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Faculty Senate Minutes 2/11/19

The tenth regular meeting of the 2018-2019 Faculty Senate took place on Monday, 11 February 2019, at 3:10pm in 123 Hathaway Hall.

NAME Attendance Department Office

Shawn Lucas PRESENT Ag, Communities, and Env Academic Policies

Leigh Whittinghill PRESENT Ag, Communities, and Env Chair, Curriculum

Richard Cristan PRESENT Ag, Communities, and Env

Ken Semmens PRESENT Agu and Aquatic Sci Vice Chair, Bud & Ac

Herman Walston PRESENT Fam and Cons Sci Professional Concern

Erin Gilliam (Parliamentarian) PRESENT Soc and Beh Sci Vice Chair, Acad Pol

Mara Merlino (Vice President) PRESENT Soc and Beh Sci Professional Concern

Jyotica Batra PRESENT Math and Comp Sci Academic Policies

Clifton Wise PRESENT Math and Comp Sci Professional Concern

Caroline Gibson PRESENT Hum and Perf Arts Chair, Prof Concern

Marlin McKay EXCUSED Hum and Perf Arts Chair, Acad Policies

Helen Smith (Secretary) PRESENT Hum and Perf Arts Secretary, Curriculum

Dantrea Hampton PRESENT Library Vice Chair, Curricm

Rene Desborde PRESENT Bus and Tech Budget and Ac Sup

Jason Keeler PRESENT Edu and Hum Dev Secretary, Acad Pol

Phillip Clay PRESENT Edu and Hum Dev Chair, Bud & Ac Sup

Li Lu PRESENT Nat Sci Vice Chair, Prof Con

Bruce Griffiths PRESENT Nat Sci Secretary, Bud & Ac

Rebecca McCoy Nur and Health Sci Curriculum

Lisa Turner PRESENT Nur and Health Sci Budget and Ac Sup

Robert Griffin PRESENT At-large (Hum and Per) Curriculum

Joe Moffett (President) PRESENT At-large (Hum and Per)

Debbra Tate PRESENT At-large (Library) Secretary, Prof Con

Allison Young At-large (Ag, Coms, En) Professional Concern

Swagata Banerjee PRESENT At-large (Bus and Tec) Academic Policies

Non-Senator Committee Members

Nkechi Amadife Library Academic Policies

Ken Andries PRESENT Ag, Communities, and Env Curriculum

Changzheng Wang Ag, Communities, and Env Curriculum

William Welsh Edu and Hum Dev Budget and Ac Sup

Mike Unuakhalu PRESENT Math and Comp Sci Budget and Ac Sup

Farida Olden Ag, Communities, and Env Professional Concern

John Sedlacek PRESENT Ag, Communities, and Env Chair

David Shabazz PRESENT LLP Chair

Elgie McFayden PRESENT PUA Chair

Tierra Taylor PRESENT BSS Chair

Beverly Schneller PRESENT AA Vice Provost

Stashia Emanuel PRESENT AA Vice Provost

Lucian Yates PRESENT AA Provost

Lori Hicks PRESENT Music Chair

Arthur Hayden PRESENT CPSLS Dean

Kim Sipes PRESENT Academic Affairs Deputy Provost

Peter Smith PRESENT LLP faculty

Kirk Pomper PRESENT Ag, Communities, and Env Dean

Mary Henson PRESENT Academic Support Coord.

Guests (in order of sign-in)

