Geneseo
College Senate Bulletin
State University of New York at Geneseo
College of Arts and Sciences
Correspondence to Dennis Showers, School of Education, South 222C, showers@geneseo.edu, 245-5264
Note: Page numbers indicate pages as per the paper copy of the Bulletins.
Bulletin No. 6
Pages 50 - 66
February 17, 2013
Contents
Section Page
College Senate meeting agenda for February 4, 2013 51
College Senate minutes of November 6, 2012 52
Faculty Affairs Committee Minutes of November 13, 201 56
Faculty Affairs Committee minutes of November 23, 2012 57
Executive Committee minutes of November 27, 2012 59
Senate minutes of December 4, 2012 62
Fall Election Report 65
University Faculty Senate report, UFS January Plenary meeting 65
Agenda for Senate Meeting on February 5, 2013
Call to Order 5 minutes
Adoption of the Agenda (circulated to the Senate-L list)
Adoption of the Minutes
Minutes of the Senate meeting of November 11, 2012 (CSB V. 57, n 5; pp. 38-42)
Special Guest
Jack Kramer (’76), Chair, Geneseo Foundation Board 10 minutes
Senate Reports 15 minutes
President Christopher Dahl
Provost Carol Long
Chair Dennis Showers
Vice Chair Jan Lovett
Past-Chair David Granger
Secretary Cheryl Kreutter
Treasurer Paul Pacheco
University Faculty Senator Gregg Hartvigsen
VP, Student Assoc. Justin Shapiro
Reports of the Standing Committees of the Senate 20 minutes
Undergraduate Curricula* Meg Stolee
Undergraduate Policies Maria Lima
Graduate Academic Affairs Doug Mackenzie
Student Affairs Dan Repinski
Faculty Affairs Jim Allen
Old Business
New Business
Preview of Governance web site 10 minutes
Adjournment
5:00
*UCC matters for Senate meeting on Feb 5, 2015
All proposals for second reading:
1. New Course:
PSYC 294: Peer Advocacy
2. Revised Courses:
BIOL 390: Molecular Techniques
PSYC 307: Sensation and Perception
PSYC 315: Psychology of Language
PSYC 325: Cognitive Psychology
PSYC 330: Biological Psychology
PSYC 331: The Neural and Chemical Basis of Behavior
PSYC 332: Human Neuropsychology
PSYC 335: Behavioral Pharmacology
PSYC 338: Animal Behavior
PSYC 357: Behavior Genetics
3. Revised Programs:
BA in Biology
BS in Biochemistry
BS in Biology
BA in Geological Sciences
Minutes of the College Senate Meeting
November 6, 2012
Present: J. Aimers, J. Allen, P. Barber, M. Board, B. Bonfiglio, M. Boquard, S. Bosch, T. Bowersox, A. Carroll, R. Coloccia, C. Dahl, D. Ernst, D. Farthing, K. Fletcher, E. Gamello, L. Gao, C. Geiger, D. Granger, D. Greenberg, C. Haddad, J. Hannie, B. Harrison, G. Hartvigsen, A. Heap, E. Joyce, R. Kahrs, C. Kreutter, J. Lasody, M.H. Lima, M. Liwanag, C. Long, J. Lovett, D. Mackenzie, G. Marcus, K.J. Matthews, V. Markowski, C. Mellow, J. Miller, J. Milroy, M. Mooney, J. Morgan, J. Okada, J. Over, P. Pacheco, D. Repinski, S. Salmon, D. Scott, J. Shapiro, D. Showers (Chair), M. Stolee, A. Tajima, G. Towsley, R. Vasiliev, M. Volpe- McDermott, A. Yankay
Call to Order
Chair Showers called the meeting to order at 4:04 PM.
I. Agenda accepted without objection
II. Minutes of October 16, 2012 accepted without objection
III. Senate Reports
President’s Report: President C. Dahl
· Discussed commission of sustainability and have received charter for the year, and they are preparing their reports. They are working very hard on issues such as sustainability education and a variety of planning and publicity. Christy Hanub (Biology) and Darlene Necaster (Facilities, Finance and Administration) are on this.
· Diversity administration - Cathy Mapes (history) and Tracy Paradis (library). This is available on the diversity webpage and the president’s webpage. Charge will also be available on the web page. Working on putting together a diversity plan in connection with the strategic planning group looking at international students and education and mentoring issues. Looking at further development of publicity for Real World Geneseo - in the mission of diversity. They would love to have willing members. I will be sending something to department secretaries. Please feel free to volunteer.
· Report the SUNY 2020 proposal discussed last time is going forward and doing vertical leg work. Vice President Milroy has the paper copy. Email Provost or Jim Milroy and they will send the entire document.
