Minutes for November 10, 2008

The Faculty Senate of Eastern Kentucky University met on Monday, November 10, 2008, in the South Room of the Keen Johnson Building. Senator Ware called the third 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 D. Porter attended for M. Kolloff

Visitors to the Senate: Corey Bray, Athletics; Sue Cain, Transition & University Services; Lindsey Cross, SGA; Jim Conneely, Student Affairs; Tina Davis, Registrar; Dave Eakin, Biology; Linda Frost, Honors Program; Gary Kuhnhenn, Enrollment Management; Deborah Newsom, Financial Affairs; Sherry Robinson, Academic Affairs; Benton Shirey, Advising & Retention; John Wade, Arts & Sciences; and Marc Whitt, Public Relations & Marketing

ANNOUNCEMENTS:
Senator Ware announced that Senator Taylor will fill in as Parliamentarian for today's meeting.

Senator Ware requested that anyone speaking at the podium should turn cell phones completely off because of static interference with the microphone.

Senator Rainey distributed a flyer on a QEP-initiative CACTUS class offered for Spring entitled "Is it Time to Change the Drinking Age." She encouraged the senators to share the information with faculty and students.

APPROVAL OF MINUTES:
The October 6, 2008 minutes were approved as written.

REPORT FROM THE PRESIDENT: Senator Whitlock

Senator Whitlock reported that the Policy on Policies will be implemented on an interim basis; he sees this as a further institutionalization of shared governance.

The Sponsored Programs policies which the Senate approved will go before the Board of Regents in January.

As preliminary talk has already begun around campus, Senator Whitlock encouraged faculty to start a conversation on whether or not a sixteen-week semester should be considered.

While not finalized, the University will probably move toward a twelve-week summer session to provide more flexibility in terms of course offerings for students and faculty.

Senator Whitlock's trip to Japan was both enjoyable and successful. While there he visited Rikkyo University, which currently partners with fourteen private liberal arts colleges and universities in this country. Currently Rikkyo University does not have a partnership with a comprehensive university and this may provide an opportunity for EKU to form a partnership with them.

While in Tokyo, Senator Whitlock attended an alumni meeting with approximately 40 Eastern graduates.

While in Kofu, Senator Whitlock renewed the second ten-year renewal exchange agreement with the University of Yamanashi.

Senator Whitlock was surprised and pleased at the number of people who read the blog he posted during his trip.

Senator Whitlock encouraged everyone to review the new test version of the EKU homepage and to share comments and suggestions. The new website will be emphasizing the use of social networks as a way to get students more engaged in campus life and campus activities.

Drs. Piercey and Conneely have been meeting regularly with the Enrollment Management team to determine how the Enrollment Management area should be structured.

State financing is looking uncertain, and projections are running about $300 million behind for the current year's budget. The Governor is expected to release a plan in early December to address the shortfall. While EKU's budget was developed for this year with some safeguards in place to help offset another cut, the tuition income is lower than originally estimated.

Governor Brashear has established a Work Group on Higher Education which is divided into two sub-committees. The first sub-committee will be looking at ways to enhance the affordability of higher education on the campuses in Kentucky and that report is due on January 15th. The other sub-committee's primary function is stability of state funding to the campuses and stability from the standpoint of tuition for students, and that report is due by September 15th 2009.

EKU's new Strategic Planning and Budgeting model will be announced soon. Senator Whitlock's primary objective with the new model is to have a solid link between planning and budgeting and to have a high degree of transparency in both processes.

The Board of Regents will be having a retreat next month, and one of the main discussion topics will be the presidential evaluation to be held during spring semester. Senator Whitlock has insisted that there will be significant and substantive faculty, staff, and student participation in the evaluation process.

UNFINISHED BUSINESS:

Dead Week Policy. Ms. Lindsey Cross was in attendance to give a brief history of the proposed dead week policy. As the discussion unfolded, it became apparent that the senators did not have the most recent version. Senator Johnson moved to postpone the vote on the policy until December until the senators reviewed the most recent update, seconded by Senator Schmelzer. Motion carried.

