Mitros; M.
Noonan; F. Nothwehr; M. O’Hara; B. Plapp; L. Richman; C. Ringen; J. Sa-Aadu; T.
Schmidt; K. Schuh; A. Sullivan; D. Thomas; T. Ton-That, W. Vispoel; J.
Westefeld; J. Woodhead
Excused: D. Balderston; S. Birrell; A.
Borreca; K. Brown; G. Bulechek; C. Catney; V. Dominguez; E. Dove; R. Fumerton;
C. Green; P. Heidger; Y. Li; M. Maktabi; R. Martin; W. Sharp; L. Snetselaar; K.
Southard; S. Vincent; W. Vispoel; R. Wachtel
Absent: L. Ayres; G. Bergus; A.
Boezaart; A. Borreca; L. Boyle; M. Cohen; S. Collins; J. Cox; K. Culp; M.
Donovan; D. Filios; T. Grabowski; V. Grassian; J. Heggen; G. Hope; M. Karwal;
L. Lichtor; S. Lutgendorf; S. Moorhead; A. Morris; A. Poremba; L. Robertson; G.
Russell; C. Thomas; B. Thompson; J. Tomkovicz; R. Tubbs; S. Wolfe; C. Woodman
Officers Present:
S. Kurtz; R. LeBlond; V. Sharp
Officers Absent:
J. Glass
Guests: A. Carinder (Student, SJMC); M.
Carney (Student, SJMC); K. Casper (Student. SJMC); N. Corph (Student, SJMC); A.
Cowell (Student, SJMC); M. Fluker (Student, SJMC); J. Gold (Student, SJMC); L.
Heamiston (Cedar Rapids Gazette); S.
Johnson (Office of the Provost); K. Knoll (Student, SJMC); L. Marshall (UI
Foundation); M. Mann (Student, SJMC); K. McElroy (Student, SJMC); M. Nelson
(Student. SJMC); A. Nosel (Student, SJMC); C. Orgren (Emeritus); E. Patterson
(Student, SJMC); A. Shurson (The Daily
Iowan); M. Streuts (Student, SJMC); A. Warner (Student, SJMC); M. Young
(Council on Teaching)
I.
Call
to Order – The meeting opened at 3:34 pm
President
Kurtz welcomed senators to the first meeting of the Spring semester.
II. Approvals
A. Meeting
Agenda- Professor Ringen moved, seconded by Professor Drake to accept the
meeting agenda as presented. There was
unanimous approval.
B.
C.
Replacements (Victoria Sharp)
· A motion was made by Professor
O’Hara, seconded by Professor Loew, to approve Sue Moorhead as the Nursing
representative on Faculty Council in Gloria Bulechek’s absence during Spring
semester 2007. There was unanimous
approval; the motion carried.
D.
Faculty
Senate Elections, Richard LeBlond
Past President LeBlond
announced the start of the Faculty Senate election process in the colleges of
Business, Education, Dentistry, Liberal Arts and Sciences, and Medicine. He
explained the three-part series from nominations through elections on the
Senate, the Council and then with the election of Officers at the final meeting
of the academic year. LeBlond read the number of vacancies for each of these
colleges. He encouraged Senators to run for reelection if their first term was
coming to an end and to galvanize interest amongst their faculty colleagues.
LeBlond acknowledged
that the work of this body is sometimes routine, but as we have seen recently,
it can also be very exciting. He wants to keep people engaged. He added that he has learned over the six years
of service that this is an incredibly important piece of the university’s
business.
President Kurtz added
that faculty governance is extremely important; it is important that we have good
people to serve in the Senate, and it will have an increasing role with the new
state governor. He said that Governor Culver
is interested in resuming the traditional role with us. He has already extended an invitation to
him. Kurtz added that it behooves us all
to get and stay involved.
II.
Guest
Speaker: Ms. Lynette Marshall,
President, UI Foundation
Kurtz offered a warm
welcome to a number of UI journalism students who attended today’s meeting.
He introduced special
guest Lynette Marshall, new President of the UI foundation, which does great
works on behalf of the UI.
