Faculty Senate Minutes 4-1-09
1.) The meeting was called to order by Dr. Clint Atchley, President
Present: Clint Atchley, Mitzi Bass, Rafael Bejarano, Betsy Fulmer (alternate for Aaron Calvert), James Duke, David Evans, Martin Halpern, Barbara Landrum, Brett Serviss, Alan Wright (alternate for Renae Clark), Jane Dunn, Kevin Durand, Linda Evans, Vickie Faust, Rhonda Harrington, Paul Huo, John Miller (alternate for Yunsuk Kok), Catherine Leach, Dana Horn (alternate for Patti Miley), Michael Miller, Rochelle Moss, Pedro Lopes (alternate for Ceyla Taylor), Allison Vetter, Dusty Schmid (Staff Senate Representative)
2.) Dr. Vernon Miles, Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs, attended the meeting and discussed several subjects as well as answering questions posed by senators.
A. The state legislature has approved a bill which makes all state institutions tobacco and combustible material free by August of 2010. The minimum fine will be $100. B. HSU has four years to comply with the state requirement to reduce our funding of scholarships from 26% of state funds to 20% of state funds. With that goal in mind, the President asked the Business Office and Financial Aid staff to create a new model based on the levels used in 2006. C. In order to comply with state Program Viability requirements, an April 1 deadline was met listing correct codes for courses and for majors. A May 1 deadline report will detail cognate programs. A cognate program is defined as programs which share 70% of the same classes. Dr. Miles made clear that this report will not be used to cancel programs. D. Dr. Miles has applied to be a peer reviewer for a Higher Learning Commission visit. He and Higher Learning Commission Committee co-chairs, Angela Boswell and Jennifer Holbrook, along with Wrenette Tedder, will attend an information session in Chicago. E. Dr. Miles will check with a former colleague concerning a plan for discerning how to value work load units, number of advisees, number of class preparations, etc. in order to equitably consider faculty salaries.
3.) Mrs. Paulette Blacknall, director of the Education Renewal Zone (ERZ), very effectively explained this program. She stressed that volunteers are always needed and expressed her appreciation to those who are already involved in the program. The HSU ERZ serves as a liaison to eleven school districts and thirty-four schools. The first phase involves professional development; Dr. Julia Hall and Dr. Debbie Hill volunteered with literacy and mathematics, respectively, in the Arkadelphia and Gurdon districts. The second phase, Visiting Professors, involves thirteen professors from HSU who go to different school districts to offer instruction and encouragement. The third phase is the Arkansas Preparatory College Academy which will offer tutoring, study skill training, and career readiness information to seventy-eight ninth grade students every other Saturday and for two weeks in June. The Academy will start classes on April 18. A public reception will be held on April 13; the governor has been invited to attend. Mrs. Blacknall concluded her presentation with an appeal to read the ERZ emails and consider becoming involved in this effort to encourage younger students to desire and to value a college education.
4.) The March minutes were approved.
5.) President’s Report
Meeting with President Chuck Welch—
I met with Dr. Welch on 1 April 2009 to discuss the issues. Dr. Welch indicated that the budget situation will remain murky until next week when the legislature ends, but he is expecting more budget cuts from the state and no new money this year or next. These cuts will not impact us too much during 2009-10 because the he anticipates that the Governor will plug some gaps. We may be hit pretty hard in 2010-11 but by then we will have paid off the early retirement package and that will help us. We would be cut deeper this year if not for the Governor’s move to plug some gaps, but this is one-time money. The bottom line is that we don’t know yet. There should be some operating money available from the stimulus. There could be the restoration of some of category B funds that we lost last year—all of this will figure into our budget and we will know more in the next couple of weeks as the legislative session ends next Thursday. There will be no raises but also no layoffs. There may be a chance for a one-time bonus if we get the restoration money, but that will not figure into base salaries. Dr. Welch expects to get somewhere between $400K and $1.8M for capital improvement. Again, this will be one-time money and earmarked for the renovation of Foster Hall.
The bill prohibiting use of tobacco products on campus has passed both the House and the Senate, and Dr. Welch expects the Governor to sign this into law. If so, there will be discussion on where people will be allowed to smoke and how to enforce the law. The bill stipulates a $100-500 fine. Dr. Welch doesn’t think any of the proposed textbook bills will run.
