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President Keeler met with President Brown and discussed plans for accreditation for the public affairs program. Also raised was terminal degree compensation. Some faculty who have completed a terminal degree recently haven't gotten expected compensation. President Brown indicated that he wanted a resolution from the Senate on faculty salary compression. The issue will be on the agenda for the December Board of Regents meeting. President Keeler then recognized Kim Sipes from Academic Affairs to present alternatives for the spring academic calendar. The current calendar would have faculty return January 4 and classes begin January 9. This needs to be revisited in light of the continuing pandemic in order to avoid holidays, three-day weekends and the accompanying student travel. Two alternatives to accomplish this were presented. One

would begin Wednesday January 20, 2021 (the Wednesday after MLK Day), eliminate Spring Break, and end May 7. The second would begin January 25, 2021, eliminate spring break and all other holidays (i.e. President’s Day and Good Friday) and end May 7. A poll of the senators indicated a clear preference for the second option (beginning January 25). A motion was made, seconded and approved to authorize the Senate Executive Committee to draw up a revised academic calendar for Wintermester and Spring 2021 in line with those parameters. In addition, there was discussion of the possibility of some programs running two eight-week sessions during the semester. Deputy Provost Beverly Schneller indicated that this possibility was open for programs that might choose it, so long as the longer class meetings the eight-week model may require didn’t conflict with times for 16-week semester classes. Questions were also raised about whether continuing the current level of online course delivery would meet SACS-COC requirements. Dr. Schneller said that SACS-COC has approved KSU for up to 100 percent online for this semester. They hadn’t extended that yet, but probably would. In any case, even this semester, we are within the bounds of what we are approved for normally by SACS-COC in terms of our percentage of classes online. Next, President Keeler brought forward a draft resolution from the Professional Concerns Committee on modes of instruction delivery for Spring 2021. The resolution asks the university president and provost to continue multiple modes of instruction as are being deployed this semester, with the mode of delivery in each case to be determined by the discretion of individual faculty and the needs of the particular

program. After discussion of the specific text of the resolution, it was amended to change a reference to “formats” to “delivery methods.” In the course of this discussion, Dr. Schneller affirmed that the language, “as per discretion of individual faculty,” reflected the policy of the university, set by President Brown. After this discussion, a motion and second were made, and the resolution was approved.

APC Chair, Buddhi Gyawali submitted a revised text for the Academic Integrity Statement considered at the last meeting. Again, questions were raised about consequences for violation of the terms of the statement and about where it would be published. Senator Gyawali answered that consequences were already covered in the Student Handbook and that the statement would be put into the standard syllabus and the faculty handbook and recommended for inclusion in the student and staff handbooks.

President Keeler called for a motion to vote, and there was none. He returned the measure to APC with the recommendation that the committee work with Dr. Schneller on the best next steps.

10 minutes were added for additional items from APC.

Senator Gyawali raised the questions of whether the faculty wanted to consider allowing a “Pass/Fail” option for student grades, as was done for the spring semester due to the emergency transition to online instruction. He also raised the question of whether faculty evaluations would be done this semester, and would they count for annual evaluations and promotion and tenure. These are issues that APC may be considering at future meetings. During this discussion, President Keeler ran an online poll of the senate which came out 11 against Pass/Fail for this semester and seven for it. He suggested that perhaps a survey of the entire faculty would be helpful for our consideration of this issue.

Meeting adjourned at 11 a.m.

Gary Stratton

Gavin Washington

Herman Walston

Bruce Griffith Buddhi Gyawali Changzheng Wang

Senators Absent: Monica Valentine, Ibukun (Mike) Ogunande, Emmanuel Amadife,

Guests

Ann Lyttle-Burns

Anonymous Caller 1

Ban #2

Beverly Schneller

David Shabazz

Debbra Tate

James Obielodan

Joe Moffett

John Sedlacek

Ken Andries

Kim Sipes

Kirk Pomper

Lauren Graves

Sheila Stuckey