FACULTY SENATE MINUTES
DECEMBER 14, 2006
President Bolter called the meeting to order at 2:00.
Minutes of the November 14, 2006 meeting were approved pending a revision requested by Satterfield.
President’s Report
Gayle Seymour made a presentation regarding the plans for
remodeling the
President Bolter provided the Senate with the revised UCA organizational chart which now includes the Senate, Staff Senate, and SGA.
President Bolter updated the Senate regarding online voting for Senate Elections.
President Bolter provided the Senate with a document showing
comparisons of UCA and other
Committee Reports
The Executive Committee had lunch with President Hardin at Mike’s Place.
President Bolter provided updates on issues regarding concurrent enrollment and conversion of existing UCA courses to online courses.
The Committee on Committees presented 3 resolutions to the Senate for consideration.
(1) Establishment of a Public Art Committee: The Committee on Committees has voted
unanimously to endorse the establishment of a Public Art Committee (effective January
2007). The Public Art Committee will have the following charge:
a) To advance the presence of public art on campus.
b) To create a collections management policy to serve the interests of the
university and the UCA foundation regarding the gifting of artworks.
c) To make decisions about the acquisition, placement, and maintenance of art on
campus.
Rationale: There is currently no standing committee to deal with a large number of issues
related Public Art on campus.
(1a) After discussion, we further recommend that the committee membership be
reduced from 11 voting members to 9 voting members with the removal of one
vice president (selected by the president) and one member of the Council of
Deans selected by the provost. These reductions are made mainly because the
positions selected for removal are deemed redundant.
(2) Revision of membership for the Retention Committee: Based on a recommendation
by Dean Sally Roden current chair of the Retention Committee, we resolve to change the
faculty senate appointed membership of the Retention committee from four to eight
(effective Fall 2007). The eight faculty senate appointments will include one faculty
representative from each of the six colleges, one
representative from
and one representative from the Honors college.
Rationale: Faculty representation on the current Retention Committee is limited to four faculty members with no restriction by college. As a result, the faculty are now
represented by two faculty members from
from (FAC, writing). The current composition of the committee implies that retention is
mainly an issue for conditional admission students, transitional students, or students in
the early stages of their education. In fact, Retention is a broader issue that affects both
low and high functioning students at all stages of their academic careers. The committee
membership should be changed to reflect this broader emphasis.
(3) Revision of membership for the University Admissions Committee: Based on an
evaluation of the current Admissions committee membership, we resolve to change the
current number of Faculty Senate appointments from six to eight. The two new positions
will be selected from among the faculties of
Rationale: Currently the Admissions Committee has faculty representatives from the six
traditional colleges and there is no one to represent UC or Honors. Because UC and
Honors are both major stakeholders in the admissions process, these entities should also
be represented on this committee.
(3a) We nominate Lisa Christman to serve as the UC
representative.
Senator
Bradley took issue with the description of committee membership as stated in
resolutions 2 & 3. He expressed
concern that placing a representative from the "
The amended language was applied to the Retention Committee proposal and the University Admissions Committe proposal. Following these revisions the motions were approved by the Senate.
Faculty
Affairs I had the following report regarding telecommuting faculty.
Currently UCA has 3 part-time faculty who teach only
online courses. The committee feels that at this time no action is
needed. However in the near future that UCA should define terms such as
what telecommunting faculty are, and establish policies on telecommuting.
The committee also discussed having the handbook committee take a look at
this issue in the next few years.
Faculty Affairs II proposed the following resolutions.
“Whereas the Academic Affairs committee of the Faculty Senate was charged to determine how many students are admitted to the university without having taken the ACT and to analyze the effects;
Whereas the committee has submitted a report describing the relationship between taking the ACT and academic performance;
Whereas the Faculty Senate has conducted a forum on admissions at which faculty asked questions and received answers concerning current and past admissions policies, plans, and practices;
Whereas President Lu Hardin stated in a recent email to faculty that “I am unhappy with the interpretation and leniency given to ‘leadership,’ potentially allowing a lower ACT to be admitted;”
Whereas President Lu Hardin has asked “for a Faculty Senate committee and admissions personnel to strongly strengthen our admission criteria;”
Be it hereby resolved that the Faculty Senate shares President Hardin’s concern about the use of “leadership points” and supports his call to strengthen our admission criteria.
Be it hereby further resolved that the Faculty Senate requests that the Admissions Committee raise the minimum admission points for conditional enrollment at UCA to at least 40 points.
Be it hereby further resolved that the Faculty Senate requests that the Admissions Committee establish minimum ACT subscale scores for conditional enrollment at UCA.
Be it hereby further resolved that the Faculty Senate requests that the Admissions Committee closely examine the use of the current admission-points formula with regard to the transparency of assigning admission points and the protection of the university.
Be it hereby further resolved that the Faculty Senate requests that the Admissions Committee develop discrete standards for the application of “leadership points” to the admission-points formula.
Be it hereby finally resolved that the Faculty Senate requests that the Admissions Committee periodically monitor the use and effects of the admission-points formula to ensure the strong admissions criteria of the university.”
This resolution was passed.
Faculty Affairs II offered the following report.
Academic Affairs was charged by the Faculty Senate to examine the adequacy and appropriateness of the composition of the Faculty Senate. Academic affairs met on November 7, 2006, to discuss the charge. The discussion re-visited a proposal for the creation of senate positions solely to represent academic units currently unaffiliated with a college. This proposal was reviewed by the Faculty Affairs I Committee in 2004.
After consideration and review of the issue, the Academic Affairs Committee recommends against a constitutional amendment to create senate positions for nonaffiliated academic units.
The committee’s reasons for the recommendation are the same as those listed in the Faculty Affairs I report dated October 12, 2004 (see next page for a copy of this report). In addition to these reasons, we note that any faculty member, including those not affiliated with a college, can directly address the Faculty Senate. Thus, the perception that nonaffiliated faculty do not have a voice in the Faculty Senate is not accurate.
Nonetheless, we reiterate point number four in the Faculty Affairs I report that “the fact that we have a number of faculty identifying themselves as ‘disenfranchised’ is cause for concern.” To resolve that “disenfranchisement,” we recommend that faculty in academic units not affiliated with any college engage in a dialogue with faculty leadership and higher administration about integrating these nonaffiliated units into existing colleges.
Academic Affairs reported that they had met to consider issues regarding telecommuting faculty and felt that those issues were not pressing at this time and should probably be considered by the Handbook Committee as some future date.
The meeting adjourned at approximately 3:20 pm