Let's call the meeting to order. Call the meeting to order. And I should tell you that last year, John Madsen set the record for the shortest meeting. I think about eight minutes. And I'm afraid to tell yet. We probably won't break it this year, but we'll try. We'll try a lot of it depends on provost apples remarks. No pressure, no finishing. Our first item is adoption of agenda, but I need to announce a revision to the agenda resolution for we're going to pull off the agenda, lack of proper notice. So we'll pull that off. But hearing no objection to that revision. Let's hear a motion to adopt the revised agenda. >> A second. >> We're certainly not going to beat the record at this bank's. Thank you. >> So all in favor say Aye. >> Motion carries approval of the minutes. Any comments on the minutes hearing? None. I'll entertain a motion to approve the minutes. Second. >> Thank you. >> All in favor of the minutes? Indicate BY saying I and last caring to come forward with a memorial slide presentation, please join with me standing for a moment of silence. >> Thank you. >> Well, welcome back, everyone. >> It's great to start a new year. >> I just wanted to start off by saying I was very fortunate to known four of the five faculty we just memorialized. And I'm struck by the incredible impact that they had in many, in different ways. But they really helped to make this a great university. >> It is. >> And I hope we're all, we all take some inspiration from, from what they did. I think we have a great year coming up here. We have a lot of exciting things to be working on as we try to become the University of our dreams and our aspirations. >> I want to start off by, mike, isn't working better, good. >> So as we try to become the university that we, that we aspire to. We're going to be aided this year by having three new leaders on our campus. At the dean level. And they are Lin OCHA geeky, who will be the new Dean of the College of Education and Human Development. Bruce Weber, the new dean of the Lerner College of Business and Economics. And to know OK and Aki, who will be the Dean of the College of Engineering. So we have some new leadership at the dean level. And I, and I ask everyone to join me in welcoming, welcoming them, and, and also wishing them the best of success in working with them. So welcome to our new deans. The other exciting thing that happened over the summer in June, we got report back from the middle states commission of higher education, Rhea crediting the University of Delaware, we actually pass that accreditation with flying colors. The committee was chaired by Jerry colon, president of Carnegie Mellon University. And they reported that the university has been moving forward with at a pace that they call breathtaking. And I think that's actually true if you look at any of the metrics that we gauge a university by, whether it's the quality of our students, the quality of our faculty, our research productivity, all of those things have been skyrocketing without question. So we really stand out as a university that's really on the go. And of course, that shows up in all of the other kinds of rankings. We have recently moved into the 100 to 150 area with the, the best, what are considered the top world rankings, the AWR, you that comes out of Shanghai Jiaotong University, we've moved up, I think over a 100 spots in that ranking. And I may be wrong on that, but that puts us between 5468 in the US. As all of you probably know, we are in the top ten of universities moving forward in the US News and World Report. So this is a place that other people are telling us now, the ranking agencies, the middle states commission, that we're really on the go now. That doesn't mean we don't have our problems. And what we have to do is make sure that we work on them to get the kind of results that we want. Now, the middle states report was also very, very open and honest about an area that we have to do a lot of work on. And, and they said in all aspects of what we do. And that's diversity. So that will be a subject this year that will have, that will be front-and-center in everything that we do and we'll get a great deal of attention. And there are some developments there that are, that are coming on that will probably be able to speak a little bit more eloquently about when next we meet? No, I'm looking forward to working with the the Faculty Senate and Executive Committee on, on many of those. It wouldn't be a Faculty Senate meeting if I didn't talk about my passions around academic rigor, around increased writing and oral communication that I, I really want to make that another push on we're making progress. I'm impressed by it, but I can't wait to do more. I think this is an incredibly important area that we have to keep our focus on as we move forward. The other thing is that we will have some very important issues for the future of the university. And what we Expect from our faculty come forward around promotion and tenure. We had a lot of discussions last year on these. We handle of an actual faculty meeting around the role of continuing non-tenure track faculty as opposed to tenure track faculty. So these discussions are going to continue this year and I'm hoping that we can have very substantive discussions and get into a very good place. I do want to reiterate my feeling on tenure track versus continuing non-tenure track because I think in our discussions last spring that we were drifting from what I think is the critical point and the critical difference between those two positions. To me, there is only one difference. It has nothing to do with workload. It has nothing to do with the various, the three-legged stool, which I hope gets broken at some point. The research, teaching, and service, I