1. 1. Call to Order: The meeting was called to order at 3:11pm, with quorum.
2. Approval of Agenda: An item was added to allow Vice Provost Beverly Schneller five minutes to share information on the SACS accreditation process. With this addition, the agenda was approved.
3. Approval of Minutes of the 28 January 2019 Faculty Senate Meeting: The minutes were approved without changes.
4. SACS Update: Dr. Schneller explained that the Focused Report (the response to the SACS off-site report on KSU) is in the final stages. The next step in the process involves the return of Dr. Silver, our SACS consultant, on February 25th. He and his team will be conducting a mock site-visit, which will give us the experience of what the real on-site SACS team will be asking us. This team will give us a schedule and request to see faculty/administrators – the call will be for Feb 26th. Schneller told faculty that if they have a class or another conflict, they need to set aside an hour for Dr. Silver’s team. It will probably be 30 minutes or less. They will ask faculty/administrators questions about topics they will expect us to know about; for example, for chairs, they might ask about the coherence of their academic program, etc. The important thing is to be succinct in answering and honest and to stick to the subject at hand. If respondents present information that may be perceived as ambiguous, the review committee might see a red flag and feel the need to follow up. The team will not be coaching people but preparing them to showcase the life of the institution and student success. The mock site-visit will be held in the Agriculture Extension Conference Room: 238 Co-op building. The actual SACS site visit is March 19-21st.
5. 5. Faculty Regent Report: Regent Elgie McFayden reported on the following issues:
6. There was a Board of Regents meeting last week. The members didn’t conduct regular business. There were three actions items. The first was to do away with the Xerox contract and initiate the Ricoh contract. The other significant action item was to approve the contract for the new football coach.
6. 6. Curriculum Committee: Chair Leigh Whittinghill reported on the following issues:
7. Senate President Joe Moffett asked if the Xerox contract had been a longtime issue. McFayden replied that for the students it was an issue; they made it known to the President that there were problems with students getting mail and printing. He added that Ricoh is the same company that UK uses and that the state government in Frankfort uses, so there will be Ricoh representatives in town who can come service the machines, as opposed to Xerox, which is based in Lexington.
8. Moffett asked if McFayden anticipated any significant issues to be raised at the next regular meeting. McFayden did not respond.
9. FSCC 18-19-22 Course changes for JOU 302 and 402: This action item involves changes to two courses in Journalism which were previously run as a sequence, but now each is one credit hour and can be repeated. Each iteration of the course will have a different topic, following students through their progress in the major. Mr. David Shabazz, Associate Chair of the School of Humanities and Performing Arts, stated that JOU 302 is designed to be a practical class for newspaper staff students, while 402 is for the editors, who have a little bit more responsibility.

VOTE: voice vote: unanimous yes with no abstentions.

• FSCC 18-19-23 New Program Masters in Counseling Psychology: This action item involves the creation of a graduate-level track in the existing Masters program. All the courses in this track have already been created, and six have already been taught. Dr. Mara Merlino, Professor of Behavioral and Social

Sciences, explained that more faculty will be needed for this program, but that the department is in the process of hiring them.

• Moffett noted that there is documentation of the demand for this track. Merlino responded that yes, many students have consistently asked the department for this program. She added that all of the courses and all of the goals of the program align with APA national standards and the state accrediting body.
• A Senator asked, what is the MA degree? Merlino replied that it is an MA in Counseling Psychology. She added that the department is also planning to add a Certificate in Intelligence and Security in addition to this MA track. KSU is a member of the Bluegrass State Intelligence Consortium, so the department is trying to add curriculum.
• Provost Lucian Yates asked, are these more appropriately called “concentrations,” rather than “tracks”? Merlino replied in the affirmative.

VOTE: Voice Vote – unanimous yes with no abstentions

• The committee also made changes to some of the Curriculum forms:
• oNew Course Proposal Form: a line at the top has been added reminding people to include the signed tracking document. (This line has been added to all the proposal documents.)
• oThe Program Change Proposal Form has been retitled to include “New Program Proposal” to avoid confusion. The dean’s signature line has been removed from this form, so that the dean does not have to sign the paperwork twice.

The document changes were accepted by unanimous voice vote.

• Whittinghill reminded faculty to make sure they use these updated versions of the Curriculum forms, rather than older ones that may still be in circulation. These new forms will be added to the Senate website once they receive approval in Academic Affairs.
• 7. Professional Concerns Committee: Chair Caroline Gibson reported on the following issues:
• Moffett asked about the due date for changes to be submitted to the committee for approval in time for fall implementation. Whittinghill replied that the March 4^{th} meeting would be the latest date for guaranteed fall implementation.