· We were spared most of the effects of the superstorm Sandy. New Jersey was hit very badly, and in the city, and portions of Brooklyn, Queens, Redwood, and Long Island. We have sent out a college notice to alumni and parents expressing concerns and things will be offered on this campus (opportunities) to assist and serve down there. Similar notice will be going out to students as well. Notice to staff will go out as opportunities are more clear. This may come out tomorrow in an email. The students want to be involved. They are talking to Tom Matthews.
o It would be useful to have a workshop for volunteers to one or more sites in the week before classes begin Jan 6 -13.
o On the model of Livingston Cares and hurricane Katrina - we will be going on a spring trip and restoration to NYC/NJ area. 40% of the students come from the affected areas. We will be asking students if they know of families who might have been extremely affected and holding a meeting for students working and volunteering. We just hope that we don’t cause more trouble than help J
o Through Livingston Cares we will have a designated hurricane relief, or through the Geneseo Foundation.
· Meg Stolee (History) - Recently the college has announced the new word mark (yes)
o Could you compare and tell us the cost of the research and implementation?
o President - We have had the same word mark since I got here. It is a normal process to redesign. This seemed appropriate to do. We engaged a firm of consultants - $65,000 divided by 26 is $2, 500 a year. The cost of implementing is very small. We are not going to do it all at once. Things get changed on the website for free. Everyone can use up the old stationary that we have accumulated. The intention of this process, which was participatory, used focus groups, advisory committees - the intuition was to present the college visually as it is today than as it was in 1986. If you look at the word mark and look at the other leading liberal arts colleges, you’ll see that the new word mark is very much in keeping visually.
o What was this money spent on?
o President - This is the typical cost of a firm that is usually spent. This was a contract that was reviewed by 100s of people that provided advice and guidance. This is the cost of doing business.
Provost’s report: Provost C. Long
· I’m back from a few days at Denver and they have some exciting things going on. They have been doing work with Scholarly Communication - looking at peer review for digital scholars, shared academics, spring events that we can be a part of virtually. I will be in NYC with the SUNY system on a conference on systemness. We will be in early December putting out applications for ambassadors for this summer. Be thinking about students who would be good candidates. Think about proposals, due in early February.
· I want to present a revised form H for chairs and departmental personnel committees for contract renewal and promotion. It has taken 8 years to change this form. Jim Beers, James McLean and James McAllen have been a part of this. There have been a lot of faculty in the conversation. The form, and the material for the intro - instructions to fill out the form and appendixes for what types of evidence to present. I need to do some working with the language with which will be done with the faculty affairs committee.
o College personal committee - I wanted them to have a look at the form. Those conversations focused on the major changes in the revised form (10 point scale in the subset). All those numbers disappeared and went to a yes/no. Many of the committee thought it wouldn’t be as helpful to them in the subsets. They were interested in having a little more definition to the response. I listened to the conversation and talked with president Dahl.
o There are a few changes:
o Under the performance ratings -- there is a range or evaluative words
o Minor change - in the last section - evaluation of contributions to service - the first one was originally disciplinary.
o Steve Derne (Sociology) The main problems identified with the existing form H were primarily: 1) Form H is not effective in prompting departments to give candidates adequate advice about whether they are meeting expectations and 2) Because numbers are not applied consistently across departments, Form H is not effective at providing the FPC, the Provost, and the President with the information that they need to judge candidates. I remain concerned that the proposed changes will not solve these problems -- committees will focus more on deciding what category to rank a candidate, rather than providing feedback; rankings will not be consistent across departments
· Provost: We have sometimes too many boxes and the conversation doesn’t always come across. (First point) I agree that we need to give good feedback; I also agree that the 10 point scale didn’t actually do that.
o Steve Derne - No one is just “acceptable” or “model” and this is
a limitation.
o In there were some numbers (50%) teaching - are those now
out? (They are still there) I’m not seeing them there and I thought that this would be a good thing. Some of us are stronger than others without that.
· Provost: We haven’t changed the policy framework. It has been an ongoing conversation but I think that this is an important time to refresh this conversation. We need to be thoughtful in our responses. There are so many pressures from many directions and it is important that we be good stewards of the profession and thinking of the roles of faculty. We need to think about the kind of faculty culture we want to develop. We need student response and staff response and working hard to identify the public values that come out of a strong faculty culture.
· President - response - I think that Steve is right about the college’s admin failure to follow up on recommendations of admin process. I’m glad we are moving on this in a productive way with the leadership of Provost Long. This is a discussion about our responsibilities to our colleagues. 80% of our faculty are tenure track.
o Jan Lovett (Biology) - one of the things were it looks brief (in giving commentary) that was where the justification was and if we remember a couple years before, we had a document where we were supposed to have each dept. list the criteria for the different stages of promotion that was agreed upon with the last Provost and that was supposed to fit with this document to the personal committee.
· Provost - all of that has happened. Departments have presented their guidelines; they live in a website and they have used them for the last two years.
o Meg Stolee - How much variation in the specificity where
they layout their specifications?
· Provost - There is not huge disparity; there are some depending on the discipline. The problem has not been entirely solved. They are talking about what is most important for their discipline.
