Minutes for May 7, 2018

The Faculty Senate of Eastern Kentucky University met on Monday, May 7, 2018 in the South Ballroom in the Keen Johnson Building. Senator Winslow called the ninth meeting of the academic year to order at approximately 3:30 p.m.

The following members were absent:

^* Indicates prior notification of absence to the Faculty Senate Secretary
^ ALT  Charles Elliott attended for L. Calderon
^ ALT  Matthew Howell attended for J. Gershtenson
^ ALT  Margaret Ndinguri attended for D. Quan
^ ALT  Mary Tortorici attended for M. Vandenberg

APPROVAL OF MINUTES:

Senator Dyer moved approval of the April 16, 2018 minutes, seconded by Senator Slusher. Motion carried. (YES =  48 votes | NO = 2 votes | ABSTAIN = 2 votes) (See Also: Individual Votes)

REPORT FROM THE PRESIDENT:  Senator Benson

Since the April 6th meeting of the Board of Regents, the Budget Implementation Team has been charged with putting in place the approved budget reduction strategies. As they begin their work, a clear direction from my office – and with support from the EKU Board of Regents—is that FY ‘19 savings from the stated goal of $25 million in reductions need to be reinvested back into academics. The first reinvestment into academic affairs will be made in the four tenured faculty positions within economics and one tenured position in theatre. The data justifies these positions both in terms of need for support course instruction for various degrees (particularly in economics) as well as general education requirements (especially in theatre).

Following discussion with our search firm consultant, we are prepared to relaunch the Provost Search. I wish to thank Dr. Deborah Whitehouse for her service as the Interim Provost and Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs during a most challenging time.

Dr. Shirley O’Brien and Dr. Matt Winslow have agreed to resume their roles as co-chairs of the Search Committee with the membership remaining intact (John Williamson of Model Lab School will serve on the Committee) and the proposed timeline as follows:

Two significant capital projects should hopefully be completed by the start of the fall semester. The first is a faculty and staff dining room that will be completed in the northeast corner of Case Dining Hall and may possibly entail an outdoor dining space facing Burnham Hall. Also, the Faculty Center in Keen Johnson will be restored to its former grandeur at no cost to the university—paid for by private funds. In addition, the Center for Teaching and Learning will be moved to the third floor of the library. 

Summer total enrollment is up 8 percent from this time last year and the full-time undergraduate enrollment is up 9 percent. Also, a snap shot of fall enrollment shows an increase of 2 percent. 

UNFINISHED BUSINESS:

Policy 4.1.3 – Academic Integrity. Senator Ciocca moved approval of Policy 4.1.3, seconded by Senator Swain.

Senator Fleischer moved the following amendment, second by Senator Corley. Motion carried. (YES = 45 votes | NO = 8 votes | ABSTAIN = 3 votes) (See Also: Individual Votes)

Under Step 1, Paragraph 2, Line 3, change to the following:
Prior to selecting either option, the faculty/staff member should must contact the AI office to determine if the student has a prior violation.

Senator Shannon moved approval of the following amendment, seconded by Senator Kopacz. Motion carried. (YES = 53 votes | NO = 1 vote | ABSTAIN = 0 votes) (See Also: Individual Votes)

Change all references in the document from Academic Integrity Office to Student Conduct and Community Standards Office.

The main motion, as amended, carried. (YES = 50 votes | NO = 2 votes | ABSTAIN = 2 votes) (See Also: Individual Votes)

Policy 4.7.2 – Sabbaticals. Senator Turner moved to approve revisions to Policy 4.7.2, seconded by Senator Marcum. Motion carried. (YES = 51 votes | NO = 3 votes | ABSTAIN = 2 votes) (See Also: Individual Votes)

NEW BUSINESS:

Report from Council on Academic Affairs. Vice Provost Robinson presented the following materials.

Senator Fitch moved approval of item #1 (new program minor), seconded by Senator Turner. Motion carried. (YES = 47 votes | NO = 4 votes | ABSTAIN = 4 votes) (See Also: Individual Votes)

Senator Corley moved approval of items #2-6 (program suspensions), seconded by Senator Dyer. Motion carried. (YES = 42 votes | NO = 7 votes | ABSTAIN = 6 votes) (See Also: Individual Votes)

Senator Corley moved approval of items #7-23 & 25-29 (program revisions), seconded by Senator Dyer. Motion carried. (YES = 51 votes | NO = 2 votes | ABSTAIN = 2 votes) (See Also: Individual Votes)

Senator Corley moved approval of item #24 (conditional on Graduate Council approval) (program revision), seconded by Senator Dyer. Motion carried. (YES = 52 votes | NO = 1 vote | ABSTAIN = 1 vote) (See Also: Individual Votes)

Item 30 was presented for information only.

