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Kentucky State University Faculty Senate Sign-In February 1, 2016

Senators Ex Officio Members and Guests Present

Glass, Cindy BSS Hunt Butler, DOFA

Alhuani, Abdallah BSS Elgie McFayden, Faculty Regent

Amusan, Ibukun Nursing Fariba Bigdeli, Chair M & S

Andries, Ken Math & Sciences Tierra Freeman, BSS

Assefa, Tibebe AFE Sheila Stuckey, Library Director

Capriles, Nancy BSS David Shabazz, DOFA

Graham, William Education Abdul Turay, BSS

Griffin, Robert Fine Arts Robert Hebble, M/S

Griffis, Bruce Math & Sciences Lynda Brown-Wright, VPAA

Grimes, Kristopher AFE

Gyawali, Buddhi at-large

Kumar, Ashok at-large

Landy, Tucker Whitney Young

Liu, Zhanping Computer Science

Moffett, Joe LLP

Ray, Andrew Aquaculture

Ross, Scott Fine Arts

Rye, Reba at-large

Sharma, Rita Math & Sciences

Sipes, Kim at-large

Smith, Peter LLP

Tate, Debbra Library

Tope, Avinash AFE

Ulrich, Stephen PUA,SW,CJ

Wang, Changzheng at-large

Representative needed from Nursing

The ninth meeting of the AY 2015-16 Faculty Senate was called to order at 3:13 pm on Monday, February 1, 2016, Hathaway Hall Room 123. Agenda was approved and Faculty Senate minutes of December 14, 2015 were approved with no amendments.

The Senate held a moment of silence for Dr. Sam Olekka, longtime colleague and Chair of Arts and Sciences.

Professional Concerns Committee Report:

Committee Chair Kumar presented the history and rationale for a PCC letter submitted for approval to the full Senate regarding letters of reprimand placed in faculty member's personnel folders about failure to submit final grades. It was agreed that some faculty members submitted all grades late. However, the concern of Senators is that no distinction was made in the letter between those particular cases and cases when, for a variety of reasons, one or two grades were not entered, or when a whole class' roster was rejected due to no entry of last attendance date for those who failed the class, and those faculty who caught the problem and informed the registrar's office but could not then enter grades because the system was closed. After lengthy discussion between Senators and VPAA Brown/Wright an agreement was not reached to reconsider the reprimands. Some Senators expressed concern that the letters are inaccurate in many cases and yet they will be permanent components of their personnel file. Dr. Brown/Wright suggested that faculty may, per policy, appeal the reprimand by submitting a letter to her office. She pointed out that submission of grades past the deadline, sometimes weeks late, has been a perennial problem at KSU and this is an attempt on the part of administration to address such. She, and a Senator and a faculty member, pointed out that it is the responsibility of faculty members to know how to use the system, even if it is not intuitive and has problems. The reporting of non-attends is necessary for compliance with Federal Financial Aid regulations.

Other points made by various Senators and guests were:

• No notification sent out of the glitch that if one grade of F did not have a 'last date attended' noted (even if the student attended all semester) grades for all students in that class would be kicked out.
• If grades for various students are entered at differing times for one class they will not be kicked out due to no entry of last attend until the last grade is entered and all grades submitted.
• Assumption by administration of faculty negligence without consideration of banner issues.
• Once Final grades are shut down in Banner they cannot be reviewed and seen by the faculty to assure compliance for about two weeks.

The following letter was approved by the Senate by unanimous voice vote.

RE:

Due to a glitch in the Banner System, some faculty members received letters of reprimand from the Office of Academic Affairs. The letters contained inaccurate information. The letter informed faculty that a memo will be placed in their file to document noncompliance.

The letter does not take into account the well documented unreliability of the Banner System. The wording in the letter is inaccurate in that it leads the reader to infer that ALL grades for ALL classes were not submitted. In fact, grades could have been submitted on time but not recorded due to the glitch pertaining to a grade of "F". A review of the system design is warranted.

The letter assumes negligence and culpability rather than fostering an atmosphere of collegiality. When an instructor has one or two classes with missing grades while the other classes are completely graded and promptly submitted and recorded, the logical explanation is error, not negligence.

The Faculty Senate is requesting that the letters sent to those who attempted in good faith to submit all grades be promptly removed from faculty files. If the Administration refuses to do so, then individual faculty must be allowed to write a rebuttal letter that also must be placed in the file along with the original letter.

Secretary Rye suggested that all faculty be notified of the option to appeal the reprimand and send a rebuttal letter of explanation to be included in their personnel file.

President Smith suggested that the PCC consider an Action Item that specifies instructions and consequences of inaccurate or incomplete entries to be sent via email to all faculty. All faculty members would benefit and especially new hires.

Curriculum Committee Report:

Chair Andries reported that the Curriculum Committee did not meet and reminded all present that any action items for Fall 2016 implementation must be to the committee by March 1st.

Budget and Academic Support Committee Report:

Vice-Chair Rye reported that the BASC did not meet, with only two able to attend.

Professional Concerns Committee Report:

Chair Moffett reported that the PCC discussed the 2016-17 calendar and are in correspondence with the VPAA's office to make sure they are on the same page regarding midterm grades, Founders' Day, Fall Break and if there will be a December commencement or not.