Chair: Dennis Showers
· I convened a governance council - commmitees in college, faculty, and presidential commissions. We talked about a way we might better coordinate the governance group. Standardizing governance information. They will know how to get the information because it will be the same way you get information for other committees. I have met with a rep for CIT - and to make a shell and a link to a second page that will have other advisory bodies. We will have a menu with a master governance calendar so they know exactly where to go. This will become governance central. Each body will have a template with standard presentation with meeting schedule, the current roster (these are constantly changing) and we have solved this problem by having the chair being the roster manager. This allows the bodies themselves to manage the roster. Standard place for committees and reports.
· The second thing: group of faculty to talk about support and evaluation of teaching. The groups invited are all distinguished teaching, recent excellence award winners, and others that are interested to form a steering committee to frame a discussion on November 28th. The issue was we’ve spent so much focus on changing the student evaluation form to make it do what it needs to do - where it might not be able to do that. We would like to talk about - when a faculty member goes up for tenure - what should be presented to make the decision? We will reverse engineer that and find out what we need, and then create a support system for a body of evidence - how do we evaluate that evidence? We will try to get people together after Thanksgiving. We would like to get to a more sophisticated place to learn how to get better numbers on the SOFI
· University awards committee - Thinking about chancellor’s awards in early career - if you have any thoughts - we are in discussion. What do we do if someone wins an award in the 4th year and they go up for tenure - how does this work?
o A chancellors award for excellence in governance - awarded to a campus rather than an individual
o Kurt Fletcher (Physics) Who maintains the websites? Who puts the records on after every meeting?
o Chair: There is a timeframe. Shared Governance - it might be advantageous to include a link to student association. The SOFI emerged from a student member to evaluate faculty. If this is to be done, we will engage it. This went to the CIE’s, then a student evaluation of instruction. One senator rose “this is the students’ opinion about instruction”. This is not to replace current discussion about SOFI - this is we’ve spent so much time on getting a SOFI instruction - we haven’t thought about other things that we can do. We need to get beyond that.
o Kurt Fletcher: what is the relationship between the website and the college bulletin?
o Chair: That is part of a large discussion. Would it be redundant? Could we take the website and easily pull everything together to send it out. One of the issues in communication - it is so easy to say - we need more communication - let’s send it out. Giving them access to what they need to know and making it so they know how to get it - that is more important.
o Q (Steve #LastName): It is important to make it searchable - we need to have CIT work on ways to make this searchable. The thing about teaching - this should help ongoing faculty figuring out how to improve the teachers
o Dennis - David Parfitt is co-chairing the committee to integrate the functionality.
Vice Chair: Jan Lovett
· no report
Past Chair: David Granger
· no report
Secretary: Cheryl Kreutter
· no report
Treasurer: Paul Pacheco
· We will be soliciting contributions College Senate next month.
University Faculty Senate –
· Look at the written report. Resource allocation tool - SUNY Central was devising a tool for reallocation, we discussed voting on a resolution on capping how much a certain campus would lose. I spoke against this. Geneseo would lose more money if it was transferred to university centers. The core mission of SUNY is to educate students. We should not favor a cut. We talked about mobility issues with Community Colleges - students being unprepared. We are concerned - what are we supposed to do - we must accept these students and accept what they received (credits). There is a loophole - if students come in from a CC and they are weak, we can appeal to not take students from that school.
o Dennis - campus governance leaders were also concerned with reallocation
Student Association
· The SOFI task force meets November 12 - if you have people with suggestions, email sabp@geneseo.edu
· The senate student caucus passed
· Thank you for the later construction time - we encourage that this is in place
· Recommend medical amnesty by the college senate
· We are trying to get everyone to the polls by 9 pm
o Steve Derne: Does amnesty refer to student affairs (no). It would come to executive committee
o Chair: It is really smart to engage the alumni
UG Curriculum Committee: Meg Stolee
· UCC moves the first reading of the new courses ARTH 302, ENGL 202, MATH 341. Motion carried. Move first reading of revised courses –
o Motion carries.
· Moves the first reading of course deletion:
o Motion carries
· First reading - program revisions –
o Motion carries
· UG Committee: Every course has a replacement at the 200 level
o Motion carries
· Next meeting is November 13 at 4pm
UG Policies Committee meeting November 13 at 4pm - Dennis is convening the meeting
Graduate Curricular - no report
Student affairs - no report
Faculty Affairs - next meeting November 13
Old business - no
New business - no
Announcements - no
Meeting adjourned 5:02 PM
Respectfully submitted,
Cheryl A. Kreutter, College Senate Secretary
William Jones III, Milne Library
Minutes of the Faculty Affairs Committee
Nov 13, 2012
Present: Jim Allen (chair), David Ernst, Lei Gao, Cristina Geiger, Robert Kahrs, Chris Leary, James McLean, Julie Morgan, Elias Savellos, Amy Sheldon
Guest: Justin Shapiro
Call to Order
Allen called the meeting to order at 4:15 PM.
Minutes of the previous FAC meeting were approved without objection after minor corrections.
1. Old Business:
Shapiro gave a report on the student task force that has recently been convened to consider issues surrounding the Student Opinion of Faculty Instruction surveys. He described three main focuses envisioned for this group:
· Improved advertising, to get students more familiar with the importance of the surveys and with how to fill out and submit the survey
· Finding ways to improve the online interface, referring primarily to extracting information from the survey results database. The current interface for entering survey information seems to be satisfactory.
· Considering methods for providing assessment a few years after having taken classes, when the benefit of hindsight may enhance students understanding of the importance of the course.
2. New Business
Chair Allen provided a list of possible discussion points surrounding the SOFis. McLean suggested an additional item, being the question of where the rules and policies for SOFIs are recorded and maintained.
After some discussion, Kahrs made the motion, “SOFI completion should not be made mandatory.” Motion was seconded and passed unanimously.
McLean and Geiger collaboratively proposed a motion, which after some discussion relating to the future potential for SOFI comments to be shared from within the computer system, was modified to:
Written SOFI comments will be only directly accessible to the instructor via the computer interface. The instructor may have the option to share written comments electronically only with those involved in decisions pertaining to renewal, continuing appointment, promotion, and awards. This policy will be published on the provost’s web site.
Motion was seconded and passed unanimously.
Discussion about whether to forbid the use of academic incentives did not yield a motion. It was noted that such a rule would be unenforceable. Perhaps, therefore, a statement on the subject should be given as a guideline. Many discussants agreed that the positive effect of incentives (i.e., increased response rate) could more effectively be achieved by administering the survey in class, and that the discussion should therefore turn to that question next.
Adjournment
Allen adjourned the meeting at 5:15 PM.
Respectfully submitted,
James McLean
Faculty Affairs Committee
Minutes
23 October 2012
Attendance: Jim Allen (chair), Amy Sheldon, James McLean, Christina Geiger, Robert Kahrs, David Ernst, Michael Oberg, Chris Leary, Lei Gao
Chair J. Allen called the meeting to order at 4:08 pm.
Chairs Report: J. Allen reviewed some of the recent history of SOFIs and FAC. In particular, he noted that Senate passed a policy several semesters ago saying that the administration of SOFIs would end two weeks before the end of the semester. This policy has never been implemented. In general, the Provost would like FAC and the Vice-President of SA to become the co-administrators of the SOFIs, in the sense that the communications to the campus about the SOFIS would come jointly from FAC and SA. Jim has been in contact with Julie Rao about the logistics of administering the SOFIs and hopes to hear back from her soon. SA is forming a Task Force to work on improving the SOFIs, in particular to think about how to best design the SOFI interface and better administer the instrument*. The Provost would like FAC to work with this Task Force to improve the SOFI and to improve the student response rate. One advantage of FAC being more involved with the SOFIs is that FAC would be more aware of Senate policies that should be followed. Furthermore, FAC has status as a Senate body and, as such, would perhaps have more weight with faculty than the Office of Institutional Research.
Lei asked if there was any chance of returning to paper SOFIs, or perhaps a hybrid system where numerical data are collected on paper and comments would be input on-line. There was general consensus that the major drawback to a paper form is the cost involved with processing the paper returns.
J. Allen then reported that the Provost will make a decision on the new Form H “soon” (Probably by the November meeting of Senate). Part of the continuing discussion includes making sure that Community Scholarship, of the type practiced by Mary Mohan in her work in the South Wedge and in Henrietta, be given appropriate recognition. The Provost reiterated to Jim her support for making sure that academic credit is only given for activities that take place under a faculty member's supervision.
J. Allen had distributed the new Family Medical Leave policy, as promulgated by the administration. The Provost had mentioned to Jim that she was wondering about emergency day care. How should the College respond when it is needed. Jim stated that, although the College now has a policy, they haven't addressed the basic issue. When a faculty member has to take an emergency leave, who handles the classes and where does the money come from to pay that person?
Another possible issue for FAC was suggested by Dennis Showers: Perhaps we could work on adopting a campus-wide ban on smoking. This seems to be coming, both from SUNY Central and from the State. This would be a chance for Geneseo to be on the leading edge.
Discussion then continued on what issues FAC should try to address this year. We will certainly work on the SOFI issues, but other possibilities include Family Medical Leave issues, a Smoking Ban, and evaluation of part-time and adjunct faculty members. On which of these should we focus?
The discussion of Family Medical Leave (FML) included the following: what can Senate do? Certainly we can find out what the current policies are concerning compensation for faculty members who take on extra duties when a colleague takes a leave. We want to make sure that we don't do a lot of work and just have what we/Senate do just get put in the Bulletin and then forgotten. Perhaps we should have a discussion with Human Resources about their publicity concerning leaves. It was noted that many women faculty members feel guilt about taking FML when pregnant or with a new infant, due to the strain that it would put on other members of their department and due to a lack of support from their colleagues.
As the discussion continued, the ordered list of topics that seems to be on our agenda for the year is: SOFIs, Family Medical Leave issues, a smoking ban.
We agreed that J. Allen will get more information from Dave Gordon and from HR about the FML policies. We will also gather the documents relating to the administration of SOFIs before our next meeting. At that meeting, we will invite SA Vice President Justin Shapiro for a discussion about the SA Task Force and their concerns about/ideas for the SOFI. At that time the Committee will make a plan of attack for action on the SOFIs.
The meeting was adjourned at 5:02.
Next FAC meeting: 13 November 2012, 4:15 pm, Room TBA
Respectfully submitted,
Chris Leary
Secretary of the Day
*Student Association goals for their SOFI Task Force
1. How best to design the SOFI interface to encourage students to utilize the SOFI for their input, as opposed to informal methods such as rate my professor;
2. How to better administer the SOFI in order to achieve item one (e.g. allowing for "retrospective" student input, such as responding to courses taken in semesters prior that had a profound impact on the students' pedagogical development);
3. How to advertise the SOFIs in such a way that students achieve a better understanding of the importance of participation in the SOFIs and the ways in which SOFI responses can help students understand professors' expectations, teaching approach, etc.
Minutes of the College Senate Executive Committee
November 27, 2012
Present: J. Allen, C. Dahl, D. Granger, D. Hartvigsen, C. Long, J. Lovett, D. Mackenzie, P. Pacheco, D. Repinski, J. Shapiro, D. Showers (Chair), M. Stolee
I. Call to Order 4:02 PM
Welcome Maria Lima.
II. Preparation of the Agenda for the next Senate Meeting
· Discussion about allocation methodology with Jim Milroy. Will take about ten minutes.
III. Reports to the Executive Committee:
· Dahl: Just a report to the Executive Committee about last year’s SAC report. Happy again to share SUNY 2020 proposal in detail electronically with anyone who’d like to see it.
o Lima: I’d like to see it.
· Long: Nothing for Exec Committee.
· Showers: Met with Dept. Chairs about best practices in advancement and things Depts. Can do to support advancement, but didn’t get what he expected. Felt it was opportunity for Depts. To say they haven’t been supported by Advancement in the past.
· Sent message to the faculty about meeting on teaching. Moving past how do we get a better student evaluation system to how do we better support teaching at Geneseo. David Parfitt has been working with me on moving this forward.
· Concern raised by members of Humanities faculty about recent proposal. Background: Proposal brought to Humanities faculty to allow for substitution proposals by humanities faculty. Proposal to substitute a reading for humanities class for one semester. It was questioned as to whether this requires full review by UCC and full Senate. I offered opinion that it does not need Senate review. Faculty asked me to reconsider, and I said I would bring it to executive committee.
o Lima: As a members of humanities faculty, I believe this structure change is minute, considering what could happen. This should not go back to the Senate.
o Lovett: Mechanistically, this would be a work for one semester, and if you wanted to use it again, you’d have to apply for next semester.
o Showers: Yes. Authorization is only good for one semester.
o Lovett: Fine with me. I don’t think one course is going to change how Humanities functions.
o Allen: Is the procedure reasonable? Can you give us an example of a similar type of change? This could change Humanities structure without going through Senate.
o Showers: I cannot. I know of no other course in which instructor is bound by particular readings.
o Allen: Is there any precedent for Humanities committee to make a decision without going to Senate?
o Granger: Yes, with number of papers and exams. This is a really incremental change, considering other things that are set in stone. I think it’s okay to proceed.
o Dahl: This isn’t a change in curricular requirements per se. The big change occurred in ’94 ’95. We had a pretty standard Western Canon. With specified tabs and options. What they did there was “structured chage.” This is allowing people to substitute a couple of menu options on a one-off basis. If this changed core of menu options, I think it should go through Senate, but it doesn’t.
o Allen: I remember that people debated what the choices were in ’94 ’95. Have they made changes in the menu options before?
o Showers: I don’t think there have been changes in the menu since 94-95.
o Long: I hope not to send this to Senate. I think then the message we send to our junior faculty is a very controlling message. There are people eager to teach humanities, but they want some flexibility on how they teach the Big Ideas. Responding to that with a relatively constrained amount of flexibility would give them a chance to make that course their own. I think not sending it on to Senate floor is a good message to send.
o Showers: I don’t advocate we do this because we think it’s the right thing to do, but based on procedural precedent. Is there precedent in the past for doing this? And Humanities faculty voted 2:1 in favor of this, so that’s will of the majority. But the minority also has a right to be heard, and that’s this discussion.
o Lovett: Given the structure menus with options, if those menus were to change, would that necessarily go through Senate, or is that the prerogative of humanities committee to look at their course? This doesn’t rise to the level of a change in the course that needs to be discussed by the college as a whole.
o Showers: That’s the can of worms. The humanities program right now is under the authority of the humanities committee. It’s a poorly defined committee of an amorphous group of faculty. There’s no document that defines membership in the humanities core curriculum.
o Lovett: What you’re asking is not whether this change needs to go to Senate, but if the process governing this change needs to go to Senate.
o Allen: Anyone share the concern there could be incremental and fundamental change to humanities core over time? What if they keep asking for these substitutions and they are just passed over again and humanities changes fundamentally?
o Granger: I think that’s what should happen. Everyone brings different perspectives, and the course needs to evolve.
o Allen: I think it needs to evolve as well, but it needs to go through Senate.
o Dahl: The change in the course would be evolutionary, and looking at literature and other courses, that’s what happens. The way I taught a course in 1975 was different than it is now. Reflective of changes in teacher and the general canon of knowledge.
o Showers: The next step after whatever is decided is to reconvene that three year review. Also, the way I read the proposal, the Humanities canon is A-J. I say I want to use R instead of E. After that semester, I go back to E, unless I decide to reapply. Not even evolutionary.
o Repinski: If the changes are these incremental changes, I don’t think it needs to move to the Senate. If evolution is intended, it requires Senate approval.
· Showers: Comments on attached proposal for changes to Research Council Constitution?
o Lovett: Under membership Part One, if it’s a one-to-one replacement, how does one ever get above twelve? There’s no mechanism for anyone to be added to the twelve already there.
o Pacheco: We’re now looking for a volunteer from each department.
· Treasurer’s Report: I convened past treasurers. We talked about what to do with Senate Fund and new ideas. Idea came up that treasurer has lost purpose and to abolish position and the senate fund. Create instead new position. I can see the point, but it doesn’t sound very effective.
o Showers: My idea about new second vice president was to assign that VP different duties, like historian.
o Lima: What about when faculty members lose family members?
o Pacheco: No clear chain of communication, so many losses are not known. It’s all very murky.
o Long: We seem not to make a great deal about faculty retirements. I’ve seen bodies like this in other locations recognize retiring faculty. There’s no faculty to faculty conversation about retirement.
o Pacheco: The Senate fund does pair with UUP to celebrate retirements.
o Dahl: The senate should have a resolution celebrating retiring faculty on her/his retirement.
o Lovett: So our job is to come up with what duties and title could replace the treasurer.
o Showers: I want Exec Committee to function as ad hoc body to amend constitution to reflect position replacing treasurer.
· Showers: Jan sent a memo about enrollment sizes and changes in majors?
o Lovett: There’s a pre-biology proposal that’s gone through UCC. This wasn’t our first choice for dealing with how to deal with the large influx of science majors. We haven’t been able to keep pace, and if the student number keeps going up, we have nowhere in the building to place new faculty and instructors. As people decide not to be bio majors, they often go to psych or anthro, which are usual alternatives. This affects majors other than the sciences. Is the fact that we’re a liberal arts college and not a STEM institution, does this mean we should look at equitable distribution of majors, and what does this mean?
o Pacheco: Business provides a good model. They do not admit majors, students come in, take classes, and then have to apply.
o Lovett: That’s one of our problems. In business, you only take one course in your first semesters that are in business, then you later apply. In the sciences, you need all these basic things in the beginning levels, it’s the opposite problem. That solution won’t help with 400 freshmen class members.
o Allen: The more general and more important issue that Jan and Paul raise is the question of the definition of a liberal arts college.
o Mackenzie: Coming from RIT, I’ve seen the other side. Students come in at age 18, and they think they know what they want, but it was so hard to move around to another RIT college, and they might not get in. I don’t want to limit the major mobility here.
o Long: This is a delicate dance, and what you see here at any time is the decision of society at large, and in ten years it’ll probably change again. We probably look relatively typical, looking at other liberal arts colleges. Other schools, the College of New Jersey, has relatively structured application process, wherein you have to select your major beforehand. It’s really an enrollment management strategy that’s a really complex thing: involves what recruitment folks discuss, what our brochures and literature say, career center, etc. We need a broader conversation with faculty about enrollment overall.
o Dahl: I don’t think historically we have sufficiently connected the dots to do long term enrollment management. We have worked to make sure we get the best students, but we haven’t worked to micromanage that enrollment. The problems in bio and psych point to our success, but we haven’t been sophisticated enough in our revenue and placement mechanisms.
Adjourned at 5:11
Respectfully submitted
Cheryl Kreutter
Secretary
Minutes of the College Senate Meeting
December 4, 2012
Present: J. Aimers, J. Allen, P. Barber, M. Board, B. Bonfiglio, M. Boquard, S. Bosch, T. Bowersox, A. Carroll, R. Coloccia, C. Dahl, D. Ernst, D. Farthing, K. Fletcher, E. Gamello, L. Gao, C. Geiger, D. Granger, D. Greenberg, C. Haddad, J. Hannie, B. Harrison, G. Hartvigsen, A. Heap, E. Joyce, R. Kahrs, J. Lasody, M.H. Lima, M. Liwanag, C. Long, J. Lovett, D. Mackenzie, G. Marcus, K.J. Matthews, V. Markowski, C. Mellow, J. Miller, J. Milroy, M. Mooney, J. Morgan, J. Okada, J. Over, P. Pacheco, D. Repinski, S. Salmon, D. Scott, J. Shapiro, D. Showers (Chair), M. Stolee, A. Tajima, G. Towsley, R. Vasiliev, M. Volpe- McDermott, A. Yankay
Call to Order
Chair Showers called the meeting to order at 4:02 PM.
The agenda was adopted without objection
Special Reports
1) David Granger
New Faculty athletics representative
- Have attend two meetings
- SUNYAC meeting at Cortland - new home of SUNYAC
- Working on a strategic plan of SUNYAC
- Attending the annual meeting of the faculty athletic association of Indianapolis in November - will be alternating between the annual meeting and the NCAA annual meeting to balance the two and get a sense from both perspectives.
Differing Viewpoints from Divisions I, II, III.
Discussed some statistical data of Division 3 and their accomplishments.
· Highest graduation rates were from Women’s Tennis.
· The second was men’s hockey.
SUNYAC website - students and coaches are featured on that site, there is an archive and you can see the previous student athletes that have been recognized (there are many Geneseo students and coaches on that list).
We are seeking awards and scholarships for athletes. Some awards are across the divisions, some are specific by division.
If you know students who are excellent students and athletes, email me (David Granger) and give a brief description of why you would recognize them for their work, this will allow me to track them and then submit the names.
Working to recognize our student athletes is the main goal.
2) President Dahl and VP Milroy
C. Dahl: Our goal is to apprise you of the changes that are being contemplated in the SUNY allocation model. To give you some sense of where we stand in the budget and how some models might affect us. The budget is available on the Administrative and Finance website.
Today: a very brief overview of the general budget and then look at the state operations budget, and then briefly what exactly the methodologies do to us in terms of dollars that get taken away.
Context: Total campus operating budget totals out at 86 million dollars. That is about 3/5 of the college’s all fund budget - 130 million dollars. There are three things, two of which are picked up centrally by NYS - the debt service on our buildings built under state bond. Fringe benefits (about 48% of the full time employee salary) are picked up separately. Finally CAS involves food and other things. If you look at all funds, it’s about 131 million. Operations are about 86 million.
Jim Milroy: As the president said, this is a state budget, funding academic affairs administration, student life, residential life, the IDF budget funded through the broad base fees and course fees. This will be affected by the new allocation method. Current proposal would cut us about a 600K to 690K over three years.
Next year will be an enrollment based budget.
Right now 55% is in the enrollment bucket, next year, 88% will be. Most adjustments are eliminated.
Total state support across the system is about 42%, and SUNY has done an analysis - the cost of undergraduate instruction. They will do a weighted average (refer to PowerPoint for more specifics).
C. Dahl: The model tips toward graduate programs.
J. Milroy: Tuition - 2013-2014, is the second year of the rational tuition increase. Last year, the cut was 2 million dollars; we were net down 1million dollars. We did see an increase this year. State will go down - the tuition will go up by 1.2 million dollars.
C. Dahl: TAP increment - when you pay your tuition, the system takes 25% and puts it in a centralized fund because there are a different percentage of TAP students across campuses. If you have more students, you may need to hand out more aid.
J. Milroy: The proposed model will negatively impact certain campuses and they will have to give transition funding so that they get to a sustainable position.
The cut to Geneseo differs across the models. The main differences are a change in research bucket that they change allocation. In the second iteration, they took out the public service research. Campus that have a large public service component saw a much bigger cut that we were the beneficiaries. They went to a three-year rolling average for enrollment.
All of the sectors are being cut, and the university centers are seeing an increase because they are the research centers and they have had the most unfunded enrollment growth. Our enrollment was frozen. Now that there is a tuition increase, this is the time to redistribute the state purpose allocation.
C. Dahl: We are looking at 690K on a 43 million dollar budget. Allocation methodologies are arbitrary. You can see the mission related trends.
G. Hartvigsen - David Lavallee - He said that there were no caps on enrollment. Is this true here?
J. Milroy: Under the current model, there were no caps on enrollment. You keep additional revenue from tuition and meals. You get 73 cents on the dollar for every student you add. Under the new model, there only going to fund approved enrollment.
G. Hartvigsen - Does our campus plan to make changes on enrollment?
C. Dahl: We have added 120 student FTE to get rid of the deficit. At the moment we don’t have plans to increase enrollment.
G. Hartvigsen - Given these considerations, are there plans to deactivate any programs or make structural changes?
C. Dahl: No - unless you take structural changes as broad.
J. Milroy - These models are a work in progress, and they will be changes
[Unidentified] - campuses in the future would have an option to apply for a tuition differential?
C. Dahl: We already wanted a differential for being highly selective and we ask for a $1000.
Senate reports: 4:35pm
President Dahl: SUNY 2020 proposal - we are asking for 20 million dollar capital to build, but we are asking the right to charge a $75 academic excellence fee - increasing over a five year period. To get us 80 more full time faculty lines. The selection of these SUNY 2020s will occur after the first of the year. We will do all we can. We don’t know when or what the selection process will be.
S. Derne - Was that $75 per year?
C. Dahl: $75 per year after five years it will be a phase in of $375 per year.
Provost Long report:
SUNY chief academic officers meeting. Discussion was about student mobility. Spent a lot of time looking at the website and looking at transfer paths. There are things that don’t fit so well with Geneseo because there are so many different paths and it does not include a lot about academic quality.
