ACADEMIC SENATE MEETING
February 19, 2003
PRESENT: Sheila Amin Gutierrez de Pineras, Poras Balsara, Doug Benn, Dinesh Bhatia, Janok Bhattacharya, Gail Breen, John Burr, Cyrus Cantrell, Isabel Darcy, Douglas Dow, Jay Dowling, John Ferguson, Matthew Goeckner, Edward Harpham, Jennifer Holmes, Franklyn Jenifer, Marilyn Kaplan, Murray Leaf, Simeon Ntafos, Larry Overzet, Ivor Page, William Pervin, Tim Redman, Liz Salter, Richard Scotch, Hobson Wildenthal, Ron Yasbin
ABSENT: Duane Buhrmester, Lawrence Cauller, Milind Dawande, Robert Marsh, B.P.S. Murthi, Suresh Radhakrishanan, Srinivasan Raghunathan, Tres Thompson
VISITORS: Priscilla Beadle, Michael Coleman, Daniel Erwin, Kimberly Kempf-Leonard, Dennis Kratz, Tom Lineham, David Maldonado, Jim Murdoch, Kendra Ray, Larry Terry
1. CALL TO ORDER, ANNOUNCEMENTS AND QUESTIONS
Dr. Wildenthal called the meeting to order and made the following statements. Dr. Jenifer is making a presentation before the Legislature. UTD is in the process of finding 7% which is to be returned to the state. We are also to be cut 12.5% for the next biennium.
Our share of the 7% is about $3 M which is about what our additional need is for the summer budget. We’re trying to maintain a summer program equivalent to past years. We are going to try to avoid irreparable damage to faculty careers, but we will be limiting some travel.
Enrollment numbers are showing that the semester credit hours are doing better than what was expected. Dr. Wildenthal stated that we will probably do okay this year.
2. APPROVAL OF MINUTES OF PREVIOUS MEETING
A motion was made and seconded to approve the minutes of January 22, 2003 as amended. The motion carried.
3. SPEAKER’S REPORT
Most of what has been happening since the last meeting is related to the state budget crisis. I will briefly describe governance involvement in these considerations and then review other major pending concerns.
1. Budget Issues. Two weeks ago, just before the last meeting of the Academic Council, President Jenifer sent an email to all faculty indicating the main U T System, legislative and gubernatorial requirements and the administration’s initial response to them. This included a commitment to involve the Senate in formulating a much reduced summer session budget. At the meeting of the Academic Council, President Jenifer reviewed the situation and we discussed how this Senate participation might be arranged. The faculty representatives did the same from their perspective, which included their awareness of great concern on the part of the faculty that the situation be resolved quickly in order to allow people to plan their summer activities. It was agreed that if at all possible we should come up with a plan in two weeks.
In view of the time constraints, it did not appear to be feasible to wait for a discussion on the Senate floor or attempt to involve any of the standing Senate committees as such. It also did not appear to involve the Council as such, since such involvement would be clearly beyond its charge. We decided, therefore, to authorize the Speaker to recommend faculty members to participate in an ad hoc committee appointed by the president to consider the matter and report back to the president’s cabinet. This has been done. The committee, under the chairmanship of Dean Jim Murdoch of the School of Social Sciences, has had their initial meeting. It would not be appropriate to speculate about the outcome but is appropriate to say what we all see as the goal: we will try to find ways to maintain the same student credit-hour generation and meet the same crucial student needs with fewer courses having larger average enrollments. Exactly what administrative measures will accomplish this is what we need to work out. It is a highly constrained situation but at the same time there are many options and each has a different mix of consequences.
Other ongoing matters are:
1. The Senate subcommittee on background check policy has met under the chairmanship of Dr. Larry Terry and suggested revisions to the draft policy developed by Mr. Lovitt and Mr. Wilson. The changes mainly incorporate certain features from the U T Austin policy that provide greater specification, reduce or remove the distinction between policies applied to faculty as against those for staff and focus more on the problem of deciding which positions to designate “security sensitive,” and provide assurance that hiring officers can discuss issues arising from background checks with candidates for positions.
