Clayton State University – Faculty Senate Minutes

University Center Board Room UC 260

Faculty Senate – 2/23/10

The Faculty Senate was called to order on this date at 11:15 by Chairman Steve Burnett.

Members Present

Gail Barnes, Stephen Burnett, Scott Butterfield, Joshua Dyer, Nikki Finlay, Anthony Giovannitti, Alex Hal, Cathy Jeffrey, Jim Keebler, Adam Kubik, Marko Maunula, Antoinette Miller, Proxy Larry Menter for Judith Ogden, Junfeng Qu.

Non-Members Present

Carolina Amero, John Campbell, Linda Corva, Micheal Crafton, Corlis Cummings, Kevin Demitt, Tim Hynes, Elaine Manglis, Mark May, Leslie Moore.

Approval of Minutes

Prior minutes of the meeting held on February 9, 1010 were before Council for approval. Motion made, seconded and approved.

REPORTS

Report from President

Dr. Hynes expressed his appreciation to the Senate for the cooperation extended to him over the past months. He urged continued work towards transparency, collaboration and commitment to learning.

While general fund dollars are tight, CSU continues to work with the Clayton County Legislative delegation to make further the plans for the new science building. Details will be posted soon for the town hall meeting scheduled April 7 in connection with the Facilities Master Planning program.

Discussion followed.

Report from Provost

Dr. Crafton stated he had no report for Senate but that the P&T Committee is working “brilliantly” and a document should be ready to vote on in the spring.

Discussion followed.

New Business

3) Presentation by Student Fee Committee

Corlis Cummings told Senate that the Student Fee Committee has completed their work of course fees and mandatory fees comparisons among peer and competitive institutions. Caroline Amero and Kevin Demmitt gave a presentation on the data. The Committee also gave their recommendations to bring CSU in line with other Georgia colleges and universities.

Discussion followed.

4) P&T Report by Dr. Stephen Burnett – Dr. Burnett gave a brief overview of the current status of the P&T committee’s progress. The members of the committee requested any comments be sent to one of the representatives of the committee for consideration. The goal is to have a finalized document ready for faculty in time to hold open meetings so that it can be voted on at the spring faculty meeting.

Discussion followed.

Roundtable Discussion Topics:

1)  President Hynes appointment – discussion centered around the mechanism of Dr. Hynes’ appointment to serve as permanent president. Several Senators expressed concern that the BOR did not appear to have consulted the CSU community on the decision. It was stressed by all present that the choice of Dr. Hynes was not the issue, only the mechanism through which that decision was made. An initial motion to have the Senate express displeasure about this process to the BOR was proposed. After some discussions of pros and cons of this idea, the motion was modified to ask that the University System Faculty Council take up this issue at its next meeting. The motion was seconded and approved. Dr. Hynes thanked the members of the Senate for their willingness to speak openly as it supports the frank discussions that he feels are necessary for transparent governance.

2)  Core curriculum meetings – Dr. Finlay reported that the core curriculum committee was not going to recommend any changes to the areas of the core currently required by CSU.

Faculty Senate was adjourned by motion made, seconded and approved.

The next scheduled Faculty Senate meeting will be Tuesday, March 23, 2010 at 11:15.