Minutes for May 1, 2023

The Faculty Senate of Eastern Kentucky University met on Monday, May 1, 2023 via Zoom. Chair Crosby called the eighth meeting of the academic year to order at approximately 3:30 p.m.

The following members were absent:

^* Indicates prior notification of absence
^ ALT Raymond Lauk attended for A. Burns
^ ALT Matthew Howell attended for A. Cizmar
^ ALT Matt Sabin attended for B. Clark
^ ALT Luke Dodd attended for L. Cormier
^ ALT Maria Bane attended for C. Hughes
^ ALT Peter Edwards attended for A. White

APPROVAL OF MINUTES:

Senator Buck moved to approve the April 3, 2023 minutes as written, seconded by Senator Grabeel.  Motion carried. (YES = 47 votes | NO = 0 votes | ABSTAIN = 1 vote) (See also: Individual Votes).

REPORT FROM THE PRESIDENT:  David McFaddin

There have been many successes accomplished over this past year. The completion of our strategic plan, a significant financial asset preservation and academic investment by the General Assembly, record breaking freshman enrolment numbers, the launch of numerous academic programs including Manufacturing Engineering, accolades for both our programs, like the Best for Vets and national rankings, as well as our faculty and staff all have created a buzz about EKU statewide.

EKU Highlights in the News - April Edition
The following highlights received coverage in local, state and national media outlets touting our EKU success: 

EKU could be key training ground for industry facing significant shortage
EKU online programs ranked among best in the nation by U.S. News & World Report 
EKU online programs ranked among best in the nation 
Green appointed chair of Environmental Education Council 
SCC nursing celebrates partnership with EKU 
Fayette County schools unveils new, free dual credit program for high school seniors 
Dual credit options for FCPS students expanded with BCTC, EKU 
Student safety fair held at EKU 
EKU launching online education degree to address teacher shortage 
CU’s $1 million Gift Supports Higher Education in Banking, Cybersecurity 
Commonwealth CU Makes $1 Million Donation to Fund University Program in Fintech & Cybercrime 
Eastern Kentucky University gets large gift to enhance finance, cybersecurity programs 
EKU program expands to offer free textbooks to all students 
EKU announces expansion of EKU BookSmart Program to all students 
Kentucky by Heart: EKU’s Upward Bound programs offer leg up to first-generation students, and veterans 
Laurel County’s Silas House to be appointed Kentucky Poet Laureate 
EKU gallery celebrates 50 years with renovations and faculty showcase

President’s Excellence Awards
The second annual President’s Excellence Awards were held last week. Milestone employees were recognized for their 25th, 30th and 35th year of service to EKU. Also recognized were EKU employees who have provided excellence in six areas. Congratulations to Dr. Socorro Zaragoza, who received the Excellence in Diversity and Inclusion Award; Terry Gray, who received the Excellence in Engagement Award; Ryan Fisher, who received the Excellence in Hospitality Award; Jennifer White, who received the Excellence in Innovation Award; John Strada, who received the Excellence in Philanthropy Award; and Dan Hendrickson, who received the Excellence in Leadership Award.

Giving Day
The 2023 Giving Day was another great success. This year’s goal was 2,292 donors representing the graduates from the Spring 2022 semester. Development continues to process gifts but at this point we can confidently say that Giving Day brought in more than 2,400 donors and raised more than $400,000. Needless to say, those are record Giving Day totals. Congratulations to our Alumni and Development teams whose dedication to our students and pride in our campus community led to such a successful event. 

Commencement Ceremonies
Commencement will be at Roy Kidd Stadium on Friday, May 12, 2023. The morning ceremony (9am) consists of CLASS, College of Business, and STEM graduates and the afternoon ceremony (6pm) with CJSMS, CHS, and CEAHS. For more information, visit registrar.eku.edu/graduation-celebrations. 