The committee has been working on their Area Coordinators Survey results. Gibson reported that she had had a lengthy meeting with Ombudsman Wilfred Reilly, and he shed a lot of light the issue of Area Coordinators: originally, University President Christopher Brown had said no to compensated Coordinators. But PCC collected the data and presented a report to the President, who had said he would look at whatever the faculty comes up with. The Ombudsman explained that the President didn't see a need for Coordinators because the Department Chair is paid an extra $10-20K to perform the coordinator duties. Rather than delegating faculty to do coordinator duties, Brown feels that these duties should be performed by the Chairs, but he said that he would entertain a proposal. - Moffett asked Gibson, how recent is this information coming from the President? Gibson replied that she had met with Reilly the past Friday. Moffett noted that he had met with the President a couple of weeks before, and Brown had said that he'd be open to the idea of Coordinators getting paid. Gibson replied that committee member Merlino is drafting a narrative for the survey.

• The committee also discussed the parking enforcement issue. The emailed PR announcements that have come out about parking changes indicate that the Police Chief is responsive to faculty requests. Faculty need to keep open the lines of communication with campus police and the PR department.

• The committee discussed faculty dining: faculty used to use the unofficial faculty dining room in the Student Center. The sign above that dining room now reads “Presidential Dining Room.” However, faculty can feel free to use that area. Gibson added that many students think there is no food service contract, but there is one.
• The committee looked at sections of the faculty handbook.
• A Senator asked if PCC will be revising the wording on interim appointments in the Faculty Handbook. Gibson replied, yes, the committee is looking at clarifying the distinction between faculty and interim appointments.
• PCC 18-19-03: Change of Evaluation Calendar: This action item is a proposal to change the current faculty evaluation calendar to coincide with the calendar year as opposed to the academic year. Thus, faculty evaluation would take place earlier, and faculty would be evaluated on the full calendar year from January to December. The rationale is that this change would give faculty members a longer period to collect data to compile self-evaluations and Tenure and Promotion information.
• Moffett noted that President Brown had asked him to bring this issue to Senate. He added that there could be several benefits to this change. There is the expectation that merit pay will come online next academic year. This calendar change would obviate the loss of merit pay due to budget freezes later in the spring.
• Gibson noted that Faculty Senate cannot look at any such changes [as a merit pay policy] before they are officially announced, so the committee won't have much to say on implementation before Brown's criteria are published. She stated that she wished to retract a document that the committee had sent forward regarding implementation of merit pay.
• Moffett responded that this is a discussion we should bring the Provost into, and that there may be some role the faculty should play here.
• Provost Yates replied that he hadn't been in on any conversations about merit pay. He added that it would be a good move to change the calendar, and the administration is interested in the thoughts of the Senate.
• A Senator asked how the calendar-shift would affect the Tenure and Promotion process: if the evaluation is part of a faculty member's T&P packet, which is submitted in August/September, but evaluation doesn't happen until January, is the T&P calendar also moving?
• Yates replied that all activities up to the time the dossier is turned in will be included the dossier. –
• Moffett noted that this issue wouldn’t come up often.
• A Senator asked, if in the current system, a faculty member is evaluating himself from April to April, will we now be evaluating ourselves over two contract periods?
• Moffett acknowledged that this might be a logistical issue.
• A Senator pointed out that another concern is that the fiscal year is July 1 to June 30 of the following year, but faculty assignments may change depending on demand in a particular semester. He noted that how we are reporting that might have implications for SACS: if we do an evaluatory period that is different from our reporting period, we might run into problems.

- 10 minutes were added to the discussion

• Gibson noted that we will have a trial period to work out bugs for succeeding years.

VOTE: raise-of-hands vote: 11 yeas and 6 nays. The Action Item passed.

• Gibson reminded faculty to upload their materials to Interfolio.