A Senator pointed out that some dates, such as no classes on inauguration day, did not make it to the web-site due to lost action items in Hume Hall by previous VPAA. As a result, the administration designed a calendar.

Secretary Rye is working from Sue Allen's files (former Administrative Assistant to Senate) to get Senate approved action items back to committees to recreate them, resign and submit to VPAA again. Ms. Allen's files, both email and iCloud accounts, do not include pdfs of all completely signed action items, although there is a list that indicates they were uploaded to iCloud. Evidently, they are no longer there.

A Senator said that he took approved vacation time during Fall Commencement and still received a letter of reprimand for non-attendance. Dr. Kumar suggested that he write a letter of appeal.

Secretary Rye said that she was a few minutes late to Fall Commencement and was not allowed to enter the auditorium by University Police. She signed the attendance list and waited outside to congratulate students.

Chair Bigdeli suggested that if a faculty member knows they will not be able to attend to send a curtesy email to the Chair and VPAA.

A guest faculty member asked if there has been a response from administration to the recommendations from PCC and Senate on on-line courses. Chair Moffett reported that it was sent but there has been no response. The faculty member said that his divisional chair will not allow any on-line classes to be scheduled and was told this was a directive from the VPAA. Secretary Rye said this is a problem because it appears that Chairs are administering the on-line policy differently and Senate needs clarification.

Chair Freeman informed the Senate that at the Board Meeting last week it was determined to kick back the report/recommendations to Senate for changes.

Regent McFayden reported that in the Board report it was indicated that no Freshmen will be allowed to take online classes. He had argued the conflict of this policy with KSU's advertised 'all on-line' degrees.

A faculty non-senator asked if Regent McFayden's understanding is that lower level on-line classes can be offered but just that Freshmen cannot take them. The response was, yes. That was the Board's determination.

A Senator expressed frustration with the contradiction of a previous administration encouraging us to develop online courses and then they are summarily, without review of available data, dropped by the current administration after the semester started.

A Senator recommended that ‘with consent of Department Chair’ should be added to our recommendations on on-line courses.

Chair Bigdeli said that it is the on-campus students that the Board wants to target and that Freshmen are not necessarily good candidates for on-line classes.

A faculty non-senator once again pointed out that the vast majority of students in his online 100-level course were not Freshmen (only 1 or 2 were Freshmen from his roster) and now he is not allowed to even offer that class on-line. He pointed out that even some Freshmen living on campus have jobs off-campus, some two, and they need to be able to use the on-line option. He said that the Community College system offers on-line to freshmen, so does that mean that their students are better prepared than ours? Chair Bigdeli replied that the Community College system is not a good comparison since they have students spread around the state and no dormitories and that, besides, KSU does not have to follow a bad model.

It was reported that the Board looked at, “percentages numbers, data, percentage off campus who are in online classes.” The problem raised by a Senator is that the Board did not look at relevant data of pass-fail rate of on-line vs traditional classes. He said that when the administration changed schedules

after classes began they created a ‘nightmare’ for some students who suddenly had class conflicts and had to figure how to rearrange after they had already been attending classes. This is contradictory to the goal of retention of students. He said there was a huge problem created and there seems to be no willingness to recognize that fact.

Secretary Rye said that currently the problem remains the inconsistent administration of policy by different Chairs and this needs to be taken care of by higher administrators.

Chair Bigdeli said that Dr. Brown/Wright requested her to remind faculty that Distinguished Faculty nominations are due today.

Regent's Report:

Regent McFayden reported that the Board of Regents has narrowed health insurance bids to three, one of which he hopes works out because it's a much better deal and should be in place by May.

He was not impressed with the outside evaluation presentation. He reiterated various reasons for low graduation rates: high out of state tuition rates, financial aid, necessity of attending part-time and not graduating in four years.

There were fewer Ds, Ws, Fs this semester and more As than all D, W, Fs put together.

He said that we have 120 accounts that had procedural problems listed by the external audit report. Secretary Rye inquired about the State-Journal report that one citation was that several student's financial aid award did not indicate if they were in-state or out-of-state. Regent McFayden had no information on that.

Other Business:

Regarding the external review, President Smith said that using the ‘Trojan thing’ as a benchmark was fallacious since it was school of 43,000 students. Regent McFayden replied that the Board indeed noted that. Smith also pointed out that High Point University spent $74 million to make a “Disneyworld” campus and that their tuition has gone up 60% since their growth began. These are unreal benchmarks and goals for KSU. Regent McFayden added that none of the universities listed were comparable to KSU.

President Smith directed the Senate committees to discuss if the faculty is ready for a vote of no-confidence in the President. He reported that he keeps hearing the time is right. He said we are 'stagnated', little progress has been made in key areas, and it's time to send a message to the Board of Regents and the Governor.

Secretary Rye reported to the Senate that the Executive Committee has been asked to meet with President Burse and his cabinet tomorrow, Feb. 2 and they will report back to respective committees.

A Senator asked if the Board is aware of all the large administrative salaries, and President Smith said they must be since they approved them. Another Senator asked if it's possible to vote no confidence in the Board as well. The response was, yes.

The meeting adjourned at 4:36.

Minutes Submitted by: Reba Rye, Faculty Senate Secretary