Summer Advantage Schedule
A benefit of working at Eastern Kentucky University is the immense flexibility provided to faculty and staff. In addition to being the University providing the most vacation days to employees among all state universities, we also believe that providing flexibility options for employees is an additional benefit. Again this year, flexibility will be offered through the Summer Advantage Schedule. The Summer Advantage Schedule will run from May 22, 2023 to July 29, 2023. Visit HR’s Summer Advantage FAQ page for more details. 

Upcoming Calendar
Please mark your calendar for the upcoming events for Fall 2023.

• May 24 - Board of Regents Meeting
• July 29 - Summer Advantage Session Ends 
• August 8 - Employee Convocation 
• August 9-13 - Move In Week 
• August 10- Big E Welcome: Kickoff, Welcome Walk, and EKU Staff and Faculty Welcome Back Bash 
• August 14- First Day of Fall Classes 
• August 16- EKU Board of Regents Meeting 
• December 1- Winter Commencement 

Leadership Matters
Thanks to Chair Richard Crosby, the executive committee, and Faculty Senate for an excellent year. Shared governance is a tenant of our institution. The ability to work collaboratively is a testament to the commitment both the faculty and administration have for our students. 

Enrollment
At this time we are tracking ahead of last year’s enrollment which was a record-setting year for EKU. We are anticipating hitting our goal of 3,000 freshmen.

Status of Chautauqua Lecture Series
During the May meeting, Senator Newhart asked for clarification on changes being made to the Chautauqua Lecture Series. President McFaddin deferred to Dean Julie George who reported that the series has moved out of the Academic Affairs budget to the Library budget out of their foundation funds. The program will probably look differently moving forward and will probably be rolled into speakers and events already planned in the Library. She will be putting out a call soon for more people to become involved in moving the program forward.

Questions on the Athletics Budget
As several senators raised questions in April during Senator Yow’s presentation on the athletics budget, he forwarded those to the president for review. President McFaddin invited Matt Roan to the May Senate meeting to share additional athletics information to address those concerns.

REPORT FROM THE PROVOST: Sara Zeigler

Provost Zeigler shared the following in her written report to Senate.

Course development support working group:
A working group has been formed to consider our current system for supporting course development and revision for face-to-face, hybrid, and fully online courses. Members were selected based on Faculty Senate recommendations. The group will be co-chaired by Ryan Baggett and Rusty Carpenter. The committee charge and membership are as follows:

Working Group Charge
The EKU Course (Re) Development Working Group will identify the existing processes in which faculty currently develop and re-develop courses (at all levels and delivery modalities). Following data collection, the working group will then conduct an analysis regarding the strengths and weaknesses of the identified processes resulting in a gap analysis where improvements could be made. Additionally, the group will identify smart practices used by other institutions of higher education in this area. Based on these findings the working group will make recommendations of high quality, cost-effective methods to support faculty when significant curricular overhauls are warranted.

Working Group Objectives

1. Identify current methods used by faculty for significant updates
2. Identify the current resources available at EKU to support significant curricular updates
3. Identify strengths and weaknesses of current curricular update methods
4. Identify strengths and weaknesses of current EKU resources that support updates
5. Identify and Analyze gaps in the current curricular methods
6. Identify and Analyze gaps in the current EKU resources in this area
7. Identify smart practices in significant curricular updates utilized by other institutions of higher education
8. Recommend quality, cost-effective methods to support faculty when significant curricular updates are warranted.

Academic Calendar Working Group Report:
Thanks to Senators Fontaine Sands and Anne Cizmar and Registrar Shannon Tipton for their outstanding work in co-chairing the Academic Calendar Working Group. Their report and recommendations are available for your review.

During the summer, the chairs, deans and other constituents will review the report and develop a process for further campus input. Additional updates will be provided at the initial Faculty Senate meeting in the Fall.