Resolution for College of Health Sciences Timeline. Senator Fitch moved approval of the following resolution, seconded by Senator Phillips. Motion carried. (YES = 36 votes | NO = 14 votes | ABSTAIN = 6 votes) (See Also: Individual Votes)

The Faculty Senate moves that:
We resolve that the College of Health Sciences develop a time line for each of the ASN nursing faculty to gain the required qualifications in order to teach in the BSN program and if these qualifications are achieved in an agreed upon time frame, reasonable effort will be made to offer the affected tenured faculty member another existing position within the institution for which the tenured faculty member is qualified by education and experience.  

GENERAL & STANDING COMMITTEE REPORTS

REPORT FROM SENATE CHAIR: Senator Winslow

The Faculty Committee on Dismissal (FCD) met on Friday, May 4. I submitted a report based on the actions taken by the Faculty Senate during the special meeting on April 16, including both the motion to reject the report from the Provost, Deans, and FCD, as well as the resolution that the May 4 meeting be an open one. It was an open meeting. The recommendations from this group included eliminating zero of the four tenured Economics faculty (they will move to the College of Business), eliminating four of the tenured faculty in ASN, and eliminating zero of the one tenured faculty line in Theatre. Recommendations from this group have been sent to President Benson.

As you have been notified, I will represent the Faculty Senate on the Implementation Teams, starting this week. The work of this group will be critical during the coming biennium. While most of the cuts approved by President Benson and the Board of Regents are unwelcome, I believe the Faculty Senate has an interest in some cuts being realized. In addition, we must adhere to the accepted cuts to meet the financial obligations as an institution. Updates will be provided to the Faculty Senate on this work in the year to come.

The search for a permanent Provost will start up in earnest early in the Fall semester. The current goal is to have a permanent Provost in place by the end of Fall semester.

Chair Winslow announced that 22 senators would be leaving Senate at the end of this meeting. He thanked everyone for their hard work this past year and especially noted Senators Kopacz and Slusher for their many years of service to Senate.

Ombud Quarterly Report. Ombud Joan Beck shared the first quarterly report of 2018. This quarter, the number of visitors to her office increased to an average of one per day which is a significant increase. Last quarter, people were more concerned with interpersonal relationships. Visitors this quarter seem more concerned about their ability to earn a living and all that that entails.

To learn more about the Office of the Ombud, please visit: https://ombud.eku.edu/. 

REPORT FROM FACULTY REGENT: Senator Day

The EKU Board of Regents will hold its next quarterly meeting on Monday June 25th in the Perkins Building quad. Committee meetings will begin at 9 AM and the full Board meeting will begin around 10:30 AM.

Now that most of the smoke has cleared from the legislative session, and the governor has allowed late action in the General Assembly to proceed unimpeded, we have a better picture of the budgetary impact on the university going forward. The FY19 EKU General Fund appropriation is set at $60.8M – a decrease of nearly $3.6M from prior year spending levels. Some of the news is good and has slightly softened the immediate impact. But we also know that in two short years we are potentially looking at another $9 million hit for KTRS. The governor’s pension plan puts new teachers to go into a 401(a)-style plan rather than KTRS, thus taking the legs out from under KTRS (which requires a base of current workers to support benefits for retired workers) and requiring more support from participating institutions. Final KTRS numbers will not be available for a couple of months yet, but the overall impact to the EKU budget appears to be that there will be somewhere around a $5-6 million lighter burden to deal with immediately - but the $9M increase still looms in FY20.

The typical fiscal strategy in such a case is to meet those needs that assure quality in the short term, while conserving for an uncertain future. I believe the President will want to restore about a million dollars to academic affairs now, and place the balance in contingency for FY20. I support that kind of approach.

HB 592 ended the state’s tuition waiver program (originally proposed in HB 453), and in the process, the $2M expense borne directly by EKU. This week UK announced that, for the next three years, it would continue to support its faculty and staff who seek advanced educational opportunities. Kristi Middleton told the Herald-Leader that EKU currently has about 400 students from UK using tuition waivers, and that helps our budget. The EKU Implementation Team is looking at proposals and partnership agreements with other institutions that might support EKU faculty and staff in that same endeavor.

