Wsu Faculty Senate Meeting

Pending approval at December 11, 2006 Faculty Senate Meeting

WSU FACULTY SENATE MEETING

November 20, 2006

Senators Present: Susan Ballard, Kimberly Bates, Tamara Berg, David Bratt (Past President), Chris Buttram, Brant Deppa, Darrell Downs (Treasurer), Mark Engen, Pat Ferden, Tim Gegg-Harrison, Ed Guernica, Peter Henderson, Kurt Hohenstein, Matthew Hyle (Negotiator), Colette Hyman, Mary Kesler (President),, Vernon Leighton, Dan Lintin, Bill Ng (Secretary), Kimberlee Snyder, Jo Stejskal (Roch.-ITV), Bruce Svingen (Vice-President).

Senators Absent: Sara Barbor (Past Negotiator), Toby Dogwiler, Cindy Killion (Board) [e-notified absence], Roger Riley, Kerry Williams (Board).

Visitors: Ann Rethlefsen, Nancy Peterson, Greg Neidhart, Kari Winter, Charles Moburg, Joe Mount, Michael Delong, Rhea Walker, Carol Long, Gail Grimm, Doug Callahan.

Agenda Scheduled before Senate meeting:

I. Call to order

II. Approval of minutes of 11/6/06

III. Agenda Additions and Approval

IV. President's Report

V. Review of Meet and Confer Notes of 11/13/06

VI. Committee Reports

A. A2C2

B. Graduate Council

C. Government Relations

D. Personnel Policies and Grievances

E. Committee on Committees

VII. Old Business

A. Faculty Data

B. River Studies Center Director (OBB)

C. IPESL

D. Study Abroad Committee

E. Presidential Designees (OBE)

VIII. New Business

A. Lyceum Committee (NBA)

B. Ad Hoc Task Force on Arts Committee

C. Annuitant Employment Program (NBC)

IX. Adjournment

I. Call to Order

M. Kesler (MSK) called the meeting to order at 3:02 p.m.

Items in order except for OB-D and NB-A.

II. Approval of minutes of 11/6/06

B. Svingen/T. Berg moved to approve Senate minutes of 11/6/06.

Motion Carried.

III. Agenda Additions and Approval:

OB-F: Rental Car

OB-G: Promotion and Tenure (set for the end of the Senate meeting)

B. Svingen/D. Downs moved to approve agenda as modified.

Motion Carried.

IV. President’s Report

M. Kesler

President's Report

11/19/06

I attended a state Meet and Confer last Friday. Here are some highlights for the topics discussed:

IPESL

· We made it clear to the Chancellor that, while we were participating in IPESL, we were not happy with the way this was handled, we did not welcome IPESL projects, and any type of compensation like this must be negotiated.

· The date for the IPESL interim reports will be changed to February 26.

Doctoral degrees

· Each campus involved in the DNP would get the same state allocation per student from MnSCU as for any other graduate student.

· Mankato is planning to develop doctorates in counselor education and educational administration.

· All the doctorates being developed will be running a deficit, but universities are hoping that the allocation for doctoral students will be addressed in the allocation formula.

· There still seem to be questions about who will fund the startup costs for these programs.

· Judy Borgen told us that their office was recommending that a fourth level of allocation be developed for doctorates after several of the doctorates have started.

· The Higher Learning Commission may very well recommend changes in funding mechanisms as they review the programs.

· Workload and compensation will have to be worked on later.

Teacher Center

· An Executive Director advertisement has been posted for the Teacher Center housed at Metropolitan State University.

· The history of this is that universities wanted it to be a center of excellence, but the governor did not.

· The intention is to offer in-service training for teachers in the metropolitan area in order to provide an alternative to the private colleges.

· There is confusion about whether the formal process was followed with the director position, since this is a new kind of collaboration.

Policies

· Policy 2.3 and Procedure 2.3.1 address student involvement. Although not stated in the policy, it clearly does not include curriculum matters. That is the way the Chancellor's office has interpreted this.

PEPER Process

· This process involves teacher education and requires a considerable increase in the workload for faculty in that program.

· Much of this work involves more detail than substance.

· We will be working with MACTE to try to address this problem with the Board of Teaching.