Faculty Compensation:
The budget build includes recommendations for both across-the-board increases and compression adjustments for faculty. If the Board approves those recommendations at its May 24 meeting, compression adjustments will be made using the same procedure as was implemented in January 2023. The 2022 CUPA data has been provided to the chairs, deans, and Senate leadership for their review.

Provost’s End of Spring Reception:
Please save the date for the Provost’s May Faculty Reception, scheduled for Tuesday, May 9, 4:30pm, in the Stratton Building Cafe and Patio. The event is open to the university community and will include refreshments.

GUEST SPEAKERS:

Student Government Association Update. Paige Murphy was in attendance to introduce next year’s leadership for SGA: Camden Ritchie, President and Clayton Latham, Executive Vice President.

NEW BUSINESS:

Report from Council on Academic Affairs. Associate Provost Wies presented 3 new certificate programs for action. Senator Grabeel moved approval, seconded by Senator Easterling. Motion carried. (YES = 44 votes | NO = 0 votes | ABSTAIN = 2 votes) (See also: Individual Votes)

Items 4-35 include some additional modalities for programs, one new minor, and 27 new courses which are presented as notification only to Senate.

Evaluation of Faculty Instruction. Chair Crosby shared that there has been some faculty concerns that the end date on evaluations went to the end of exam week. The Senate adopted a policy previously that stated that evaluations would end prior to the beginning of exam week in order to avoid a negative evaluation that might be submitted for a professor after finals are given. As a point of information, the understanding that's being circulated by the administration is that evaluations are to end on the Friday before finals week.

GENERAL & STANDING COMMITTEE REPORTS

REPORT FROM SENATE CHAIR: Senator Crosby

The Executive committee had a rather lengthy meeting on April 1. The committee spent most of its time on updates from the liaisons to the Senate Standing Committees. Some Committees have already completed their work. The final, large report will be delivered today from the Welfare Committee dealing with the results of their survey to the faculty. This report is the second of its kind, building on their important work last year. Chair James Blair and the Welfare Committee have provided highly valuable work in taking the temperature of the faculty and allowing us to pass along real data to the administration instead of anecdotes. The same goes for Budget and the rest of the committees. All have done truly outstanding work.

This will be my last report as Chair. It has been an honor and a privilege to serve as Chair for the last two years and Vice Chair for two years before that.

REPORT FROM FACULTY REGENT: Senator Marion

Since the last Faculty Senate meeting, the Board of Regents has not met. The next meeting is scheduled for Wednesday, May 24 at 9am on the stage at the Center for the Arts. While the agenda is not available yet, it remains expected that the May 24 meeting will have many items of interest to the faculty and university at-large. Of particular interest will be the Board’s consideration of a proposed university budget that will be constructed to support the university’s strategic plan and goals within the realities of our expected state, student, and other revenues versus our expenses. Last year’s quarterly meeting included a compensation action item and in communications with the President and Provost, there are ongoing efforts to make necessary budget modifications to enable greater investment in the university’s faculty and staff.

Since our last Senate meeting, several of the Regents have again attended university events recognizing faculty, staff, and students.

Burnout Conversations: During the last month, the impact of the last seven or eight months of intensive work among the collective faculty and staff at EKU has not been lost on me both from personal experience with my academic duties, coupled with the stories I’ve received from my conversations with our faculty colleagues. Together these, along with a FCTL Burnout session, which featured a brief burnout assessment tool, have further heightened my awareness of the palpable burnout impacting our faculty, of which many are holding out hope that their life circumstances and life balance will be somewhat more achievable around May 15. While the stress of the matter has been daunting, the reality is that EKU is not alone, as the Association of Governing Boards is getting more mindful about the impact of higher ed stressors on employee retention and productivity, as evidenced by a brief post in November, and their recent Trusteeship Conference having talent retention and human resources as their closing session. Nationally, EAB describes the problem impacting the country as one that is ‘real’ and ‘cannot be wished’ way and for universities not willing to address the matter, consequences on hitting strategic objectives could be notable. Thankfully, through conversations with the President, Provost, and others, we are gaining in awareness that we, EKU, are not alone in this challenge, and we may learn from the Senate, other tools, and possible future instruments, for possible mitigative measures to enhance workplace well-being at EKU to enable EKU’s culture to optimally support the strategic plan. 