don't think we think of ourselves that way. I don't think any of those things are important in trying to distinguish between tenure track and continuing non-tenure track faculty. In my opinion, tenure track faculty are expected to have an impact on the national level. And continuing non-tenure track faculty are expected to have their major impact on the local level. To me, it's as simple as that. It doesn't have to do with how much time you spend or how much time is allotted by your chair workload and so on, which is really how many courses you teach a semester. And so I want at least my opinion on that matter to be very clear and be in the public record. But I leave it to greater minds than mine to come up with better ways of defining how we want our faculty to spend their time and how we reward them. So with that, what I'd really like to do now is respond to your questions and your comments. Yes. >> Oh, I credit summer holiday talking about what's going on. >> I looked at it on the website on one page, and instead it was done because the federal stimulus dollars are no longer available. But I thought and I don't know the history of this, but did that start with stimulus dollars earned as just being ended? Because stimulus dollars have Hezekiah and actually bring a lot of clarity to this. >> To be honest, the I think the, the, the invoking of stimulus dollars was a miscommunication from the state government. The Summer College has been funded at least in part from a specific state line that was part of what they call the State special lines. Now, without getting into too much detail this year, the state special lines, which are about $25 million, those that went to colleges were rolled up and were left to the discretion of the dean in how to use the reduced funds on their priorities. However, a number of the state special lines that were not reporting to the college were directly controlled by the Governor and the Legislature. The line for the summer college comes directly from the state, and it was cut Now, the state may have cut it because they lost the stimulus funds that were some pass through. But the direct line to the university was cut for Summer College. Now we are very interested actually in keeping summer college going. We think it's I, I personally believe the campuses is tremendously underutilized in the summer. I think summer college could possibly be a great recruiting tool. And given the report we just got over diversity from the middle states commission on higher education. I think that summer college should go forward. I think we're going to come to that consensus will find a way to pay for it by restructuring a bit. And we also want to use it for making sure that we have opportunities for a more diverse student body. So more on that, I think in the next, there'll be more clarity in the next couple of weeks as we move forward. But I'm actually optimistic. I think some are ecologists can keep going. It's true that the State pulled all of the funding for it, but we think we can really structured in a way that will make it self-sustain and be a positive force for greater diversity on the campus. >> Going forward to it, joan, thank you. >> On the subject of diversity and recognizing that that's a multifaceted issue that we need to come back from a lot of different directions, and some of them are more difficult than others. But it seems to me that something that ought to be fairly straight forward is establishing a reservoir Fund which could be tapped into by any department. And I'd be on a matching basis citizen, if they can identify really well qualified students from historically disadvantaged backgrounds to help recruit them to graduate school so that we're never told we don't have money for that. >> I think you'll see ideas related to that and to the same idea with regard to recruiting faculty. The, the Middle States review panel pointed out that while we have the problem across the board, we really need to focus on diversifying the faculty and making our students are underrepresented students more successful too, because there's a fairly large gap between the graduation rates of, of students and who are under-represented, and those are from the majority. So certainly we'll be putting resources to both of those. >> And that applies at the graduate and undergraduate Well on that line. >> But I say that a good way prove that graduation rate is to prevent them from flunking out. And this is where I think something we've been talking about in the past, like better advisement and making sure that students actually have taken prerequisite courses with adequate grades is, is going to be important. Let's see an issue that's arisen in our college and maybe raise awareness, maybe Urbis NADH and maybe nobody else cares. College, but I know this university does a lot for recruiting students. Goods do Apparently, under the new parking regulations, a prospective student and their family that comes to campus had been arrested in the College of Sciences has to pay a fee to park in our lat. >> And they had if they decide to come on campus to visit the rest of the campus, they have to pay an additional parking fee that the parking services on main campus will not recognize the fact that they've already paid to par in the lot Townsend Hall. >> I think that's ridiculous purpose. >> I think if we're in the business of recruiting students, making a PEI wants is bad enough. >> But making a page like this is laugh in the face or prospective student that I will pass along to the appropriate folks. Hopefully we can fix it. Sounds little things that really drive people not say that we have up. Actually, I think faculty, you mess up their parking and, and you can make them angry to university, even though