Minutes for April 3, 2023

The Faculty Senate of Eastern Kentucky University met on Monday, April 3, 2023 via Zoom. Chair Crosby called the seventh meeting of the academic year to order at approximately 3:30 p.m.

The following members were absent:

^* Indicates prior notification of absence
^ ALT Eric Meiners attended for A. Brooks
^ ALT Matt Sabin attended for B. Clark
^ ALT Kelly Smith attended for L. Edwards
^ ALT Chad Cogdill attended for T. Kelley
* ALT Ann Callahan attended for E. Stevenson

APPROVAL OF MINUTES:

Senator Grabeel moved to approve the March 6, 2023 minutes as written, seconded by Senator Sands.  Motion carried. (YES = 48 votes | NO = 0 votes | ABSTAIN = 0 votes) (See also: Individual Votes).

REPORT FROM THE PRESIDENT:  David McFaddin

2023 Legislative Session Closeout
This year’s legislative session has come to an end. EKU, led by Amy Scarborough, tracked over 240 bills in both the Senate and the House. While many bills were introduced and debated, 34 with potential impact for EKU actually became law. Of those, 11 are K-12 bills, five are police/public safety and five are human resources/healthcare benefit related. We don’t believe any of the bills passed have a direct impact on our current or prospective student population. If you have any questions about specific legislation, please reach out to amy.scarborough@eku.edu.

Budget
As we approach the end of the budget year, we will be closing out the current fiscal year and preparing for the 2023-2024 budget year. Currently, the VPs are working with Deans, AVPs, Chairs, and budget managers to create the upcoming budget. While budget reviews often make faculty and staff uncomfortable, I want to remind everyone that under my leadership, EKU will annually review, edit and prioritize our funding based on our strategic priorities. I plan to provide a high-level preview of the budget priorities during the upcoming “Lunch and Learns” with faculty and staff.

• April 12, 2023-Faculty Lunch and Learn 
• April 18, 2023-Staff Council Luncheon 

Leadership Updates
While we normally do not announce staffing announcements at Faculty Senate, we have recently made some significant changes that are worth noting. Additional information will be sent campus wide regarding these changes later this week.

• Vice President Dannie Moore will be adding Housing to his program oversight. To accommodate the new addition, the following have been named:
  • Karen Peavler-AVP of Student Life (includes Campus Recreation, Housing, and Student Life) 
  • Rae Loftis-AVP of Student Life (Veteran Programming, CEIGE, and Federal TRIO programs) 
• Carrie Ernst, our Chief Innovation and Optimization Officer, will move to report to the President's Office. 
• As Provost Zeigler communicated earlier to campus, we are pleased to finalize our Dean search with the announcement of Dr. Elizabeth Smith as the Dean of Education and Applied Human Sciences 

Key searches that are ongoing include the Vice President of Development and Alumni Engagement and the Director of E-Campus. Both of these searches are the result of the upcoming retirements for two of our most outstanding leaders, Betina Gardner and Tim Matthews respectively. Those search committees are hard at work now and updates will be provided as those searches progress toward completion.

Scholars Week
EKU's Scholars Week celebrates, showcases, and promotes the rich culture of faculty, student, and faculty-student scholarship, research, and creative endeavors. Scholars Week begins this week and will take place from April 3, 2023 to April 14, 2023. 

Giving Day
EKU’s annual Giving Day is on Wednesday, April 19. Our hope is to meet this year’s goal of 2092 donors. The number represents the number of EKU graduates that walked across the graduation stage last year. I encourage you to hit social media to promote the day among your colleges and departments, make requests of donors who are committed to our mission, and consider giving yourself. I am encouraging everyone to sport their maroon this Giving Day. 

Recognizing Excellence
Please mark the following dates and prepare to celebrate with our students, faculty and staff. 

• April 4 - Faculty Awards and Recognition Ceremony
• April 6 - Phi Kappa Phi Induction Ceremony 
• April 7 - Scholars Assembly 
• April 26 - Employee Milestone Recognition Breakfast 
• April 26 - Presidential Excellence Awards 
• April 27 - Student Excellence Awards 
• April 30 - Colonels’ Celebration 

2023 Spring Commencement
As a reminder, 2023 Spring Commencement ceremonies will take place at 9am and 6pm on Friday, May 12, 2023. Here are some faculty reminders: 

• Our commencement committee has worked hard over the past year to redesign our spring ceremonies to maximize the student, faculty, staff and guest experience. The overall length of the ceremony has been shortened significantly, the staging and processional/recessional flow has been improved and several key contingencies have been put in place to enhance comfort and health.
   