MnSCU Budget

· The budget that will be presented to the legislature will include an average 4% a year for the biennium, with room for some institutions to go higher if some go lower than 4%.

· The budget also includes an initiative for the underserved (firstgeneration, low income, students of color, and ELL), for nursing, for another Center, and 10 million for STEM.

· The Board of Trustees have stated they will decide on priorities for the budget once they see how much of it the legislature funds.

Pandemic Planning

· The pandemic planning done on campuses, sometimes without faculty involvement, was meant to be an overarching plan for policy development, posing the questions that needed to be answered on campus.

· The plan was done over the summer because the state required information.

· There are questions about what would happen in terms of faculty compensation if we had to close and refund tuition.

Other

· Reimbursement for home internet through our IFO funds is being taxed because Congress feels that this lends itself to personal use.

· Al Essa from the Chancellor's Office will be working with an Instructional Management System Advisory Committee and he would like to see faculty have the dominant voice on that.

Spellings Commission Report

Bruce Svingen, Paul Johnson, and I, along with Nancy Jannik, attended a policy summit on “The Spellings Commission Report: A Catalyst for Action” in Indianapolis. This was sponsored by the Midwestern Higher Education Compact and the State Higher Education Executive Officers. We were among only a handful of faculty present. Other attendees from Minnesota included Chancellor McCormick; Susan Heegaard, director of the Minnesota Office of Higher Education; and Minnesota legislators Lyn Carlson, Sandy Pappas, Claire Robling, and Bud Nornes.

The summit started with Charles Miller, chair of the Secretary of Education’s Commission on the Future of Higher Education, summarizing the report and recommendations. Other speakers and panels focused on some of the major recommendations concerning access, cost, accountability, innovation, and quality. A number of speakers referred to the “urgent” need for reform or the “danger” our country faces because of the lack of reform in higher education. They cited global competition, structural problems in higher education, poor student progress, and other concerns.

Some of the specific recommendations cited in the report and by speakers included:

· Increase the productivity and efficiency in higher education so that the costs per student are decreased.

· Simplify the financial aid system to focus more resources on needbased aid.

· Make the costs of college more transparent to families.

· Improve innovation in higher education, especially in new pedagogies that focus on teaching and learning.

· Improve student performance in reading, writing, critical thinking, problem solving, and math and science skills. (It is interesting that they do not mention the role of the arts, humanities, social sciences, history, etc.)

Provide clear (and standardized) student learning outcomes in a national database so families can compare institutions.

· Develop a national tracking system to follow each student’s progress throughout their entire education.

This report seems most concerned with a highly educated workforce for our global economy. It presumes that higher education has few incentives to contain costs and improve quality. They want our higher education system to return to its #1 place after slipping to 12th place in the world. During the conference, we often felt that the blame for these problems was directed towards faculty.

Many conference attendees were troubled in that the Spelling’s report assessment goals for higher education are very different from the direction that higher education has been moving in the assessment of learning. The director of the Higher Learning Commission, HLC, Steve Crow indicated that the assessment criteria that accreditation body had been encouraging at institutions may have to significantly shift focus if the Spelling’s report becomes the regulating document for higher education assessment.

This report seems most convincing in its focus on getting students from lower income groups, as well as racial and ethnic minorities, an excellent education. Most families would probably also agree that the financial aid system needs to be simplified. However, the report’s focus on the collection of data nationally would bring up a number of privacy concerns.

Will the recommendations in this report be put into action? There is good reason to think they will. The recent elections may provide some moderating quality to them.

Additional Notes during Senate meeting:

1. Some Education Faculty was present to address Senate on PEPER process. PEPER is part of an accreditation process in the state for educational programs seeking approval, it is mandatory. PEPER process is due in February. The amount of work involved is highly taxing on faculty involved in the process.

2. Spellings Commission Report can become quite political and can affect higher education greatly. The final report, though, has been toned down already. Productivity issue appeared to be aimed at faculty and was felt by faculty attendees at conference.

3. Budget issue at the last State Meet and Confer (not in President's report) will be related to Faculty Senate.

V. Review of Meet and Confer Notes of 11/13/06

Meet and Confer Notes received by Faculty Senate.