everything else is go and well, we have a potential donor who is at 1, was a billionaire and will not give the university any money because was carves told me he was a student and we didn't even touch it, the city. So Steve, but I will say those kinda little things are so frustrating because they can negate some, really, you could have that student might have had a tremendous experience with five or six faculty and then come back and find a parking ticket or they get dinged again and it just negates the whole sum. So I appreciate it. >> And the secretary that organizes these would greatly appreciate it because I think she's already has several arguments with parents saying what's the deal. >> Well, thank you and thanks for the opportunity. >> Jeff, some announcements. >> We'll have our first open hearing will be Wednesday, September 28th and the location will be announced. I think Smith all but that will send an email out to all faculty on that. The question is whether ASL, American Sign Language, should count as a foreign language for Udi admissions. October meeting, perhaps November meeting, we will bring a proposal forward to amend the faculty senate, the faculty constitution, and the handbook or the bylaws of the Senate. Since this means going to run longer than normal, we don't want to bring you back here in January. So we want to amend both the constitution and bylaws to no longer mandate irregular Faculty Senate meeting in January. As far as I know, we've been out of conformity with that requirement since the inception of the Senate in 1970. I suppose we also want to, embarrassingly enough, the Constitution requires, or sorry, the handbook requires that we meet the first Monday of every academic month. So we're out of conformity with that today. And so we want to make we don't want be scofflaw, We want to amend it for that reason as well. There'll be you can expect these to see these three items sometime this year. At least two of them will come in the fall. As you remember, we have a couple ad hoc committees, one on scheduling and the calendar. There'll be proposing a pilot program beginning Fall 2013, and I will have will also have an open hearing on that and a brief report to the faculty senate in October on that matter. As frivolous. Apple mentioned P and T revisions like a bad horror movie. You just can't seem to kill the things. They just keep coming back, but they're back with this will have a brief report from Jack Brodie on that. The October meeting will also have an open hearing on that matter and hopefully we'll we'll bring that to a close this year. And finally, there's discussion on a proposed policy regarding faculty suspensions or the euphemism involuntary leaves, that's under discussion. There'll be an open hearing on that matter and this body will review that proposed policy as well. I jumped now, this is where someone comes up and rescues me. I'm from the Department of Philosophy. >> If it's not advocating Thank you. Affected. >> So here are three ongoing senate projects that I want to keep you aware of. The first is we have a second ad hoc me on RB be chaired by Tom delve into hopefully we'll have a brief report from Tom in October on that. Our past president, John Madsen, has agreed to engage in a project looking for areas in the faculty handbook that need updating and to introduce a numerical system for the faculty handbook. And so he's gonna, he'll be bringing resolutions began in October to, to update the faculty handbook. And finally, our parliamentarian, no better person than Chuck for this chocolate. Be collecting Faculty Senate policies, resolutions, rules that differ from roberts, and we'll collect them, put them on the website. Right now, we rely on oral tradition and memory, and that's not always reliable, and so we want to codify those. And so you'll see more about this. And finally, let me say one thing about the three principles I'll be using this year in doing Faculty Senate business. And I invite you at least to contemplate joining me in adopting these principles. And this is a lexical ordering. The first is, as we contemplate faculty senate business, we want to protect, promote the interests of students. That's my major concern. Secondly, we want to enhance faculty governance. This is This body, this form is the major place where faculty governance is done. It's not the only, but it's a, it's a major place and we want to, we want to respect that and we want to advance that. So we want to enhance faculty governance. And thirdly, we want to work with the administration whenever possible and appropriate to advance excellence it at UT, I think given the first two principles, if we do those Well, the third 1, third 1 will follow. But those are the three guiding principles I'll be using this year. Any questions on the announcements? The questions on the announcements? >> We have no business on the consent agenda. >> We do have under the regular agenda for resolutions to look at. The first resolution, it's an updating of the faculty handbook. This is a time sensitive matter because it'll be an accreditation body on campus in early October with regard to this. So we need to get this done. >> So this resolution, you've had a chance to read discussion on this resolution. >> Steep center Bernhard. >> So the substitution F Professional Education for teacher education invites confusion with our other professional graduate education. >> So I, I actually checked with John Sawyer today. He said Yes, certainly does invite confusion. I assume that that switch to teacher education was motivated by the fact that we prepare professional staff who are not teachers for work in public schools? I don't know. >> The committee thought about that when they were revising the language, the fears