| 3 credit hour courses - MW or TR |
| Monday | Tuesday | Wednesday | Thursday | Friday |
| 8-9:15 | MW1 | TR1 | MW1 | TR1 | tutoring, professional development, committee meetings, RESEARCH and other things? |
| 9:30-10:45 | MW 2 | TR2 | MW 2 | TR2 |
| 11:00 - 12:15 | MW 3 | TR3 | MW 3 | TR3 |
| 1:00 - 2:15 | MW 4 | TR4 | MW 4 | TR4 |
| 2:30 - 3:45 | MW 5 | TR5 | MW 5 | TR5 |
| 4:00 - 5:15 | MW 6 | TR6 | MW 6 | TR6 |
| 5:30 - 6:45 | MW 7 | TR7 | MW 7 | TR7 |
| 5:00 - 7:30 | M 8 | T 8 | W 8 | R 8 | F 8 |
| | | | | |
| TR 3 -- ONLY USED BY KSU 101 AND KSU 102 |
| | | | | |
| TR 11-1 - Reserved for meetings, assemblies, convocations, etc. No classes other than KSU 101 and 102 can be scheduled during this time. |
| | | | | |
| 4 credit hour courses in ENG and MAT with instructional counselors, e.g., ENG 101, MAT 115a, should be scheduled during the same MW and TR time block. No 4 day/week courses should be scheduled in block 3 |
| | | | | |
| M8, T8, W8, R8, F8 for 3 hours classes that meet only once per week. |
| | | | | |
| Courses with labs -- | | | | |
- 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?
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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.
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- 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:
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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.”
12. Adjournment: The meeting adjourned at 4:35pm.
Minutes respectfully submitted by Helen Smith, Faculty Senate Secretary.