She described the
current financial situation at the UI as the “best of times and worst of times”. We have just successfully completed a billion
dollar campaign, but her predecessor Michael New, the architect of the
campaign, died last year. He led the Foundation
to this remarkable success. In addition to the $1 billion campaign, it was the
50 year mark of the Foundation. During
that time there had been only two presidents, Darryl Wyrick, who served for 37
years and was then succeeded by Michael New.
She quoted from a
document written by Loren Hickerson who hired Darryl Wyrick as the Executive
Director of the UI Alumni Association in August 1958. The document, titled “Notes on Old Gold” was
written one year after the Foundation was chartered. In it, he spoke of gifts
to the UI as being significant to the giver, to the university and to all who benefit.
It is the business of the university to teach what is known, but it is also the
business of the university to dream, be it a casual fancy or towering thing of
depth and form. Conquering of cancer is such a dream or the achievement of a
brotherhood of nations. It continued that a dream may be lost for want of
substance to make it a reality.
She added that she was
particularly pleased to have attended the dedication of the New Art and
· Named faculty positions increased
from 190 to 245
· Presidential scholarships
increased from 50 – 118
· Foundation & university
endowments increased to $832m; and most recently it
is reported as $895m. She noted they are
closing in on $1 billion.
· Alumni participation has risen
from 11.5 to 15%
· Private support is being raised
for14 new buildings and 419 new programs.
She commented that it
costs $0.08 to raise one dollar.
1. Student engagement in philanthropy
-
2. To make corporations understand
why their help works here.
3. Work with Deans to increase
staffing. The UI Foundation has 45-50 officers, but needs more people sharing the
UI story across the country.
4. More focus on
5. To reach the $1billion mark.
6. To increase the endowment per
student.
The floor was opened to questions.
She was thanked for her
presentation before senators.
III. Reports
A.
Faculty Senate President, Sheldon Kurtz
·
President
Kurtz reported he heard from Professor John Solow that $250 was raised from the
sale of “Radical Minority” pins which was contributed to the Crisis Center.
·
He
noted that Senators Carlson and Sa-Aadu serve on the presidential search committee.
He expects Dean Johnsen will keep us posted as best as he can. On-campus interviews are still an open item;
it hasn’t been finalized yet. Kurtz said we have a big semester to look forward
to and hopefully on-campus interviews.
B.
Council on Teaching amendments to the Ops Manual, Mark Young, Chair, Council on Teaching–
Proposed changes to Section 15.2 have already been
approved by the Faculty Council. The suggested changes concern faculty office hours
and increasing use of electronic communication. Further revisions had been
suggested by CLAS.
Changes include:
Professor Young explained there was some Faculty Council
discussion consideration of privacy issues.
Faculty are encouraged to refer to the official university policy which
suggests the use of standard UI email addresses.
If the Faculty Senate adopts these revisions, they will be
forwarded to President Fethke to be approved before it goes into the Ops Manual.
He was asked for clarification about faculty response
time, recognizing that students often expect immediate replies. Young said the sense of the Council is that faculty
should be explicit about this to avoid other expectations. There is nothing to require faculty to
respond via email, but they should state how they will communicate with
students.
He was asked how many hours per week faculty are expected
to offer office hours. Young said the
Council had discussed this and decided not to put specific restrictions on
that. Only CLAS mandates three hours per
week.
He was asked if it’s acceptable for email responses at any
time. Young said there had been
discussion about substitution of email responses for office hours, but it was
not felt that that this could be mandated at this time in the context of the Ops Manual. Faculty do need to be
available at times, i.e., to provide signatures.
Concern was expressed about language in part 1 of the revision
which says that those who teach online courses be able to use electronic
communication implies that faculty on campus may not use electronic
communication. Of course those on campus
may use electronic communication as well.
It was suggested that the sentence in Section 15.2.h be
revised to read: “Faculty teaching
online courses, or those not located on campus, may use electronic
communications in lieu of office hours.”
Professor Loew moved to approve the revisions with the
addition of “in lieu of” in Section 15.2.h; Professor O’Hara seconded; there
was a unanimous vote; the motion carried.
C.
Revisions to Collegiate, Departmental and Program Reviews - Professor O’Hara briefly
reviewed the proposed changes to Sections 28.2 and 28.3 of the Ops Manual, to make the language related
to collegiate and departmental reviews parallel. Dean reviews have been put
into its own section. He noted that the word “research” has been changed to
“scholarly activity” throughout. These changes have the approval of the
Committee on Faculty Policies and Compensation, the Faculty Council, and Vice
Provost Pat Cain.