8. Academic Policies Committee: Chair Marlin McKay was absent, so committee member Jason Keeler gave the report:

• The committee discussed students being added into classes after the drop deadline. A concerned faculty member attended the last committee meeting to discuss this issue. The committee agreed that the instructor should be consulted on whether a student can be added to a course late. There used to be a form that professors had to sign to allow late adds.
• The committee discussed course enrollment caps: some online courses have 40 students, some have 2. Is that divergence fair for the students or the faculty?
• Deputy Provost Kim Sipes brought the committee a possible change to the scheduling of courses.
• A committee member noted that the most recent Catalogue states that students need the instructor's signature to get into a closed class. But the language is vague about what “closed” means; for instance, does “closed” mean at the enrollment cap? It seems to be up to the advisor, not the instructor, to add students.
• At this point, Sipes distributed to the Faculty Senate this new scheduling proposal:

• Sipes explained that one problem with the current schedule is that instructors have away from the standard times, so we’ve had conflicts of students not being able to take certain classes because of course overlap. She added that we’ve also gotten to a point where now TR 11-1pm is not inviolate because now classes have begun bleeding over into that block of time, so students can’t attend convocations. Thus, Academic Affairs is proposing a move to a MW/TR schedule, with Fridays left over to activities. This would give students time on Fridays for tutoring sessions, and it would give faculty time for professional development, all-day assessment activities, or research days. Academic Affairs wanted to present this to the faculty and get faculty feedback. This system would work for 1-, 2-, 3- and 4-hour classes that don’t have labs. There may be occasions/exceptions to this schedule, like for nursing, etc. Those exceptions would have to be written up and approved by the Provost; he is going to accommodate what faculty need, but the goal is more structure across the board.
• A Senator asked, so students will not be required to do anything on Friday if they choose not to? The Provost replied, yes. The Senator responded, how will that keep students on campus on the weekend?

The Provost replied that they will develop student affairs programming; students would not be required to attend these programs, but the programming would lure them to stay as part of the college experience.

• A Guest asked how this schedule would work for five-day-a-week classes. Sipes responded that accelerated ENG and MAT could fit within a four-day block. She added that upper division classes with labs could have labs on TR. She stated that she has spoken with math faculty, and they responded that this new schedule might actually work better for them. The issue goes back to how many credit hours and how many contact hours do students need to satisfy those credit hours.

- 5 minutes were added to the discussion

• A Senator noted that, as someone involved in scheduling lab coursework, he would be happy to sit in the think tank room. Scheduling labs is not just a matter of times but also of facilities. We have a finite amount of space and a finite number of days. Sipes responded by inviting him to join the deliberations.
• Another Senator stated that this semester we had challenges with scheduling classrooms. The Provost responded that our space consultants said that we don’t have a problem with space, but we have a problem with space-utilization. We have over-usage on TR because people don’t want to teach MWF. If we make this change, it will give us a better utilization of the space we have.
• Schneller added that she has worked at an institution which has this schedule. Students were able to schedule their internships on Fridays, and faculty were able to go to conferences because most of them start Friday. Similarly with internships and with capstone projects: we would have Capstone Fridays, which would give faculty more opportunity to create projects, knowing that the students have Fridays to work. Additionally, the longer class periods allow teachers to do more and finish lessons; the longer class times also reduce the urge to procrastinate.
• Sipes pointed out that this schedule would keep athletes from missing Friday classes due to away games.
• A Senator noted that student athletes are continually training in the afternoon; he asked, will this schedule create a conflict?
• A Senator explained that for upper class math-science classes, students have multi-hour labs; it will be hard to coordinate between the lab facility and the athletic practice.

- 5 minutes were added to the discussion

• Sipes responded that most of the football team travels on Friday, and the Baseball team also travels on Friday. A Senator responded that there are other athletes than the football players: softball, baseball, golf, basketball players. Also, he said, we have classes that do field trips.
• Another Senator noted that there may be conflicts for transfer students and for students in those afternoon labs. He suggested that faculty move more classes to MWF instead of redoing the whole schedule.

-Another Senator agreed that there would a lot of conflict with labs in the afternoon. He suggested that initially, we could try to move some of the classes to this new schedule—the ones that don't have labs—and then we could evaluate the success of this small change. Then we could later add the labs to this new schedule, after faculty have considered how to revise lab times.

-Another Senator suggested making a motion from the floor, as the schedule needs to be made as soon as possible; it is supposed to be finalized on the 25th of this month. A Guest responded, why do we have to have schedules on Feb 25th? Why don’t we just bump that back to March, as it has been in the past? Sipes replied that the Chairs need to review the schedules.

