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Minutes of Faculty Senate Meeting

November 13, 2020

Submitted by Danny Collum, Secretary

Meeting began 9:01 a.m.

After Thanksgiving break the remainder of the semester, including final exams will be conducted online.

Due to President Keeler's departure from KSU, Vice-President Phillip Clay will become Faculty Senate President in January. An election for a new Vice-President will be held at the first Senate meeting of the new semester.

Additional items reported: A survey on student technology needs is available in the Faculty Senate section on Microsoft Teams. And President Brown's chat this afternoon, while billed as primarily for staff, is also open to faculty.

Senator Griffiths reported that the university needs to increase the data we get on our general education courses. We need to assess each general education course and the program as a whole. Faculty should contact him to participate in this effort.

Dr. Schneller introduced Daryl Love, of Professional Development and Career Services, to present about InScribe, a new student support software program. According to Mr. Love, InScribe is a virtual kiosk for student support, especially when the university is operating remotely. It will help students solve common problems with information, starting with quick access November 20. As students use InScribe, it will keep adding information and evolving. This will allow us to move from the “send email and get a response” pattern to a more interactive model. It will also create an environment of sharing with student comments. When a new question is posed to InScribe, a moderator will get a notification. InScribe will be available through a link in “Current Students” on kysu.edu. Anyone can read from InScribe, but only students can post to it. InScribe represents one small step we are taking to overcome the isolation imposed by the pandemic. Academic units can create InScribe pages. Interns will be employed to curate the pages. It’s hoped that InScribe will be a less scary way for students to reach out for information.

Senator Gyawali reported that APC has been working on the issues of faculty evaluations and a pass/fail grading policy in the current pandemic situation. As a result of that work he put forward these APC-approved action items.

This action item calls for faculty evaluations to be conducted this semester for the purposes of giving faculty feedback on their teaching and collecting data for the university; however, those evaluations will not be required for tenure and/or promotion applications or for annual evaluations.

Much of the discussion revolved around the need for faculty to have feedback on their teaching, especially when we are having to try new things in an unfamiliar mode. APC members replied that faculty would still get that feedback; it would simply become optional, instead of required, for tenure, promotion and evaluation processes. An objection was also raised that colleagues in the tenure/promotion process could be trusted to allow for the unusual circumstances of this semester in reviewing course evaluations from this year. APC members responded that faculty may find themselves being reviewed for tenure/promotion some years from now when there would probably be administrators reviewing the application who weren't even at KSU in 2020.

After this discussion, the item was put to a vote and passed unanimously.

Senator Gyawali reported that APC had gathered information on midterm grades for the current semester with midterm grades of previous semesters and found that the percentage of students failing at midterm was significantly higher than in previous semesters. The committee also met with the provost, registrar and SGA president to gather their views on the pass/fail option for this semester. After this process the Academic Policy Committee passed an action item calling for the institution, only for the Fall 2020 semester, of a pass/fail grading option for any course where it is not prohibited by accreditation standards or other conditions. In the action item passed by the committee, the “Pass” would be for a grade of “D” or higher for undergraduate courses and “C” or higher for graduate courses, and the deadline for a student to choose the pass/fail option would be December 1, 2020. When this item was presented to the Senate, guest Dr. Ken Andries objected that “C” could never be accepted as a passing grade for a graduate course. A number of senators agreed to that objection and also questioned the wisdom of accepting “D” as a pass for any undergraduate course. This would mean students would be able to pass courses in their major with “D”-level performance and get credit for prerequisite courses that usually require a “C.” Senators objected that this could start us down a slippery slope to lessened academic rigor. Another senator noted the high failure rate at midterm and noted that if we don’t accommodate students in this unusual time, we may not have enough students enrolling for the institution to survive.

One senator pointed out that at some institutions students may receive “Pass,” “Pass-D” or “Fail.” Registrar Yolanda Benson said that this would be impossible in our online grades system. The system only allows us to use standard grades (“A,” “B,” “C,” “D,” “F”) or P/F.

President Keeler put out a poll on the issue of grade level for a “Pass” which showed that senators participating unanimously favored “B” as the “Pass” grade for graduate courses. “C” for an undergraduate “Pass” was also favored by a margin of 19 to 2.

The APC action item was amended to reflect this preference of the faculty, and was then passed with a vote of 17 in favor, four opposed and two abstentions.

Senator Wang presented an action item to add HED 300 Foundations to Health to the Physical Education Non-Teaching (Exercise and Sports Studies) program and to lower the 20 free electives to 17 free electives. This was approved unanimously.

The next item approved by the Curriculum Committee adds HED 221 Personal Health 1 (2 Credit Hours) and PHE 302 Human Physiology (4 Credit Hours) to the Physical Education (Teaching) curriculum. This also was passed by the Senate unanimously.

At this point, Senator Smith presented the committee’s revised language for the relevant sections of the Faculty Handbook. She noted that language on qualifications for deans had been revised in line with the feedback from the full Senate and that the date for chair elections had been clarified as mid-spring in the final year of the term.

Dr. Andries raised questions about the wisdom of rotating terms that could deprive a unit of institutional knowledge and about the concept of electing chairs, which he noted has not been actually practiced at KSU.

Noting that Senator Lai, who had done most of the work on this action item, had already had to leave the meeting, Senator Smith withdrew the proposed item and asked Dr. Andries to join PCC at its next meeting.

Vice-Chairperson Fariba Kashan reported on the technology survey that, as was noted in the president's report, has now been distributed to all faculty. With this accomplished, the committee's next goal is to produce a resolution calling for the university to prioritize academic quality when making the budget for the next fiscal year. Senator Clay will be bringing information on the KSU budget process to the next BASC meeting.

Regent Moffett recently participated in a meeting of the Coalition of Senate and Faculty Leadership (COSFL) which brings together faculty leaders from all of the Kentucky universities. This organization had been more active in the past and is now being resuscitated. COSFL met with Aaron Thompson, president of Kentucky’s Council on Post-secondary Education (and form interim president of KSU). Much of the discussion centered on questions about the Gray & Associates program reviews initiated from CPE.

Thompson said representatives from Gray & Associates will meet with COSFL at its next session. Regent Moffett asked for faculty to direct to him any other issues that COSFL might help us in addressing. Faculty safety during the pandemic was immediately suggested by senators, also faculty evaluation procedures and budget issues, especially around performance funding as it affects us.

Regent Moffett also reported that a special meeting of the Board of Regents has been called for Thursday November 19. Action items for that meeting include approval of the final 2020-2021 academic calendar and of the 2020-2021 tenure and/or promotion calendar.

The meeting adjourned at 11:18.

Gary Stratton

Senators Absent: Monica Valentine, Keith McCutcheon, Ibukun (Mike) Ogunade,

Guests Attending:

james #2

Joe Moffett

John Sedlacek

Frederick A. Williams Jr., Ph.D.

David Shabazz

Deanna McGaughey- Summers

Debbra Tate Ban Mirta Rimolo Keturah Nix Whitni Milton