It is unclear if the Board will need to take any further budget action in June. Program suspensions have already been made by the Board and I do not anticipate that we will revisit any of those decisions – with the possible exception of School Psychology. What remains is for the President to take the input from the Provost, Deans, and Faculty Committee on Dismissal and work with the Implementation Team to assure that all needed course coverage is accomplished by top-ranked faculty. That meeting is set to occur later today. I anticipate the Provost, et. al., will necessarily affirm the need for four Economics faculty to cover the needed courses in CLASS and B&T, and one faculty member to cover Theatre in General Education. If that occurs under the president’s guidance, we may be in a position to avoid a direct politically-motivated assault on tenure at this time. (See: Regent Day’s remarks on Tenure [page 4] at the Rally for Higher Education held in front of the Keen Johnson Building on April 12th)

As you may be aware, I disagreed with many of my faculty colleagues and joined with other Board members in support of the total student experience at EKU, including keeping EKU athletics in Division I. This was consistent with our strategic objective: that while budget cuts may force us to be smaller, our programs will remain excellent.

Yesterday the Attorney General’s office opined that the Board of Regents violated Open Meetings law at its March 19th meeting. Chairman Craig Turner released the following statement in response.

The Eastern Kentucky University Board of Regents is now in receipt of the Opinion of the Attorney General as it relates to the Board’s meeting on March 19, 2018. The Board takes great exception with the ruling, and will consider all the options available to it under the law, including appeal.

As mentioned in the Board’s response to the complaint, the Board’s sole intention for the closed session was to maintain the privacy of the identified individuals impacted until the list of position eliminations was final and the terminations had been carried out in a more individualized, appropriate and considerate manner. General budget matters were not discussed, in direct contradiction to the Attorney General’s Opinion. Furthermore, no action was taken at the March 19 meeting. Even in these times of austere budgets and difficult cuts, we will continue to hold the privacy of our employees as a top priority. Those impacted are being eliminated through no fault of their own, and have played a key role in making EKU the quality institution that it is to both learn and thrive as a student, and to work as an employee. We sincerely thank those employees impacted for their dedication and service.

The Board will continue its diligent efforts, alongside the President and administration, in leading the University through these significant budget cuts, while keeping the decision of the Attorney General in mind, and while continuing its commitment to transparency.

According to news reports the only avenue for appeal would be by suing the Eastern Progress in Circuit Court.

While the idea of suing one’s own student newspaper is foreign to my way of thinking, a couple of factors mitigate those reservations. First, unlike high school publications, the Eastern Progress claims to be an “independent student newspaper” and not the Board’s paper in any sense. Second, this week the Progress knowingly revealed the protected identities of some faculty who had not yet been informed through official channels and according to university policy timelines, of their positions’ elimination. This is a shabby way to treat respected individuals, in my view, and something I would have preferred that neither the university nor any of its constituent entities would have found palatable or consistent with the campus spirit.

Since the feelings of affected faculty and staff have been ignored – all in the name of transparency – initiated by a Faculty Senate Executive Committee member who was ostensibly elected to protect and advance the interests of the faculty, allow me to shed a little more light on the situation.

As for the particular arguments made by the OAG, since the matter may be headed for appeal, I am constrained from commenting further.

REPORT FROM PROVOST: Senator Whitehouse

Senator Whitehouse reminisced about her time at Eastern over the past 34 years.

Please mark calendars for the following dates:

• May 11-12 – Spring Commencement (all Commencement ceremonies will be held in Alumni Coliseum)
  • College of Justice & Safety (May 11 at 9:00 a.m.)
  • College of Health Sciences (May 11 at 1:30 p.m.)
  • College of Business & Technology (May 11 at 6:30 p.m.)
  • College of Letters, Arts, & Social Sciences (May 12 at 9:30 a.m.)
  • College of Education & College of Science (May 12 at 1:30 p.m.)
• May 15-16 – 2018 Faculty Scholars Institute
• May 18 – Pedagogicon
• May 17 – Pre-Conference Workshops
  • 9:30-11:00 a.m. – Effective Communication for Leaders Under Pressure, Joan Beck
  • 1-4 p.m. – Assignment Design and Assessment: Intentional Integration for Significant Student Outcome, Cindy Judd & Ryan Baggett, EKU Faculty Innovators
• September 28 – Assurance of Learning Day (SAVE THE DATE)

STANDING COMMITTEE REPORTS:

Academic Quality Committee. Senator Polin reported that the Committee has successfully addressed the charges presented to it at the start of the academic year. The Committee has served as a channel of communication among the Faculty Senate, the faculty-at-large, and the Administration on academic matters and the formulation of academic policy; and it has been available as an advisory agency to the President of the University and to the Provost on academic matters.