There is a new University wide policy on academic program
reviews from the Provost. There is a
diverse committee overseeing that whole review process.
Professor D'Alessandro moved, seconded by Professor Loew
to approve and forward the changes to the President’s Office. There was unanimous approval; the motion
carried.
D.
Smoking Policy – Susan Johnson, Associate Provost for Faculty. Dr. Johnson said she has made this
presentation on countless occasions. It concerns the Smoking Policy
recommendations that went forward to President Fethke in November, including a series
of items that will go into effect in July:
a.
An
increase perimeter around entrances and exits to take in account air intakes;
b.
to
have the university apartments convert over to non-smoking over a 2-year
period;
c.
and
a discussion about on-stage exceptions when they might not be an acceptable
alternative. Faculty in CLAS are
considering that recommendation.
d.
The
biggest recommendation is for the whole campus to be smoke-free by July 2009.
Johnson expects to have a deal of discussion about the
final item. She said the committee has
now been dissolved.
Johnson was asked if this policy applies to smokeless
tobacco products. It does not. The
committee’s motivation was primarily about secondhand smoke exposure. The
Health Sciences campus is in the process of creating a communication plan.
It was recommended that the smoking cessation education
program include smokeless tobacco as well.
Perhaps the Health Science Deans should be petitioned on this question.
Discussion ensued whether Kinnick Stadium, the Field house
and
Professor Loew moved; seconded by Professor Plapp, to
endorse the final recommendations of the smoking cessation policy. The motion was adopted with one dissenting
vote.
E.
Fund Solicitation, revisions to Ops Manual,
Susan Johnson, Associate Provost for Faculty
AP Johnson explained that one :one solicitation interactions
between peers are allowed only during the two months when on-campus
solicitation takes place and not within the public arena. The revisions were
strongly supported by Provost Hogan and were approved by the
Professor O’Hara moved; Professor Loew seconded, to
approve Ops Manual revisions to the
section on Fund Solicitation. The motion
carried by unanimous approval.
F.
“Roads Scholar” program update – Professors Downing Thomas and Steve McGuire
This program, under the formal name of Iowa Engagement Corps, was introduced in
May 2006, proposed on behalf of
Last May, a group of faculty members traveled to points in
western
This year, another trip to northeastern
Professor Thomas encouraged senators to volunteer to participate
in the program and to promote the program amongst their colleagues. He added
that they would like Provost Hogan and President Fethke to attend.
Professor McGuire said it was important for the university
to have a face in the public. This program provides a positive experience for
faculty. None of the faculty who attended the first time expected how well they
would be received. The goodwill
continues to this day.
This year’s theme is a kind of Chautauqua. When the host
communities were asked what themes they would like to discuss with UI faculty,
they responded “the environment.”
McGuire hopes to identify faculty in engineering to speak to this. He added they want an alumni story swap where
alumni and faculty get to know each other.
Last year, faculty self-nominated towards the end to fill
the bus, but this year, McGuire wants to identify terrific representatives from
the start. He asked for direct help from
Kurtz and LeBlond. He added that he
hopes
G. Performance Reviews:
Maureen McCormick, UI Learning and Development.
One year ago, she became chair of a committee to look at performance
review issues, to target the indicator directly related to this. By 2010 she wants 100% participation. They were also asked to look at the Ops Manual to make it more meaningful,
and to create a communication plan. Susan Johnson clarified that this is
applies to faculty in that they are often supervisors.
Professor O’Hara thinks it’s a best practice not to couple
annual salary reviews with the performance reviews. One of the recommendations we make is to make
it on the anniversary date. Attention is
focused on performance, and not the number they will get in June. It is a fairly
decentralized process.
Professor Kletzing said we should tailor different reviews
rather than use generic ones. McCormick
referred senators to the Learning and Development website. She wants to add to it, including templates
about how to do the job well. She asked
people to send their recommendations to her.
VI.
Adjournment
The meeting closed at 5:06 pm
The next meeting of the Faculty Senate is scheduled for
Tuesday, March 20, 2007, Senate Chamber, Old Capitol