Closing Comments: The last several years have been quite remarkable for the country and higher education. Nationally, EKU weathered the ongoing COVID era and its worst storms far better than most of our peers. One key reason was Dr. Richard Crosby. In times like these last few years, he has always maintained his empathetic leadership style, which is a characteristic very evidently illustrated by him that has helped us persevere. His time as Vice Chair and Senate Chair were invaluable at the right time for many reasons. He made an indelible impact on Eastern over his career and has kept it on a course into the future.

STANDING COMMITTEES

Academic Quality Committee. Senator Sands reminded that their final presentation was shared last month. The Committee was also part of the Provost Ad Hoc Committee looking at the calendar. That report and the recommendations were presented as part of the Provost’s report today.

Budget Committee. Senator Yow shared the committee’s year-end report which includes the status of the charges received for this year. He also reminded that the budget presentation was provided to Senate last month.

Suggested charges for next year include the following:

• Append FY 24 data to the Spring 2023 budget report using the budget spreadsheet template.
• Append data to the Knight Commission spreadsheet and update the athletics budget report.
• Follow up on additional questions Faculty Senate members may have on budgetary issues. 

Elections & University Nominations Committee. Senator Spira reported that the committee recently worked with department chairs to ensure that new senators were on board in time to attend the organization meeting later today.

The following charges are recommended for next year:

• Work on the part-time faculty elections in the spring semester.
• Administer any Faculty Senate elections as necessary.

Information Technology Committee. Senator Hight shared the committee’s year-end report.

She also shared an update on the IT survey on myEKU. As you are aware, the myEKU platform replaced EKU Direct. The survey was developed to see what faculty perceptions are related to this change. There were about 144 surveys collected which is about 60% of the respondents. The most frequent response was that the experience was average. It was also noted that only about 9% of faculty were able to receive training, so more training should probably be made available. When asked what they liked about myEKU, nothing really stood out. When asked what they did not like about myEKU, the most common response was the difficulty of navigating the grade submissions screen. The most common response to how can myEKU be improved was return to EKU Direct. (Supporting Docs: Survey Executive Summary & Survey Results)

Faculty Rights and Responsibilities Committee. Senator Brent shared their year-end report which details their progress on the charges received this year.

Rules Committee. Senator Bishop-Ross shared their year-end report. Recommended charges for next year include the following:

• Oversee and coordinate with all the Senate Standing Committees to assess and update the internal procedures of the committees.
• Follow up on creating an updated online Faculty Handbook.
• Follow up on investigating what open meetings laws imply for voting requirements and update Part Seven of the Faculty Handbook accordingly.
• Consider updating archaic language in Part Seven of the Faculty Handbook.
• Make other necessary updates to Part Seven of the Faculty Handbook.
• Update Internal Procedures as needed. 

Welfare Committee. Senator Blair and his team members provided an excellent presentation on the results from a faculty survey which measured faculty perceptions of benefits this year and compared the results received to the survey results from last year. With mental health issues, employee burnout, and a perceived lack of shared governance, the faculty are in a negative place. Several key variables got significantly worse from the 2021-2022 survey to the 2022-2023 survey. This shows current actions are not making positive improvements or are actually making things worse. (see also: supporting survey data)

Recommended charges for next year include the following:

• Continue monitoring the external environment for higher education as well as faculty perceptions of benefits being provided by Eastern Kentucky University.
• Work directly with key decision makers within and outside of Eastern Kentucky University to improve workplace conditions and compensation.

ADJOURNMENT:

Senator Kelley moved to adjourn, seconded by Senator Lauk, at approximately 5:30pm.

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(See Also:  Polling Results by Motion & Senators)

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