2. The School of Arts and Humanities has established a committee to revise its bylaws in view of the guidelines and the experience of Human Development and Social Sciences. The Chair is Professor Gerald Soliday.
3. The School of Engineering and Computer Sciences is now circulating their bylaws draft for comments. We should have it by the next Senate meeting.
4. The Faculty Advisory Council Satisfaction Survey has been pretested and is now being implemented. Chancellor Yudof has written a letter to all faculty encouraging participation. Although there seems to have been some confusion in sending it out, this has now been resolved. However participation is low. According a memo from Robert Nelsen this morning, the rate is just 18%. We were hoping for around 50%. The System and Regents take it seriously and we should not create the impression that we do not. If you have not responded yourself please do so, and if you have, urge others to do so.
5. There have been changes issued to Policy Memoranda containing charges for Senate Committees. I have been notified by the Provost’s office after the fact. Although such changes almost always reflect responses to changes in titles and other administrative matters and have no consequences for academic policy, in order to be sure we need to establish a way to review them within the framework of Academic Governance before putting them in effect.
6. In the January meeting, the Senate voted to carry over the discussion of peer review for non-tenure track full time faculty to this meeting to allow more time for the Senior Lecturers to consider their recommendations. This recommendation has now been received. The recommendation is that Senior Lecturers be hired and reviewed only by Senior Lecturers. Although the recommendation had not been received by the Council prior to its last meeting, the Council had placed the item on the agenda for this meeting on the expectation that it would address peer review in the more usual sense. Since receiving the recommendation, the Council has voted unanimously by email ballot to withdraw it from the agenda for more discussion in the Governance system.
7. As of Monday evening we had 35 nominations for Senate for 2003-2004. Three more petitions arrived after the deadline, but were mailed before the deadline. The election committee has ruled that they should be included, and the ballot has been revised. It will go in mail today or tomorrow.
All other new matters are on the agenda.
4. CEP RECOMMENDATIONS
Dr. Leaf introduced the new degree programs that the Committee on Educational Policy has approved.
Master of Science and Doctor of Philosophy in Criminology
A motion was made and seconded to approve the new Master of Science and Doctor of Philosophy in Criminology. The motion was approved.
Master of Arts in History
A motion was made and seconded to approve the new Master of Arts in History. The motion was approved.
Bachelor of Arts in Arts and Technology
A motion was made and seconded to approve the new Bachelor of Arts in Arts and Technology. The motion was approved.
Master of Arts in Arts and Technology
A motion was made and seconded to approve the new Master of Arts in Arts and Technology. The motion was approved.
Master of Fine Arts in Arts and Technology
A motion was made and seconded to approve the new Master of Fine Arts in Arts and Technology. The motion was approved.
Fall 2003 Catalog Policy Changes (Social Sciences)
A motion was made and seconded to approve the Fall 2003 Catalog Policy Changes for Social Sciences. Dean Coleman spoke briefly about the change in total hours for independent study. He also addressed the area of minors and the requirement for a minimum of 12 of the 18 hours to be taken at UTD. The motion was approved.
5. QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS
A question arose about the Academic Senate web site and the posting of minutes to it. Dr. Yasbin explained that because of a breakdown in personnel, the minutes have not been posted and he is working on bringing the web site up to date with minutes. Dr. Yasbin has also sent out the minutes to the faculty in PDF format.
A question arose about the Senior Lecturers and whether they will be included in the budgetary cutbacks. Dr. Wildenthal responded that at the present time, nothing has been decided about whether we will have to cut back on Senior Lecturers. He did indicate that Senior Lecturers are extremely valuable and hopefully we will not lose any of them.
The hiring freeze was established effective January 31st. These were for positions that were not open, offers had not been made. The Deans’ searches will be on-going. The hiring freeze is for right now and that doesn’t necessarily mean we will have a freeze next year. That has not been decided. We will honor offers and contracts that already had been offered.
6. ADJOURNMENT
The business was concluded and the meeting was adjourned.
Respectfully Submitted,
Sandra K. Goertzen
Academic Governance Secretary