Senator Polin shared the finalized version of the Student Success Initiatives Map.

The Committee is currently working to have the Map “housed” on the Student Success Center’s website and updated by the Student Success Center’s staff at least once a semester. The goal is for this to be a living document that is a repository for all University stakeholders; thus, it is important this Map find an appropriate place where it can be maintained.

The Committee would like to make a few recommendations based on the development of the Map. First, it was noticed that websites are inconsistent (e.g. terminology in addresses is different), outdated (e.g. some email addresses listed are employees no longer with the University), and incorrect (e.g. some initiatives such as the Chapel of Meditation are still listed as “open”). It would be beneficial for this to be reviewed and updated/corrected to ensure University stakeholders receive the correct information. Second, the Committee also recognized that faculty resources (e.g. professional development)—similarly to student resources—were plentiful and diffused across campus, making it difficult to understand all opportunities available. A second Map that focuses attention on faculty resources would be most helpful.

Budget Committee. Senator Ciocca reported that the committee met on April 25 to discuss the special Senate meeting on April 16 and the campus-wide message from the President’s Office on 03-25-18 about budget cuts by the various components of the University.

Senator Ciocca presented for approval the resolution regarding the Subsidy of Collegiate Athletics at EKU (see below). (Chair Winslow reminded that as the motion comes from committee a second is not required.) Motion carried. (YES = 39 votes | NO = 9 votes | ABSTAIN = 7 votes (See Also: Individual Votes)

RESOLUTION:
Be it resolved 
That the $10.4M in funds to be used to maintain Collegiate Athletics be reduced insofar as to maintain the largest number possible of Staff and Faculty positions in Academic Affairs and Student Success, which are crucial to the Mission and the Vision of Eastern Kentucky University 

Be it resolved 
That when and only when all of the Academic Personnel have been reinstated, whichever remaining funds be then used for Collegiate Athletics and that any such expenditure, from now and forever, will only be allowed after funding for the Mission and the Vision of the university have been secured.

Elections & University Nominations Committee. Senator Mason reported that the committee completed the following charges:

• Supervised nominations and elections of Faculty Senate chair, vice chair, Faculty Senate membership, and Faculty Senate committees.
• Revised the internal procedures of the committee
• Conducted elections for faculty to university standing committees (Graduate Council, General Education, Library, and Research) through amended process. The amended process passed at Faculty Senate on December 5, 2016 and includes a nomination ballot and election ballot. It also requires consultations with the Vice Provost as well as consultations with respective committee chairs prior to the election. The rationale for the changes in the process included, “…increased transparency…”, “…greater faculty involvement…”, “…expanding opportunities for faculty who seek service…”.

Results indicate an increase in faculty involvement in both the nomination and election process for faculty vacancies on university committees. (see chart below)
 

Considerations for next year’s committee include the following:

• Provide input regarding the various definitions of Faculty-at-Large.
• Supervise the election of the Faculty Regent (2019-2022), Spring 2019.

Information Technology Committee. Senator Baggett shared the IT Survey Overview.

Rules Committee. Senator Kay announced that faculty should have recently received an email with a link to some petitions regarding past Senate motions that were passed in recent semesters. As a reminder, historically the motions passed by Senate that required faculty-at-large approval would be presented to the faculty-at-large after the fall convocation. In an effort to streamline the process, last year that was changed so that it only needs to go before the faculty-at-large if at least 10% of the faculty sign a petition saying that it should move forward. So that’s the purpose of the email faculty recently received. Please explain that to your colleagues if they have questions.

Senator Kay presented for approval the Senate Internal procedures. (Chair Winslow reminded that motions coming from committee do not require a second). Motion carried. (YES = 54 votes | NO = 1 vote | ABSTAIN = 2 votes) (See Also: Individual Votes)

Senator Kay presented for approval the Faculty Handbook Section 7 revisions. Motion carried. (YES = 54 votes | NO = 1 vote | ABSTAIN = 1 vote) (See Also: Individual Votes)  

ADJOURNMENT:

Senator Whitehouse moved to adjourn at approximately 5pm.

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