Senator Robles requested that Ms. Cross forward the most recent draft which was approved by the Student Senate to the secretary for immediate distribution to the senators.

Ms. Cross asked that any comments or questions about the policy should be e-mailed to her at lindsey.cross@eku.edu. She also indicated that while she would immediately send the requested update to the secretary, there will be another revision submitted later which will address the Senate's comments from today's meeting.

Ad Hoc Committee Recommendations on Early Registration Policy. Senator Wilson moved to approve the following statements, seconded by Senator Wray. Motion carried.
[attachments shared at meeting: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10]

• The Senate is not in favor of the policy draft as currently written and were in support of the Ad Hoc Committee's recommendations and addendums being included in the draft before discussion on an actual vote of the policy.
• The Senate approves a resolution of support for a revised Early Registration for Designated Populations policy incorporating the "Recommendation Regarding Early Registration Policy and Rationale" outlined by the Faculty Senate Ad Hoc Committee on Early Registration in its memorandum dated November 10, 2008, together with an Addendum incorporating recommendations from the November 10 Faculty Senate meeting. Said addendum will include recommendations supported by the senate as follows:
  1. Senator Lowry suggested that priority registration be assigned by standing. For example, a Sophomore from a Designated Population could register ahead of other Sophomores, but not ahead of Juniors or Seniors
  2. Senator Richardson recommended that each designation population (Students with Disabilities, Student Athletes, Honors, etc.) should be considered individually for possible inclusion in the Early Registration for Designated Populations proposal.
  3. Senator Johnson requested that the ad hoc committee's suggestion to create a university-level committee should be developed now and presented along with the actual policy rather than waiting until the need arises to establish the committee structure; and that the recommendations of the Ad Hoc Committee on Early Registration be given due consideration to address the needs of students with significant family care and support responsibilities.

Senator Ware announced that if any other senators have an issue that is critically important which should be included in the addendum, please send it to Steffen Wilson, chair of the Ad Hoc Committee within the next week.

Ad Hoc Committee Report on Syllabus Policy. Dr. Janna Vice reported that the committee met and had a very productive and effective meeting. The revised policy will be presented to the Executive Committee at the November meeting and to the Senate at the December meeting.

NEW BUSINESS:

Report from Council on Academic Affairs - Dr. Janna Vice presented the following materials at the request of Senator Piercey.

Rules Committee. In her written report to the Senate Senator McKenney shared the following:

The committee met on October 27 to discuss the year's charges which include:

1. making recommendations as to the need for a new Senate Standing Committee on Academics and Advising
2. reviewing Faculty Senate rules and recommending any needed changes no later than February 16, 2009.

The Committee divided up a list of Eastern's benchmarks and also Kentucky's regional universities. Members will investigate whether these institutions have senate committees dealing with academics and advising and if so, what kind of structure and mission these committees have.

The next meeting is scheduled for Monday, November 24 at 3:30 p.m.

Rights & Responsibilities Committee. Senator Noblitt reported that the committee is working with Dr. Sherry Robinson on the Policy on Policies.

Committee on Committees. Senator Staddon reported that he was elected as chair of the committee.

Welfare Committee. Senator Foote reported that last month the committee sent out a survey on shared governance and asked the senators to share it with their colleagues. The committee is now in the process of reviewing the data collected and will report on the findings soon.

Ad Hoc Committee Report on EKU Community College. Senator Taylor reported that the committee met today for an informational meeting with Dr. Jack Luy, former Director of the Richmond Community College. Next month they plan to meet with Dr. Ken Clawson, dean of EKU's former community college.

FOR THE GOOD OF THE ORDER

The topic of discussion was: "How many adjuncts should a department be able to have?"

Due to time constraints, the discussion was postponed until later.

ADJOURNMENT: