Minutes for September 12, 2022

The Faculty Senate of Eastern Kentucky University met on Monday, September 12, 2022 via Zoom. Chair Crosby called the first meeting of the academic year to order at approximately 3:30 p.m.

The following members were absent:

^* Indicates prior notification of absence
^ ALT Andrew Putman attended for C. Streetman

APPROVAL OF MINUTES:

Senator Crosby stated that without objection, the May 2 regular and organizational minutes would be approved by acclamation.  As there were no objections, the minutes were approved.

REPORT FROM THE PRESIDENT:  David McFaddin

Freshman Enrollment
Our 2022 Freshman class is currently at 2,762 compared to 2,504 from 2021, 2,321 in 2020, and 2,307 in 2019. This is a significant year-over-year improvement. Next fall’s freshman class goal is 3,000.

Overall Enrollment
We are very excited about the strong freshman class but certainly see areas where we need to improve to get our overall enrollment to pre-covid numbers. This requires a focus on two areas, we need attention in our online programs and our graduate programs in order to meet our goals of increased overall enrollment.

Big E Central
Earlier this semester we launched Big E Central which is a one-stop location for Financial Aid, Student Accounting, and Registrar assistance. As with any launch there are always growing pains and the team is experiencing high call volume which results in longer wait times for our students. The team is working on streamlining measures to address reducing the hold times including a shifting of additional staff from other areas to support this work.

Welcoming New Deans
After what feels like years of searches, we are pleased to welcome our new deans. If you haven’t had a chance to meet our new group of deans, I highly encourage you to do so.

Parental Leave
An email was distributed earlier today on parental leave. This change was intentional to ensure that we 1) provide our employees with benefits that allow employees to have work/life balance; 2) make us competitive with other public and private sector entities and 3) push our team to be focused on making EKU the Employer of Opportunity. Please work with your HR Business Partners and supervisors if you are interested in taking advantage of this leave option.

Performance Management
In the upcoming week, Human Resources will announce a new campus performance management system. This system is currently focused on staff reviews. It is important that all faculty overseeing the work of staff employees review the material. I want to stress that the reason we have feedback systems is to do just that…provide feedback. In numerous surveys and exit interviews, employees have shared that a common frustration is the lack of supervisory feedback.

Pedway Update
This week I provided an update at the Richmond Chamber of Commerce’s State of the University about a variety of topics including the status of the Bypass Pedway. The pedway is not at the minimum height required for state approval. We are currently working with the contractor and our legal teams to reach a resolution between the parties. Once we reach an agreement, the contractor indicates it will take 60 days from the date of agreement to finish the project.

Upcoming Legislature Session
The 2023 short-session (30 working days) of the Kentucky General Assembly will begin in early January and will end by March 31st. There will be 20-25 new legislators in 2023 due to retirements and redistricting. We will be meeting and building relationships with the new members to brief them on EKU issues and our legislative priorities. We will host Colonels at the Capitol in mid-February and will be sharing more information about our agenda before the end of the year.

We expect the legislature may open the budget to narrowly address several pressing issues, including additional support for communities impacted by the flood devastation in Eastern Kentucky. We will highlight EKU’s support for our students in the service region who were impacted by the flooding and will ask the General Assembly to fund some of those initiatives. If you have any questions, have identified opportunities to streamline legislative language, or are asked to testify or plan to meet with a General Assembly member, please contact our Chief Government, Community and Corporate Relations liaison Amy Scarborough.

Powell Plaza
We are finalizing an exciting amphitheater project in the Powell Plaza. This is going to provide an excellent opportunity for us to give students another location to collaborate with both faculty and each other, create a soft scape in what otherwise is a highly concrete space, and add appropriate lighting and sound capabilities to enable events and activities. We anticipate this being complete in the upcoming weeks.

Veterans Memorial
In addition, out of respect to our men and women who bravely fought for our country, it has not felt appropriate that the hub of energy of our campus, Powell Plaza, is colocated with a place of extreme reverence, the Veterans Memorial. For this reason, the Veterans Memorial will be moved to the Carloftis Garden. This will create a beautiful and peaceful place for staff, students, veterans and community members to reflect and appreciate the sacrifices of our servicemen and women. That project is anticipated to be completed in 2023.

Faculty Lunch and Learns
Faculty Lunch and Learns are an opportunity for faculty members to join the Faculty Senate Chair and me for discussions on the topic of your choice. Each Lunch and Learn will take place while breaking bread over a meal at Case Dining Hall in the upstairs Regents Room. Registration will close once each event reaches capacity. Lunch will be provided at each event for the first 30 faculty who RSVP at the following links:

Colonel Conversations

Colonel Conversations will be topic-specific discussions on hot topics that you tell me are important to you. These sessions are designed to provide open dialogue and discussion about the issues and topics that impact you every day. Registration will close once each event reaches capacity.

• Colonel Conversations: EKU…the Employer of Opportunity
  October 5, 2022, at 3:00pm - Crabbe Library

This session will highlight the good, the bad, and the ugly of working at EKU. The goal is to have a productive conversation about what EKU is doing to be the Employer of Opportunity and brainstorm new ways and ideas to work towards being a Best Place to Work in Kentucky.

• Colonel Conversations: Turn up the Heat-What Facilities are Hot and What are Not
  December 1, 2022, at 3:00pm - Crabbe Library

A discussion about what are the hot places to work on campus and the ones that are not. We will share the long-term campus plan for asset preservation funds and realistic timelines on what you can expect in the future as it relates to campus offices, classrooms, and residence hall spaces on campus.

REPORT FROM THE PROVOST: Sara Zeigler

One clarification on the new performance management system that the president mentioned, this does not alter any of the policies or regulations relating to faculty evaluation or the evaluation of academic administrators who hold faculty rank. Those regulations have not changed in any way and will not change without all of the proper processes being followed.

I recently addressed each of your college convocations and talked with you about the high-level concept we’re going to be using wherein advancement in faculty rank and longevity at the institution is awarded by higher level bumps to address compression issues. Melinda Compton has drafted a model for me looking at dollar figures and how much it would be for rank in each level. This model does include clinical faculty and lecturers as well as senior clinical faculty and senior lecturers. Again, this is a high-level concept and will not delve into individual cases. The deans and I will be reviewing this model at our meeting tomorrow and at that time I should be able to take it both to the Cabinet and to the chairs for further review. This year there is a $500,000 pool set aside to address compression. The amount available is really easy to spend quickly, especially when addressing faculty and staff. As the fund is small this year, faculty may want to consider using those funds to increase our professional development fund. 

Later in today’s meeting, Chair Crosby will do an unofficial poll to see if you and your constituents prefer piloting the new compression model this year or using the $500,000 instead to increase professional development.

The call has been issued for cross-college and interdisciplinary proposals again. Deans George and Baggett are co-chairing that. We are devoting $100,000 to those efforts this year. The good news is the deadline will not be the day after we return from winter break.

In terms of opportunities to talk with me about your questions and concerns, an email will be sent out today or tomorrow listing some open office hours for me so that you can schedule a time to meet either by Zoom or in person during those set times. You're also always welcome to make an appointment at another time. Sometimes it's easier for last minute concerns to have some time blocked out.

There will be two social hours scheduled for faculty this semester on October 13 and December 1 around 4:30 pm so that you can come enjoy a little food and beverage and then move on about your evenings. The locations will be announced soon.

Finally, let me give you the update on the faculty liaison position. As you know, Beth Polin had occupied this role which came into being after we stood down the Ombud position. Beth is going to do some work on Leadership Development and a Leadership Center in the College of Business and will no longer be doing the faculty liaison work. At this time, we don’t know what the best option is for replacing that. For an initial step, Chair Crosby and I are going to meet with Beth and find out what her experience was, what kinds of issues were coming up to her, recognizing that not everyone was bringing those issues forward, and also recognizing that staff need resources as well as faculty. As such a faculty liaison is probably not the best way to affect that.

Chair Crosby stated that one of the Faculty Welfare Committee’s charges this year is to look at the issue of having an Ombud versus a faculty advocate and to make recommendations.

GUEST SPEAKERS:

Introduction to Board of Regents Chair. Michael Eaves was in attendance to introduce himself to the Senate. He began his education at Eastern in 1971, graduated in 1975, went on to law school, and then came back to Richmond in 1979 to practice law. Last year he retired and was appointed to the Board of Regents. At the June meeting he was elected to serve as chair to the Board.

Introduction to Assistant Counsel. Ms. Dana Fohl introduced Ms. Lauren Keeler to the senators. Ms. Keeler has joined the University Counsel team as Assistant Counsel. While she’ll also have legal duties, her chief responsibility will be that of policy development. She will be working closely with members of the faculty and staff as policy initiatives move forward.

Student Government Association. Ms. Paige Murphy, SGA President, gave a brief update.

• Students loved all of the events held during the Big E Welcome.
• Students are excited about the updates being made in the Powell Plaza.
• Faculty and/or departments can request money from our IT fund for IT-related expenditures this fall. The deadline to apply is this Friday.  

 NEW BUSINESS:

2022-23 Committee Charges. Chair Crosby presented the 2022-23 Committee Charges as an information item. Many of the charges were based on recommendations that each of the committees made last year in their final report. Please remember to review the internal procedures (http://facultysenate.eku.edu/internal/) to review information that pertains to all committees as well as additional information for your specific committee.

Standing Committee Elections. The following committee vacancies were filled.

• Board of Governors (2 vacancies)

(Reminder: Members on the Board of Governors do not have to be serving on the Faculty Senate.)

The following were nominated: Brittani Moberly, Raymond Lauk, Sara Evans, Senator Easterling and Senator Mayer. 