S. Iyer has been working on this conversation with David Lavallee.
System has been talking about strategic enrollment management - target setting for the system.
School of Business - We will have two candidates for an interim dean for School of Business. Gale Mercif will meet with the School of Business faculty about search for a permanent dean.
We have been working to create a MOOC for our alums that will take place in January - focusing on identity in the digital realm. That is an experiment - that is a low cost, does not offer credit, and it will be working with WordPress. There are a lot of alums who are interested. It is a way to see what it might have to offer us.
At the end of this week, we will post applications for the ambassadorships. There will be a panel for past ambassadors to answer questions of interested students. The application deadline is Feb. 15 and we will try to select by spring break.
Chair Dennis Showers
There is an all faculty meeting Newton 209, 2:30 to 3:30pm
The conversation is about creating a collegial community supporting excellence in teaching and community, documentation.
Vice Chair Jan Lovett - no report
Past Chair David Granger - no report
Secretary Cheryl Kreutter – no report
Treasurer Paul Pacheco – At the last meeting I let you know I was to convene a meeting of past treasurers. We had that meeting and to report the results last week - I want you to know at some point there will be a proposal for the mission of treasure in the spring. The time has come for the annual senate appeal. The only way it is funded is through your generosity.
University Faculty Senate Gregg Hartvigsen - no report
VP Student Association Justin Shapiro
Although the SUNY Board of Trustees approved the enrollment-based allocation method, the
Student Association was able to collect and send almost one thousand letters of disapproval from the Geneseo community? Also, the SOFI Task Force has established a solid timetable and there appears to be much interest in the Task Force from the students.
Undergraduate Curriculum Committee Meg Stolee
Second reading new courses ARTH 302, ENGL 202, MATH 341 (motion carries)
Second reading of revisited course (7 courses) (motion carries)
Second reading Course deletions (17 courses) (motion carries)
Second reading program revisions (5 programs) (motion carries)
First reading new course PSYC 294 (motion carries)
First reading revised courses (motion carries)
First reading revised programs (4 programs) (motion carries)
Undergraduate Policies: Maria Lima
We need to give rationale for policy changes. Meeting Jan 29.
Graduate Curriculum Doug Mackenzie - no report
Student Affairs Dan Repinski- no report
Faculty Affairs Jim Allen- no report
Old business (none)
New Business (none)
Adjournment: 4:52 pm
Respectfully submitted, Cheryl Kreutter, College Senate Secretary
Bill Jones, Milne Library
Fall Election Report
On behalf of the Committee on Nominations and Elections, I'm pleased to
announce the results of the Fall 2012 elections.
The following four faculty members have been elected to the Faculty Personnel
Committee (FPC) for a two-year term from January 2013 - January 2015.
Anne Eisenberg
Jeffrey Over
Paul Pacheco
Daniel Strang
The following three faculty members have been elected to the Committee on Nominations and Elections (CONE) for a two-year term from January 2013 - January 2015.
Kodjo Adabra
Beverly Evans
Sheikh Farooq
Report of the University Faculty Senator
The following is my report on the main activities at the January 24 -26, 2013 plenary meeting at SUNY Oneonta.
1. Open SUNY. We're moving toward more online learning opportunities for our students. Of the 460,000 SUNY students about 86,000 students take online courses. Approximately 60,000 are degree seeking students. Look for your students to have more credits from "other" institutions.
Regarding growth in online learning our sector of comprehensive colleges stressed to the Chancellor that we believe that an undergraduate education is more than the courses the students complete (a strong nod to Bob and the Campus Life division). My contribution was to remind the Chancellor to keep in mind that SUNY's mission statement emphasizes educational opportunities for all at "geographically distributed… diverse campuses." Now she knows that she needs to change the mission statement.
2. Seamless transfer. This is widely perceived to be a homogenization of education across SUNY institutions and a threat to the quality of a Geneseo education. Students should be able to get an associate's degree at a community college and be prepared to transfer to a four year campus and get a bachelor's degree in just two more years. This, however, is difficult for programs with more than 60 credit hours. I talked to Provost Lavallee about this personally and he definitely recognizes the problems. We will, for example, be able to file waivers to SUNY denying entry for students from certain institutions to enter some of our programs, but we will certainly have to clearly demonstrate these students from certain institutions are not adequately prepared. Good luck with that!
3. We passed a resolution calling for a new Chancellor's award for excellence in adjunct teaching. Full time instructors are not included because their responsibilities are complex, possibly including advising and even research. Therefore, this is limited to adjuncts. (I voted for this resolution - motion passed)
Additionally, please pick up your copy of the University Faculty Senate Bulletin in the Provost's office for more detailed information on the Budget (from a faculty standpoint), harnessing systemness (Chancellor Zimpher), enrollment and financial sustainability (Provost Lavallee), the new Resource Allocation Tool (yes, the RAT!) by SUNY CFO Brian Hutzley and the Student Assembly's Plan (Kevin Rea).
Respectfully submitted,
Gregg Hartvigsen
SUNY Geneseo University Faculty Senator (2010-2013)