Minutes for May 7, 2007

The Faculty Senate of Eastern Kentucky University met on Monday, May 7, 2007 in the South Room of the Keen Johnson Building. Senator Eakin called the eighth meeting of the academic year to order at approximately 3:30 p.m.

The following members of the Senate were absent:

^*Indicates prior notification of absence to the Faculty Senate Secretary
^ALT Brooke Bentley attended for E. Hunter
^ALT Steve Barracca attended for L. Noblitt
^ALT Dana Howell attended for S. Shasby

Visitors to the Senate were: Gary Barksdale, Human Resources, Chris Blades, AFIS; Walter Borowski, Earth Sciences; Jim Conneely, Student Affairs; David Fifer, SGA; Debbie Newsom, Financial Affairs; Jerry Pogatshnik, Graduate Education & Research; Mike Sheliga, Technology; Wally Skiba, Human Resources; Aaron Thompson, University Programs; Virginia Underwood, Chief of Staff; and Marc Whitt, Public Relations & Marketing

APPROVAL OF MINUTES:
The April 9, 2007 minutes were approved as written.

REPORT FROM THE PRESIDENT: Senator Glasser

Senator Glasser shared the following in her written report to the Senate.

In light of the recent Virginia Tech tragedy, Senator Glasser shared the University's Campus Emergency Response Plan, which is intended to provide general guidelines in the event of a crisis situation.

Among the key components of this plan are a campus emergency response team comprised of key university personnel and a response command center to coordinate efforts to manage a campus emergency.

In addition, emergency plans for the extended campuses have been developed or revised recently. These efforts were conducted in cooperation with local, state and federal emergency operations personnel, as well as the University's Risk Management Committee.

The EKU Police Department is a full-service, 24-7 law enforcement agency with 26 sworn and armed officers. EKU Police can also call upon the Kentucky State Police, Richmond Police, the local sheriff's office and the Lexington-Fayette County Police Department to assist if needed.

The university has many resources to contribute to campus safety, or to respond to and manage a crisis. In addition to EKU Police, these include many policies, procedures and protocols designed to enhance safety and respond to emergency situations; physical security features such as the card access entry system for our residence halls; and a very valuable resource in the University's Counseling Center. Campus safety is also further enhanced by maintaining landscaping, lighting, shuttle bus services and emergency phones at various locations.

In the event of an emergency situation, notifications can be provided through the EKU home page, e-mail bulletins, electronic newsletters, telephone hotlines, a campus-wide TV information channel, WEKU-FM, and other local and regional media outlets.

EKU is also collaborating with the Madison County Emergency Operations Center to enable the University to issue an emergency alert via siren and PA system on campus, text messaging, cable TV emergency messaging, an asterisk system to use for voice messaging all campus phones, a procedure for voice messaging off-campus phones through a third-party vendor, and reverse 911 for use as notification to the emergency response team and a limited contact list of administrators.

Furthermore, all campus police vehicles are equipped with loudspeaker public address systems and officers are equipped with hand-held public address systems. Each University building has an assigned building coordinator and a communications system in place, through e-mail and phone, to quickly provide emergency information.

In addition to these safety measures, guidelines are in place for faculty and staff in dealing with disruptive student behavior in academic settings.

In the event a student presents a clear and present danger to the university community, upon the recommendation of appropriate University personnel, the president may impose any necessary measures to protect the student, the University community, University property, and/or the ongoing activities of the University.

Many other pro-active measures are in place, including counseling and educational programs in our residence halls and elsewhere. Supervisory training by the employee assistance program is available for recognizing the warning signs of violent behaviors and actions to take to avoid or minimize such situations.

Housing professional and paraprofessional staff receives extensive training on safety and security initiatives, including crisis response and management. Human Resources and EEO staff will receive training as soon as possible from public safety on actions to take if confronted with potentially violent individuals, and Human Resources will assist public safety and the counseling center in coordinating and scheduling training for all employees.

Human Resources will also schedule the employee assistance program to provide supervisory training related to these issues.

Senator Glasser shared a list of approved actions from the last Board of Regents meeting.

Senator Glasser gave a brief report on current projects:

• Phase 1 project drawings for the Science building should be advertised for bid on April 27, and Phase 2 site demolition drawings will follow shortly behind the Phase 1 bid.
• Clay Hall renovations will begin July 1 with a completion date expected by August, 2008.
• Bidding for Phase 2 of the Business and Technology Center is scheduled for August, 2007.
• The Intramural Field Renovation Project will be phased so field work can begin as soon as possible with the intention of completing the work so play can begin by Fall 2008. A separate phase will address the architectural component of the project: a building with concessions, classroom, operations, storage, etc.
• The Manchester Postsecondary Education Center will be bid on April 26, with completion anticipated in late 2008.

In other news, Senator Glasser shared the following:

• The Capital Campaign has passed the $18 million mark toward its goal of $25 million.
• New freshman applications for Fall 2007 are running slightly ahead of last year's pace. A more significant increase is seen in transfer applications, which continues to be a special focus for the University.
• Alumni Weekend is scheduled for April 27-29.
• Spring Commencement exercises will be held Saturday, May 12. The morning speaker will be Thomas Logsdon and the afternoon speaker will be another Craig Morrison.

Senator Glasser shared a "news and accomplishments" list for Spring 2007.

NEW BUSINESS:

Report from Council on Academic Affairs

Item 1 was introduced as an informational item only.

Senator Collins moved approval of item 2, seconded by Senator Johnson. The majority were in favor and the motion carried.

Senator Schoolmaster moved approval of item 3, seconded by Senator Flanagan. The majority were in favor and the motion carried.

Senator Sanchez moved approval of item 4, seconded by Senator Sambrook. The majority were in favor and the motion carried.