Dr. Welch is looking into the possibility of keeping the old workout room in Garrison open for faculty and staff, no students allowed.
We have signed a contract for the emergency text messaging system.
We will hire a national company to redesign our webpage. This will be paid for with private money and by suspending advertising on cable television. We will continue to advertise locally in theaters. The company will survey faculty, students, staff, etc. to determine our needs and start implementing changes. We probably won’t see the changes until fall.
Dr. Welch and Bobby Jones have started working on the problems on campus outlined by the Buildings and Grounds committee last month. New lights and poles were ordered before the freeze and should be coming in shortly. The first ones will go between Arkansas Hall and Reynolds and over by Foster Hall. They are working on emergency doors and automatic doors now. There will be an environmental engineer on campus this week to look at the library to determine the library asbestos issue. All other issues will soon be addressed.
6.) Reports of Committees
A. Executive: The Recommendation from the On Line Course Compensation Subcommittee of the University Technology Committee regarding compensation for the development and teaching of online course content (as printed below) was sent to the Academics Committee for consideration.
A RECOMMENDATION FROM THE ONLINE COURSE COMPENSATION SUBCOMMITTEE OF THE UNIVERSITY TECHNOLOGY COMMITTEEREGARDING COMPENSATION FOR THE DEVELOPMENT AND TEACHINGOF ONLINE COURSE CONTENT
Compensation for Teaching
Compensation for teaching any online course should be the same as for teaching any course, regardless of whether that means it must count as an overload or as part of the instructor's normal teaching load. The instructor and department chair will set enrollment limits, subject to approval and review by those higher in the chain of command.
Should it be deemed appropriate for a course with larger enrollment to count as two courses in the teaching load (i.e., 6 hours of load credit for large enrollment in a 3-hour class), the course should be listed twice in the schedule in order to make that clear. In recognition of the difficulties inherent in online class delivery, we recommend that online courses be capped at two thirds (or less) of the corresponding classroom-delivered course (or analogue where a directly corresponding course does not exist).
Compensation for Course Development
When a faculty member is preparing to teach a course that is new to the catalogue or adapting an existing course for online delivery, an online course can be difficult and time consuming to create. When the instructor and department chair identify the need for a specific online course and anticipate that course creation will be sufficiently time consuming, they may request for course creation to count as part of that instructor's load for one semester (3 hours load credit for a 3-hour course, etc.). Whether that means the department must offer one less class that semester, pay that faculty member overload pay, or hire adjunct faculty will be determined by those above them in the chain of command on a case by case basis.
Ownership of Intellectual Property and Course Materials
All lectures, activities, and other course materials (course content) developed by the instructor of an online course remain that individual's (the developer's) intellectual property and may not be used by other instructors without the written permission of the developer.
However, the university temporarily retains some usage rights after the developer leaves the university. In all instances, the university can use the existing online course content for a full semester after that instructor leaves for any course which that specific instructor had been scheduled to teach. This time may be extended in the following situations:
- If the developer received compensation got to reduce other teaching responsibilities while developing the course content, the university may use the content for the remainder of the current academic year plus an additional semester.
B. Academics:
The Academics Committee met on March 19 and focused its discussion on the related issues of admissions standards, remediation, and retention. Dr. Halpern reported on a conversation with Amber Taggard of the admissions office regarding Reddie for Henderson Day and the possibilities for making academics a more important focus of the day’s experience for visiting high school seniors. Ms. Taggard indicated that there is a significant problem with a significant portion of visiting seniors merely viewing the day as an opportunity to take off from school and that they focus on hanging out with their friends and being rowdy. She reported that our guests are rude even to our president. Although students who are accompanied by parents or school personnel behave better, most students are unaccompanied. Ms. Taggard thought that any substantial change in the way the day is organized is unlikely but stated that faculty could be more “stingy” in giving students the sticker they need to gain permission for the day off. She also suggested the possibility of cancelling classes from 2 p.m. to turn that period over for academic sessions for visiting students. Ms. Taggard wondered how effective Reddie for Henderson Day is as a recruiting device and suggested that student visitors’ names might be checked against incoming student records. On the idea of faculty participating in visiting college recruitment fairs at places like National Park, Ms. Taggard was quite receptive. Faculty and staff at each table should have a sign indicating the program they represent. She suggested that admissions staff would welcome invitations to visit departments to learn more about academic programs.