lacking for people. >> And let me furthest to our new Deputy Provost, it was motivated by the fact that we prepare school leaders. We prepare, we prepare school psychologist, a number of other kinds of professionals for schools that are also accredited by yeah. Okay. So I I'm sympathetic with the confusion issue. I don't have I don't have solution to that problem right now because we didn't need it to be broader than teachers that John Sawyer nicely thanks for bringing this up and bring it to my attention. >> I apologize that I was not aware. >> But before today when Steve brought to my attention, I certainly agree with mutation be high and the rewrite. >> My only concern is that there are several statements in the policy that if taken out of context, can be interpreted much more broadly than the preparation of professionals in the education arena. >> There's only really one paragraph parenthetical statement in there that identifies it as being those who work in schools. >> So that's my concern. >> And I think there are some ways that it could be written to make it clear that this is among educational professionals, professionals in the area of education or something of that sort that I think would assign some of those concerns questions, comments. >> If not, I'll entertain emotion to call question because it only did Deutsche up what's called a vote. Then often favor resolution. One, signify by raising your placard, your car, please. Thank you. Those opposed and the resolution passes. Resolution to this is elimination of senior day senior days or tradition that's been around for apparently one year. It's the Thursday before finals. We the committee could not think I'm reporting this correctly. The committee could not find the origin the Senior Day. There seems to be no reason for it. And in order to expand finals week, accommodate scheduling the finals, the committee recommends elimination of senior debt. >> Discussion on this resolution number to hearing no discussion. >> All in favor resolution new, signify by raising placard or those opposed. And resolution two passes. >> Third resolution there is what's called APR. >> You hear that you think academic program review, this is not, this is associated with that and not that. This is a committee that reviews the APR reports and this rest this resolution is amended. The composite, the composition of that committee bit. It is bringing the newly elected president elect, who the following year will chair the Coordinating Committee. The Coordinating Committee often will deal with the issues brought up in this meeting. And so it's giving the new it's bringing in the person who will chair the next year, the committee that will deal with these issues. So it's making a slight modification of that committee membership discussion on this resolution hearing. None. All in favor, please raise your card and the resolution passes. Resolution for the same scene of John Morgan with jump out because he's the one who alerted me to this. We've pulled resolution for resolution five, recommendation from the Faculty Senate Committee on Rules having to do with recommendations. Many people Who consent to write recommendation for students find that the institution asks for certain information which currently is not which currently is excluded from comment by the faculty member. And so this resolution is amending the handbook to allow certain predicates, certain properties to be mentioned, which are often called for discussion on this issue, on this resolution as professors, right? As opposed to personal found human resource person? Yes. Little letters yes. That look down the rest of the conclusion. The result letters should address relevance and so on. >> Yes. Yes. And then soundbite being how we follow the same knew of phone calls. I live question comments? >> No further discussion. >> All in favor of this resolution, please raise your heart and it passes. >> We have no unfinished business, by the way. An educational moment. We don't have any we didn't we had nothing on the consent agenda. But the difference between Consent Agenda and the resolutions. Consent agenda are those items this body can pass and they go into effect. Resolutions go from this body to the Board of Trustees. So in effect, resolutions passed by this body are are advisory. And so that's the distinction between the two categories. Unfinished business, I'm not sure what that is that you think that would be old business, new business, and we have none of that. >> Introductory introduction of new business, professor Morning. >> Thank you. >> Geoff alluded to I've been reading carefully documents such as the faculty constitution and the bylaws of the university faculty senate recently. And there are some issues that I think we should address in the near future. One of them concerns the number of elected senators, which has become an issue recently in the College of Arts and Sciences, in which the number of du is now equal to the number of elected senators. And I'm therefore giving notice of an amendment to change the faculty constitution, which specifies in section four dash T2, the number 50 senators, which is the same as we had in 1970 when the university faculty senate was first established. When there were only 550 faculty at the university in about 40 departments and a couple of standalone colleges not subdivided into departments. And so I will read my resolution, which I understand will be referred to the Rules Committee. Whereas when the university faculty senate was established in 1970, there were about 550 faculty and some 40 departments on this campus. But there are now twice as many faculty and about 50 departments representing a considerably wider diversity of fields now than 40 years ago. And whereas