Motion on Unwritten Protocols. Senator May moved, seconded by Senator Winslow to approve the motion on unwritten protocols to change the language under "Academic Colleges and Departments" in Part 2 of the Faculty Handbook to include the following language at the beginning of the section:

Academic units may supplement the academic policies of the faculty handbook with additional policies provided that such policies are: (1) not in violation of the faculty handbook; (2) approved by the faculty of that unit according to the established procedures of that unit; and (3) written and made available to those faculty and staff expected to abide by said policies.

Senator Eakin ruled the motion substantive and deferred further discussion to the September 2007 meeting. If the Senate approves the motion in September, it will then need to go before the Board of Regents for approval.

GENERAL & STANDING COMMITTEE REPORTS

Senator Piercey announced that the one-time faculty merit awards should be distributed with the May 15 payroll.

Senator Piercey mentioned that over the last couple of months, the Senate has voiced concerns about the lack of faculty input on motions approved by the Council on Academic Affairs and the Provost Council. In answer to those concerns, the Provost has decided to temporarily postpone academic and policy motions presented to both committees so that the Senate may review the motions as informational items prior to approval.

Senator Piercey announced that his office is working on a system to better communicate the status of motions approved by the Senate. He will be reporting on the status of those motions being reviewed by his office at each Senate meeting. Currently there are two motions in queue. The promotion and tenure recommendations and the motion on the current membership of the Council on Academic Affairs.

Senator May moved to request the promotion and tenure recommendations in handbook language be re-submitted to the President for consideration and for consideration by the Faculty-At-Large at the Fall Convocation, seconded by Senator Robles. The majority were in favor and the motion carried.

Senator Piercey asked the Senate to reconsider the Council on Academic Affairs motion recently approved. As new motions regarding academic and policy changes from the Council on Academic Affairs and the Provost Council will now be postponed until the Senate and other affected parties have an opportunity to provide feedback prior to approval, it seems unnecessary to change the current makeup of the CAA Committee.

Senator Piercey shared a report of the recent activities of the following divisions: Enrollment Management, Institutional Research and Effectiveness, and University Programs.

STUDENT GOVERNMENT ASSOCIATION: David Fifer

Mr. Fifer reported that SGA has created a new award starting in 2007-2008 named in honor of Eastern's 5th President, Herman Donovan. The award is designed to recognize people who have benefitted the student body in some sort of exceptional manner.

Going in to the fall semester, a big priority of Student Government will be renovations to the Powell Student Center. President Glasser has very graciously appropriated money to make some limited renovations to the Powell Student Center in the fall semester. A number of focus groups to get student input will be held to determine the best way to allocate the available funds.

STANDING COMMITTEE REPORTS:

Election Committee. Senator Randles reported that the new part-time representative for the next two years will be Daniel Phillips in the Department of Anthropology, Sociology & Social Work.

Committee on Committees. Senator Dieckmann reported that at the last meeting she announced that there was low participation for self-committee nominations to University committees. Since that time self-nominations have continued to trickle in. Nominations closed last Friday and the committee is working on the nominations to send to the Executive Committee later this week.

Welfare Committee. Senator Collins reported that the committee continues to work on two issues: 1) shared governance and 2) faculty administrative role.

Senator Collins shared the following in his written report to the Senate.

The Faculty Senate Welfare Committee supports the University's plan to implement direct deposit for payroll. The primary reasons for implementing direct deposit are ease and convenience to the employee, and increased safety, security and efficiency in the payroll process.

This process has been thoroughly investigated and mechanisms to accommodate individuals who cannot establish a checking account are in place. For example, the use of a pay card that would operate like a debit card could be issued to individuals who cannot obtain a checking account. The employee's pay would be credited to the card which could be used to access cash from ATM's or at National City Bank locations, and/or pay for items at the point of sale.

ANNOUNCEMENTS:

After much discussion on the language change from "teaching, service and scholarship" to "teaching, scholarship, and service," Senator Eakin announced that he will invite Jaleh Rezaie, former Strategic Planning Committee Chair, and Alice Jones, former Senate representative on the Strategic Planning Committee, to the September meeting for clarification on the language change.

FOR THE GOOD OF THE ORDER:

The topic of discussion was "Alternative Scheduling."

A number of senators voiced their support for an alternative schedule such as a M-W/T-R schedule.

When asked his opinion, Dr. Aaron Thompson suggested that class scheduling patterns should be reviewed at benchmark institutions and other institutions similar in size. In addition, classroom building space should be considered, as well as co-curricular possibilities such as weekend classes. Data is currently being gathered to look at all these aspects.

Senator May said having co-authored the Senate's alternative scheduling report, he didn't sense a huge move to go to alternative scheduling. However, if it is considered, would the existing buildings accommodate that kind of schedule?

Dr. Aaron Thompson agreed that such a schedule would be possible if a longer time period is used and if classes start earlier in the morning.

Senator Carter asked that more data be available before deciding the next step of action.

Senator Piercey mentioned that the current system is fairly flexible and there are some MW classes in existence already.

Senator Chapman announced that there are also a few weekend classes available. She suggested that new ideas may be found by allowing departments to look at what would be good class arrangements for their classes.

Senator Shadur stated that commuting students should be asked for their opinion on alternative scheduling. Feedback should also be solicited from faculty to determine if they are willing to teach alternative schedules.

Senator Robles announced that Business & Technology students and faculty overwhelmingly prefer a two-day schedule.

Senator Eakin said both discussions on this issue have seemed to end with the suggestion that students should be asked for their opinion on alternative scheduling. Senator Eakin indicated that he would discuss this further with Mr. Fifer, SGA President.