  Key changes include:
  • Reduction of the ceremony length that reflects the shortened Fall Graduation Ceremony
  • Two speakers will tandem announce graduates to reduce the time to announce/walk graduates across the stage 
  • Concessions will be open 
  • All students and faculty will be provided water in advance 
  • Walk in will be indoors instead of outside for both students and faculty 

• A severe weather plan is in place. We will move to the Alumni Coliseum in the event of severe weather. A website will be activated in the event that decision is made. That website will direct faculty and students to a new ceremony date and time.
• Please prepare that the second ceremony will be slightly longer. We will be honoring EKU alumni and four-star general, General James Rainey with an Honorary Doctor of Laws at the 6:00 p.m. ceremony. This ceremony will be slightly longer (additional 15 minutes) in order to accommodate the honorary degree portion of the program. 

Presidential Office Hours
Still having full sessions for our President's One on One’s. The final date for the semester is Friday, April 21, 2023, from 10-11am. 

EKU Today
EKU Today is getting a facelift. Thanks to the work of the CBM and Slate teams, CBM will be moving later this month to the new platform to communicate internal campus messages. The most important component impacting faculty is that the link that you have traditionally utilized to send announcements will be modified. Be watching for communication coming later this month. 

EKU in the News
We have had great success in getting our faculty, students, and alumni in the news, especially when newsworthy topics align with the work of our faculty. Here are some examples: 

• Eastern Kentucky University adds new engineering program
• Baptist Health Richmond welcomes new board members 
• Kentucky Newsmakers 3/26: EKU President David McFaddin 
• Mass shootings are changing the way police operate 
• The News Journal UC, EKU named 2022-2023 Military ... 
• EKU alumna Mullins wins Miss Earth USA 2023 title 
• EKU highlights student resources during Mental Health Week 
• EKU's Hamilton a finalist for Skip Prosser Award 

REPORT FROM THE PROVOST: Sara Zeigler

The Online Education Director’s search is underway. Semi-finalist interviews have occurred and we will move on to finalists very soon.

IT sent out an email earlier today with a survey about our next LMS. Our contact with Blackboard expires in 2025 and we have an opportunity to look at different operations for a learning management system. Obviously, this needs to be a faculty-driven process and so the first step that the working group is engaging in is that survey. Please encourage your colleagues to complete the survey.

Senator Price asked Provost Zeigler to address why the eCampus development stipend was changed and what the goal is for saving money in that area.

Provost Zeigler answered that a significant amount of money has been spent on course development or re-development but those stipends have only been going toward online course development. The number of expenditures has been increasing, and that’s been an issue. Plus, it’s time for a re-examination of how we support faculty in course development so that we are also honoring what on campus faculty are doing to update their courses, that we make sure that it’s comprehensive, and that we look at pedagogy in addition to if the course is structured in a way that’s friendly. So, we are doing a stop gap for the coming year to make sure that we keep expenditures under control. This should yield a savings of about $100,000 which will keep us even to where we were a year or two ago. We are also creating a work group that will look at how we support faculty course development and re-development more holistically and how we use instructional design for the course. The work group will be named before the end of the semester.

NEW BUSINESS:

Nominations for Faculty Senate Chair. Senator Jones nominated Lisa Kay for chair for the 2023-24 academic year. Senator Price moved to close nominations, seconded by Senator Sands.

Nominations for Faculty Senate Vice Chair. Senator Johnson nominated John Brent and Senator Walz nominated James Blair for vice-chair. Senator Johnson moved to close nominations, seconded by Senator Grabeel.

Faculty Rights and Responsibilities Motion on Faculty Grievance Policy. On behalf of the committee, Senator Brent moved approval of the motion.

Senator Callahan moved to amend the motion to add the deadline date of September 1st for the requested information and to delete the section requesting categorical information under the justification section, seconded by Senator Buck. Motion to amend carried. (YES = 42 votes | NO = 0 votes | ABSTAIN = 3 votes) (See also: Individual Votes)

The main motion, as amended, carried. (YES = 42 votes | NO = 0 votes | ABSTAIN = 2 votes) (See also: Individual Votes)

ANNOUNCEMENT:

Chair Crosby encouraged the out-going senators to remind their areas to elect a replacement and alternate before the end of April and to forward updates to the Senate secretary.

GENERAL & STANDING COMMITTEE REPORTS

REPORT FROM SENATE CHAIR: Senator Crosby

The Executive Committee met on March 27 and had an informal report from President McFaddin at 3:30 before the official meeting began at 4pm. We had a report on Academic Affairs from Provost Ziegler during the regular meeting.

The biggest item on the agenda was whether senators should be tenured before they serve. There was much discussion on the topic with voices pro and con. The main justification for tenure being that senators could serve on committees whose tasks may challenge the administration without any fear of retaliation. But, as with many things, the cons outweighed the pros in changing the rules. Many departments strongly prefer allowing non-tenured colleagues to serve on Senate. Therefore, no action was proposed and we will continue to allow all departments to choose colleagues (tenured and/or non-tenured) as they see fit.