many faculty wish to elect a senator from their own department to represent knowledgeably their departmental interests in the university faculty senate, as has long been the practice in the College of Arts and Sciences and some other colleges. And whereas the current limit of 50 elected senators, originally prescribed by the university faculty constitution in 1970 and never increased since then, may soon make it impossible for the faculty in the College of Arts and Sciences and some other colleges to continue to elect one senator from each department. Therefore, be it resolved that section four dash T2 of University of Delaware faculty constitution be amended to increase from 50 to 60, the number of elected faculty senators to take effect at the beginning of academic year 20122013. >> You're to give a hard copy of that by the constitution, I guess. So. That cannot be acted upon at this meeting except to refer to committee. >> And that will go to to the rules committee for my second. >> My second, yes. Okay. And the second was in reading the universe. The university faculty senate bylaws recognized that in fact, there is no procedure for reviewing changes in how senators are elected from the different colleges. So I'm now going to propose the following amendment to the by laws of university faculty senate, which are contained in the first section in the faculty handbook that's two should go to the Rules Committee. Whereas the university faculty senate bylaws and regulations do not currently provide for any review of changes in procedures for electing senators from each unit to ensure that the new procedures are consistent with the by laws and regulations of the university faculty senate and free from any other problems. Be it resolved that the last sentence of article ten of the by laws and regulations of the university faculty senate be amended to read as follows. Any changes shall be reported to the Secretary of the Senate and must be reviewed by the Rules Committee and approved by a simple majority of the university faculty senate prior to their implementation to assure their practicability, their adherence to traditional principles of democratic faculty governance, and their consistency with the University of Delaware faculty constitution and the by laws and regulations of the university faculty senate. >> And you supply in hard copies of those? Yes. Uh-huh. And who was the second? Second >> Professor Buhl sort Centreville. Hi, Martha Bureau, family studies. We had a faculty meeting and we the fact that we needed to be caught up with our annual post-tenure peer evaluation process needed to be addressed. And in looking at how we go about doing that, trying to catch ourselves up, I found that our our department's PMP by law, it's actually don't have anything specific about the committee that needs to do that or or the composition of the group that would do that. And, and I look through a few other PPE last from a few other units across campus. And that is that they were missing there as well. And because I know that we have been doing so much for the PNP at the university level and at the department level. If, if we are going to become more diligent in assuring that everyone has their post tenure reviews, that it might be something that we want units to have in their bylaws someplace and rather than have to redo PNP my last two years running or three, you're right, that might be something that we'd like to adjust this year as well. And I'm not sure who to refer that to. And I don't have a nice so that sounds like Coordinating Committee Brooks, chuck. >> Sure. >> So if somebody is discuss the issue, is is that something that needs to be a name for it? Because it's it's in, it's in the faculty handbook and it's in that chair. Successfully. >> P and T documents typically don't have a provision regarding post-tenure review. And so you'd like to faculty senate you that to see where it belongs to. >> And if it does, we could handle that now and you have to repeat everything again speaking, isn't that right? And I would suggest that as you think about this, you might not want to co-mingle that with promotion and tenure, but to think about having departments review their departmental bylaws, where I think typically committee structures and department governance issues are included in those bylaws. And there is an approval process in place for that, which I don't remember off the top of my head. I'm don't think that it includes the Senate, but I may be wrong, but I could find out, does it sound, doesn't typically get and with that, that would provide your remedy for them, for their concern. >> But it is something that the provost's office could certainly encourage departments to be doing. >> As we do try to catch up with the post-tenure reviews that were mandated to do. >> Thank you for pointing out that. The faculty handbook, there's the suspicion it's make work and asserting. >> Any other new business Introduction to Business hearing? None. Let me say 1 very quickly, I commend you. You're, according to Professor Morgan's figures, you're representing double the amount of faculty that your colleagues thirty-years had, would have, would have represented. But apart from that, genuinely thank you for serving in the faculty senate. This is the most important forum for faculty governance. And I encourage you to, to encourage your colleagues when cocaine calls to step up to the plate to become, to participate, to become active in the Faculty Senate. Make Jack's life easier. >> I'll entertain a motion to close the meeting second. >> And those in favor please stand and exit.
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From Joseph Dombroski May 06, 2020
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