Brittani Moberly and Raymond Lauk were elected to fill the vacancies.
(Brittani Moberly = 16 votes | Raymond Lauk = 12 votes | James Kirby Easterling = 11 votes | Jana Mayer = 7 votes | Sara Evans = 4 votes) (See also: Individual Votes)

• Elections & University Nominations Committee (1 vacancy)

Senators Easterling, Keller, and Stevenson were nominated.

Senator Easterling was elected to fill the vacancy.
(James Kirby Easterling = 23 votes | James Keller = 7 votes | Erin Stevenson = 22 votes) (See also: Individual Votes)

Unofficial Faculty Senate Poll. Chair Crosby asked the Senate to participate in an unofficial poll to see if faculty preferred that the one-time $500,000 pool available this year be used to address salary compression issues or divided among faculty to increase faculty development. Overwhelmingly, the faculty chose addressing compression issues. Chair Crosby will share the results of the poll with Provost Zeigler. (Compression = 40 votes | Professional Development = 6 votes | ABSTAIN = 4 votes) (See also: Individual Votes)

GENERAL & STANDING COMMITTEE REPORTS

REPORT FROM SENATE CHAIR: Senator Crosby

For the past several years, the Elections & University Nominations Committee has solicited nominations to fill faculty vacancies on four university standing committees (General Education, Graduate Council, Library and Research). However, there are specific qualifications needed to serve in some of those positions. As there is a lot of turnover on the Senate Standing Committee, new members may be unaware of those qualifications and the faculty who self-nominate for those vacancies may not meet the necessary criteria. This has caused some problems over the years. The Executive Committee discussed the issue and was in agreement that, without Senate objection, the responsibility for filling those positions should revert back to the university committees.

Senator Winslow moved to keep the nomination process in the Senate, seconded by Senator Hartch.

Senator Kelley moved to postpone discussion to the May meeting, seconded by Senator Sexten. Motion carried. (YE3 = 41 votes | NO = 2 votes | ABSTAIN = 2 votes) (See also: Individual Votes).

REPORT FROM FACULTY REGENT: Senator Marion

The next Board meeting will be on Friday, September 16 at 9am in Walnut Hall located on the first floor of the Keen Johnson Building. Once the agenda is available, it will be viewable on the agendas page of the Board of Regents website linked here: https://regents.eku.edu/agendas-0.

Recapitulation of Summer Board Activities
During this summer, the EKU Board had several new Board members appointed by Governor Beshear. Furthermore, a new Board Chair (Regent Michael Eaves) was elected at the June meeting of the Board as outgoing Chair Lewis Diaz completed his term of service on the Board. The Board agenda on June 14 had a lot of information and action items, including approval of the 2022-23 operating budget. 

The July 21 Board agenda and meeting were very brief as the Board met for the purpose of fulfilling a state statute which requires administering the oath of office to new appointees and electing a vice-chair and secretary within 30 days of gubernatorial appointments to the Board.

• In addition to the agenda links above, pre-meeting and post-meeting summaries and important items for sharing with our faculty were included in three summer Faculty Regent Updates.
  • Those updates can be viewed in a Google Folder linked here.
  • Also, while not in the initial budget book on June 14, the detailed expenditures portion of the 2022-23 Board budget book were made available in late June, which can be viewed on the University Operating Budget page linked here.

Information from Council on Post-Secondary Education (CPE)
Next week (September 19-20), regents and trustees from all of Kentucky’s institutions will be attending the Kentucky Postsecondary Education Trusteeship Conference. The agenda for that meeting is linked here. The CPE is actively working on the Healthcare Workforce Collaborative having recently provided $8M in grants to institutions in Kentucky, and CPE is active this month with the Commonwealth Education Continuum which includes partners from K-12 Education and Economic Development. The CPE will be hosting the 4th annual Higher EDquity Symposium this November 14-15 at NKU, and a save-the-date announcement went out on August 21. The CPE also recently released their 2022 Progress report documenting how the state is fairing with respect to progress (enrollment, degrees/credentials) in regard to the Statewide Strategic Agenda’s goals. 

Information from Council of Statewide Faculty Leadership (COSFL)
COSFL will be hosting their first meeting this Friday afternoon on Zoom. Among information sharing by the various university COSFL members statewide, Dr. Aaron Thompson from CPE will provide remarks and host Q&A with COSFL membership. 

REPORT FROM COSFL: Senator Cizmar

COSFL is scheduled to meet for the first time this academic year on Friday.

ANNOUNCEMENTS:

Chair Crosby reminded the standing committees to meet soon to elect a chair and set their meeting schedule and then forward the information to him and the Senate secretary.

ADJOURNMENT:

Senator Grabeel moved to adjourn at approximately 5:15pm, seconded by Senator Moore.

click here for printable version of minutes  
(See Also:  Polling Results by Motions & Senators)

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