VI. Committee Reports

COM-A. A2C2 (documents in Senate packet)

The following A2C2 items from the November 15, 2006 A2C2 meeting were presented to Faculty Senate for comments and consideration:

I. CPPS

A. New Courses:

1. NURS 498: Advanced Critical and Progressive Care Nursing.

2. PER 450: Travel Study in Costa Rica

3. MKTG 450: Travel Study in Costa Rica

4. GEOS 450: Travel Study in Costa Rica

5. FLAN 218: The New Europeans: Understanding the E.U.

6. GS 435: Indigenous Social Movements in Latin America

7. SOC &CJ 439: Sociology of Disabilities

8. BIOL 365: The Cultures and Ecology of East Africa Tanzania

9. Art 117: Drawing for the Sciences

B. Program Revision:

1. Global Studies

Faculty Senate approved courses and programs in Item I.

II. USS: No University Studies course can be cross listed with another course unless both courses have been approved for the same USP category. (A "cross listed course" is defined as one that was taught by the same faculty member(s) in which a student could register for the course under two separate class numbers.) APPROVED

Faculty Senate approved USS motion.

III. Notifications

1. THAD 210: University Studies Notification: Spring 2004

2. WS 320: Change in designation code to WAGS 320

3. MTED 100: One Time Course Offering: Listed again as the course was not offered last summer as originally intended

4. HERS: Change in major title from: Exercise and Rehabilitative Science: Athletic Training to: Athletic Training

IV. Motion 1. The Subcommittee recommends the addition of sections 3.a. and 3.b. to the Proposal for New courses in WSU Regulation 34. (See attached/below)

3. a Instructional delivery methods utilized: (Please check all that apply).

Lecture: Auditorium / ITV / Online / Web Enhanced / Web Supplemented
Lecture: Classroom / Service Learning / Travel Study / Laboratory / Internship/Practicum
Other: (Please indicate)

3. b. MnSCU Course media codes: (Please check all that apply).

None: / 3. Internet / 6. Independent Study / 9. Web Enhanced
1. Satellite / 4. ITV Sending / 7. Taped / 10. Web Supplemented
2. CD Rom / 5. Broadcast TV / 8. ITV Receiving

Definitions:

01Satellite: (no MnSCU definition)

02 CD Rom: (no MnSCU definition)

03 Internet: Predominately - where all, or nearly all, course activity occurs in an online environment. One to two activities may occur facetoface in a classroom, with the maximum being two activities.

04 ITV Sending: a course in which students are in the classroom with the instructor, other students join via interactive television technology from other geographically separate locations

05 Broadcast TV: (no MnSCU definition)

06 Independent Study: a course in which the teacher develops specialized curriculum for the student(s) based on department guidelines in the University course catalog

07 Taped: a course in which the teacher records the lessons for playback at a later date

08 ITV Receiving: a course in which students are not in the classroom with the teacher, other students join via interactive television technology from other geographically separate locations

09 Web Enhanced Limited Seat Time: For a course in which students are geographically separate from the teacher and other students for a majority of required activities. However, some onsite attendance is required. The course includes synchronous and/or asynchronous instruction.

10 Web Supplemented No Reduced Seat Time: For a course utilizing the web for instructional activities. Use of this code may assist your college/university in tracking courses for "smart classrooms" and/or facility usage.

Senate questions/comments:

1. If faculty changes delivery as defined in a course, the course would need to be re-submitted for approval. Process would be intrusive to faculty.

2. Defining that a course would be different because of course delivery would be imposing teaching style on faculty. Having the requirement that a course has to be re-submitted for approval if there is a change in delivery method would be too much work and would also be intrusive.

3. How is having different delivery method different from having different faculty using different teaching style for the same course? We don’t change course names or numbers if faculty uses different teaching style for the same course.

4. ITV designation changes course load assignment, not others.

5. Faculty might need to talk to department managers/secretaries on what boxes are being checked for their courses. Most faculties would not know what has been checked or what needs to be checked.

6. Mode of delivery could make a difference in content.

Faculty Senate generally agreed that Senate needs to study this issue further before voting.

K. Hohenstein/B. Svingen moved to table A2C2 Item IV until the next Senate meeting.

Motion Carried.

Requests that A2C2 address/provide:

1. Set of comparative data for to show that we need to stay in alignment with MnSCU coding and data on why delivery methods would change the course (content).