• 5 minutes were added to the discussion
• A motion to switch to this new schedule for fall was brought from the floor and seconded.

VOTE: raise-of-hands vote: 1 yea, 9 nays, 5 abstentions. The motion did not pass.

• A Senator said that the new schedule makes sense. Another senator replied that we just need to figure out the logistics.
• A Senator from the Music department noted that Music always presents a special problem because students have so many applied lessons, and the individual instructors have to make their own schedules. It used to be that music students had to have 1-3pm TR reserved for lab time only, but now that has been compromised.
• Sipes stated that she did a lot of research before developing this proposal. She added that it's a big change, but that we really do have to think of what's best for the students. At all the other schools that she has looked at, the calendar schedule policy is set by the administration. It's a matter of space utilization: we need to have 50% of classes during peak times and 30% of classes outside of peak times, and then the departments can determine scheduling within those parameters.
• A Senator stated that there is concern among the faculty that they haven't been brought into this conversation. Sipes responded, that's why we're here today. The Senator replied that the Senate body isn't the whole faculty. A more inclusive discussion among faculty needs to happen. Not all labs are the same.
• 9. Budget and Academic Support Committee: Chair Phillip Clay reported on the following issues:
• The committee reviewed the classroom assessment presented at the last Senate meeting.
• The committee studied the June 30th, 2018 University Financial Statement document, especially pages 6-7, which present a condensed Statement of Revenue and Change. KSU made fewer expenditures on instruction, even though total revenue was up. The operating revenue was zero for 2018 but 964,396 for 2017. On pages 12-13 of the document, which discuss designated and non-designated spending, the numbers indicate that the instructional budget is decreasing as a proportion of spending. It was 15.46% in 2017 and 14.13% in 2018. This change represents about 1.3 million less spent on instruction last year than in the year before. Clay explained that this document is on the Finance section of the university website.
• Moffett noted that the document isn't very detailed.
• The committee looked at some old action items related to the targeted annual instructional budget. They had previously recommended a 30% instructional budget by 2022. They compared KSU's instructional spending to Morehead's (35%) and NKU's (32.9%).
• The committee looked at the issue of an enrollment cap on online courses; they have yet to determine whether there is an official cap on those classes.
• 10. Faculty Ombudsman Report: Ombudsman Wilfred Reilly was absent, so there was no report.
• 11. Other Business:

12. Adjournment: The meeting adjourned at 4:35pm.

• Dr. Peter Smith, Director of the QEP (Quality Enhancement Plan), presented an update on KSU’s QEP. He stated that the QEP/SACS report is being uploaded today, and the SACS consultant Dr. Silver is returning February 26th. The title of the QEP is “Learning That Works,” and it is focused on teaching Design Thinking. The new Humanics (HUM) sequence will be a spring board to permeate the curriculum with Design Thinking methods. We want to have our students graduate with the kinds of skills that employers of the future will be looking for: the skills that cannot be taken over by MLAI (Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence). These will be the invaluable soft skills that only humans possess. Developing these skills is the overall goal of the QEP. Not all employers are committed to upskilling their workers, so they will look for new employees who already possess those skills. Smith stated that he would create a QEP “cheat sheet” for the on-site visit so faculty can respond with knowledge to SACS examiners’ question about the QEP.
• A Senator asked why we are now getting paid every other Friday instead of the 1st and the 15th. She noted that this change has wreaked havoc with employees' automatic bill-payments, which cannot now be tied to a particular monthly date.
• Provost Yates explained that Payroll transitioned to ADP (Automatic Data Processing, Inc.) and their system couldn't handle the 1st/15^{th}$ pay-date structure, so we went to 26 pay periods. Yates stated that he had asked why, also, and never got an answer.
• Another Senator said that the ADP representative had asked if employees wanted to go to one pay period a month. Employees responded no, as 30 days is too long for low-paid workers to go without a paycheck. Considering the two options, the idea was “the more paychecks, the better.”

Minutes respectfully submitted by Helen Smith, Faculty Senate Secretary.