The Executive Committee liaisons to the Standing Committees reported on the work of their committees. All are doing great work, and for this meeting the Budget Committee will present its report. The Faculty Welfare Committee is digesting the data from its recent survey to all full and part-time faculty and will present its report at the regular May meeting. Additionally, the Faculty Rights and Responsibilities Committee will be submitting a resolution or two at this meeting for you to consider adopting.

Although not an official extension of the Executive Committee, the “Problem Solvers” group (me, Vice Chair Lisa Kay, Faculty Regent Jason Marion and Provost Ziegler) met on March 28 and had a very informative meeting. We were able to share faculty concerns about the Tuition Waiver and the compensation for eCampus course development with the Provost. She had a lot of helpful information/rationale to share.

REPORT FROM FACULTY REGENT: Senator Marion

The next Board meeting will occur on Wednesday, May 24. It is expected that at that May meeting, there will be a full agenda on matters of interest to the faculty and university at-large. Most notably, the May meeting will include the budget, setting of tuition and fees, among many other items.

Since our last Senate meeting, the Board and several of the Board members have attended university events/receptions for faculty, international education, and members of the CPE Board. In my Faculty Regent role, I have received several communications from concerned faculty in regard to proposed efficiencies from Academic Affairs related to university budgeting. I’ve shared these concerns with Senate Exec, the Provost, and the President. These largely relate to increasing inflationary costs, flat state support for operations, still lower than desired enrollments in junior, senior, and graduate coursework, and a university priority to invest in personnel.

REPORT FROM COSFL: Senator Cizmar

COSFL hasn’t met recently. However, the members did get a communication related to the bill that was being considered by Kentucky Legislature related to students being allowed to carry weapons on campus. That information was promptly related to you through Senator Crosby about how to potentially let your voices be heard. That bill was, in fact, defeated in this last session.

STANDING COMMITTEES

Academic Quality Committee. Senator Sands shared their year-end report on enrollment patterns in online and on-campus courses, student outcomes, DFW rates, and faculty resources and professional development needs. In addition, Senator Brent shared information on a new charge the committee received this year to investigate satisfaction/issues with Barnes and Noble’s Bartleby service. (see also: Data Summary, IDC-PD Need, Bartleby Faculty Toolkit, Bartleby Data 2022)

The committee suggested the following charges for next year’s committee:

• To continue ongoing monitoring of:
  • Enrollment patterns in online and on-campus courses
  • Student outcomes, DFW rates
  • Faculty and Student satisfaction with Bartleby through surveys

This year the Provost gave an additional charge to the committee, along with a number of other people on campus, to review the academic calendar. The report and recommendations are due to her by April 10.

Budget Committee. Senators Cizmar and Grabeel shared a summary report on EKU’s operating budget focusing on revenue and expenditures from 2017-18 to 2021-22. (see also: Working Draft-EKU Operating Budget Summary)

In addition, Senator Yow shared a report on the Athletics budget. The information in the report focused on the comparison of EKU Athletics with 26 benchmark institutions that are in the same NCAA subdivision (D-1 FCS). The data used in the report was pulled from the Knight Commission on Intercollegiate Athletics. (see also: benchmark athletics expenses)

Several senators had question about the decrease in scholarships for men’s football and basketball and yet the budgets for those increased, especially as other lines for other expenses are relatively flat. Senator Yow stated that the committee would compile a list of questions to share with President McFaddin prior to May 1st so that he can be prepared to address those at the next Senate meeting.

Elections & University Nominations Committee. Senator Spira reported that the committee members meet in person over a three-day open period to revise the annual letter that is sent to department chairs on electing new replacements for out-going senators.

Information Technology Committee. Senator Hight stated that the committee met on March 27 to discuss the technology survey. The survey should be distributed soon.

The committee was supposed to meet with the Teaching and Learning Technology Committee to discuss ChatGPT and Generative AI as well as to tour the Greek Innovation Center but that was cancelled and will have to be rescheduled for a later date.

There are several committee members rotating off senate in May. However Co-Chair Fry will still be on the committee to help train new members on google docs and the digital voting system.

Faculty Rights and Responsibilities Committee. Senator Brent encouraged the senators to discuss with their colleagues the issue of using non-university communication venues to conduct university business, to assess the degree to which there is a concern, and to share feedback with the committee if there is support for alternative sanctions beyond just putting forward a resolution that upholds the policy for all across campus.

The next committee meeting is scheduled for tomorrow at 9:30am.

Rules Committee. Senator Bishop-Ross announced that the next meeting will be on Monday, April 10.

Welfare Committee. Senator Blair reported that the committee has been going through the data planning process and hope to have the final report to the Executive Committee on April 17. After further revisions the report will be shared with the senators at the May meeting.

ADJOURNMENT:

Senator Cizmar moved to adjourn at approximately 5:45pm.

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(See Also:  Polling Results by Motion & Senators)

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