Committee members thought that a decision should be made to give greater importance to academics at both Reddie for Henderson Day and at Heart Start. At Reddie for Henderson Day, having a specific time slot devoted to academics such as 2 pm can be accomplished without cancelling classes. Each department could have faculty available to explain its programs. At Heart Start, the current scheduling leaves no time for academic advising. The focus instead is on accomplishing the task of providing attending students with schedules.
The committee realizes that getting all our students to be properly prepared for academic work so they can succeed at Henderson is a complex task. Current admission standards allow admission of students with very low ACT scores as long as they are in the top half of the class. A preliminary look at data provided by Ginger Otwell just today indicates that very few of these students graduate from Henderson.
The committee also discussed the issue of research expectations/teaching loads/and equity across and within colleges. The committee would like guidance from the Senate in whether to undertake an internal study of the issue of the class load/equity issue and an external study of how comparable institutions handle the issue of providing some relief from heavy class loads to facilitate faculty meeting research expectations.
Submitted by Martin Halpern, committee chair
C. Buildings and Grounds: No report
D. Finance Committee: Information concerning state appropriations for HSU can be found at www.adhe.org Bill #1542
E. Procedures Committee: No report
F. Ad Hoc Committee on Promotion/Tenure and Salary Study: The resolution (as printed below) passed unanimously.
Resolution from the Promotion/Tenure and Salary Study Committee
Whereas, a highly qualified, motivated faculty is critical in assuring Henderson State University’s success as Arkansas’s public liberal arts university and as an institution of higher education;
Whereas, competitive faculty salaries and compensation are vital in recruiting and retaining an excellent faculty; and
Whereas the Faculty Senate is pleased that the state is providing funds to Henderson and other state institutions and agencies to increase the salaries of the lowest paid state employees; and
Whereas the Faculty Senate appreciates the positive effect the 2005 Salary Study had on some faculty salaries; and
Whereas the Faculty Senate appreciates the transparency of the current Budget Committee process and positive responses from the administration to requests for information from faculty; and
Whereas the Faculty Senate appreciates the openness of the Administration to reviewing budget priorities; and
Whereas the Faculty Senate expresses disappointment with the decision to neither fund the final year of the Salary Study nor set a date for correcting this inequity; and
Whereas the Faculty Senate wishes to note that even full funding of the Salary Study would leave Henderson faculty three (?) years behind peer institutions since 2005 data were used as the base for determining equitable salaries (consider also the further data with regard to peer institutions)
- faculty salaries as a percentage of the total university budget have declined from 23.29 percent in 2001-2 to 19.35 percent in 2008-9
- faculty salaries for all salary ranks are in the fifth or lowest quintile according to the latest data from the AAUP
- Henderson ranks tenth among twelve Gulf South universities in faculty salaries
- Henderson ranks nineteenth among twenty-two COPLAC schools in faculty salaries
- Henderson ranks fortieth of forty-two state IIA universities in our region in faculty salaries; and
Whereas the Henderson faculty are proud to play the central role in providing Henderson students with content -rich, high standards liberal arts education; and
Whereas the Henderson faculty’s role should be recognized with supportive and equitable treatment;
Be it resolved that the Faculty Senate of Henderson State University hereby expresses its grave concern, and strongly encourages the Administration and Board of Trustees to give immediate and serious consideration to the effects that this dire situation is having on the health of this institution, and to take all steps possible, including funding the fourth year of the salary study recommendations, to achieve a system of fair and competitive salaries to faculty throughout the university; and
Be it further resolved that the Henderson State University Faculty Senate calls on the University to shift budget priorities to make increasing faculty salaries to levels commensurate with those of our peer institutions the highest budgetary priority; and
Be it further resolved that Henderson State University Faculty Senate calls on the University to convene a high level Task Force with significant participation by members of the Faculty Senate to develop a plan for accomplishing the objective of increasing faculty salaries to levels commensurate with those of our peer institutions at the earliest possible date. A standing committee should be established to routinely review salary issues.
7.) Old Business: none
8.) New Business:
A. Concerns about the Job Fair being cancelled were discussed.
B. A motion was made, seconded, and passed to move the scheduled May 6 Faculty Senate meeting to April 29.
9.) The meeting was adjourned.
Respectfully submitted,
Mitzi Bass, Secretary