The Faculty Senate agenda is posted weekly on the Web, at 2504 Buzzard, and at 315K Coleman.

1. Call to order by Bonnie Irwin at 2:06 p.m. (2504 Buzzard Building)

Present: J. Allison, R. Benedict, J. Best, G. Canivez, J. Coons, C. Eberly, P. Fewell, B. Fischer, G. Foster, B. Irwin, G. Lockart, N. Marlow, J. Tidwell, M. Toosi, B. Young, G. Kelly. Guests: T. Abebe, B. Delk, D. Grooms, S. Gustafson.

2. Approval of the minutes of December 7, 1999

Motion (Tidwell/Coons) to approve the minutes of December 7, 1999.

Corrections: An additional bulleted item should be added to V.A.1.c. (after the second bullet): Not all faculty members had the opportunity to participate in the planning process at the departmental level.

Yes: Allison, Benedict, Best, Canivez, Coons, Eberly, Fewell, Fischer, Foster, Irwin, Lockart, Marlow, Tidwell, Toosi, Young.

3. Communications

1. Council on Academic Affairs minutes, 2 December 1999. General Education Subcommittee will include Bock, Brinkmeyer, Methven, Owen, Wohlstein. New courses approved: FLE 3050, Culture and Language in the French-Speaking World; FLE 3061, German Literature in Translation; FLE 3220, French for Business; FLE 3000, Media and Global Communication.
2. Thank-you note from Eulalee Anderson for International Student event, 3 December 1999.
3. E-mail from Kathy Ford to Bailey Young regarding senate discussion of International Student Fees, 6 December 1999. Ms. Ford addresses many of the same points that Dean Augustine did–IPAC approved the fee structure; Dr. Augustine met with AIS early in the fall semester; monies not being used for recruitment but for other international student needs.
4. Committee on the Assessment of Student Learning minutes, 7 December 1999. New course proposal format for general education courses was discussed.
5. Committee for the Assessment of Student Learning minutes, 14 December 1999. Discussion of whether to block student registration for those who do not submit papers for portfolio; faculty have expressed concern that this is moving too fast; economic issues are still a concern.
6. Student Senate minutes, 8 December 1999. Melissa Riley appointed new Vice President for Public Affairs. Senator Ruppel was elected speaker.
7. Intercollegiate Athletic Board minutes, 9 December 1999. All fall sports were below 15% in missed class time. New volleyball coach is Brenda Winkler. Middle Tennessee will leave the OVC after spring 2000. Rachel Wright (Women’s Tennis) was chosen as an OVC Scholar-Athlete.
8. Letter from Nikolina Pacic, student, regarding scheduling of graduation, 13 December 1999. Holding Commencement ceremony before finals is a disadvantage to students whose parents come from a long distance. Students cannot spend time with family if they have to study for exams.
9. Faculty Senate account statement, 30 November 1999
10. Faculty Senate account statement, 31 December 1999. Balance available: $2280.
11. E-mail from Waldo Born, faculty, regarding TRS, classroom hours, graduation, grading deadlines, etc., 7 January 2000. Textbook rental sends message that books are not important. Not enough contact hours in the semester, especially for MWF courses. Some instructors are giving exams before finals week, meaning they are not using all the class hours that they do have. Commencement before finals is ludicrous. Early grade deadlines discourage essay exams and thus limits student writing experiences.
12. Memo from VPAA Abebe with Academic Affairs FY2002 Planning Focus Statement, 5 January 2000. Plan outlines four major foci: 1) Improve education program quality and accountability; 2) Enhance access to high-quality educational programs and services; 3) Build a stable resource base requisite for quality educational programs, services, activities, equipment, and facilities while continuing to fulfill mandated annual-leave, sick-leave, and early-retirement plans; 4) Facilitate an environment of free enquiry and exchange that enhances the academic community.
13. E-mail from Eric Davidson, 16 December 1999. He has been developing a foundation for a campus-based alcohol coalition and would like to come to Faculty Senate to give a presentation.

4. Old Business

1. Committee Reports
1. Executive Committee. Although the Executive Committee has not met since the last Faculty Senate meeting, there are some scheduling issues to present. TRS will be on the agenda–perhaps next week–for discussion. Nilsen and Abell may be coming to Senate next week. Foundation representatives will be here February 8. Eric Davidson would like to be scheduled in late January or early February. There was also an offer from Ron Phillips for a demonstration of the LanDesk software. Faculty will have the option to be a part of this. We can learn from the demonstration and determine how best to disseminate what we have learned to the rest of the faculty. There also have been several calendar issues raised; the Calendar Committee will be approached about coming to Senate
2. Faculty-Student Relations. The Committee met together last semester and discussed several items. They will brainstorm on how to get faculty and student together for the purpose of discussing some joint issues.
3. Search Committees. The VPIA Search Committee met to consider bids of two search firms. One was selected. A representative from that firm will be on campus January 25. The first candidate for University Counsel will be on campus Thursday. The plan is to have five candidates on campus for interviews. This raised a general question about interviews: why are there typically 4-5 candidates for these types of positions but a limitation of 3 candidates is imposed for faculty campus interviews? Norm Bedford from Ohio State was hired as Assistant Director of Financial Aid. We will be on campus in mid-January. Five candidates were identified for the Rec Center Director; one has dropped out. The first interview will be Thursday. The other three will be next week on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. Another general interview question was raised: now that most faculty have computers, do we need paper copies of the interview schedules?
2. Textbook Rental Service. A discussion of this will be deferred until next week. Senators asked to read the materials that have been distributed.
3. Fall Forum. Discussion of the reports from subcommittees began with the Faculty subcommittee:

• Encourage departments to recognize the importance of mentoring by adding appropriate language to the Departmental Application of Criteria in the area of service. There was some discussion whether the Drafting Committee should develop a resolution.
• Increase the number of sabbatical awards. Two more have been added with the contract. Where does EIU stand relative to other institutions in the percentage of sabbaticals related to the number of faculty. If we are much lower, it becomes an academic quality issue.
• Establish a study group to focus on the career trajectory of faculty members at Eastern, with the objective of establishing resources needed for sustained productivity across the entire arc of the career. This refers to faculty who are productive and sustain that productivity in each of the three areas. What factors enhance productivity and what factors stop productivity. If the latter factors are systemic, we have a problem. As people develop in their jobs here, what factors are helping them or hindering them? This knowledge would help us dramatically. We should establish a task force that would look at each of the three levels–assistant, associate, and full. The mentoring issue could be a part of this as well. There was a task force in the 1980s that looked at a similar issue. It would be interesting to see that report as well. There was considerable discussion about this item:
• There was some concern expressed about the suggestion or implication of evaluating faculty as a means to determine who is productive and who is not. There are times people may be less productive in research because they are developing courses, etc.
• We need to work through the departments because of the inherent differences in the disciplines.
• It was also noted that teaching tools are very important for faculty. It is important to have a good productive faculty development center. Many schools send their new faculty to work shops to learn how to teach, grade, write exams, etc. These are very important for new faculty.
• This idea merits a grant proposal to some appropriate organization to allow us to conduct decent quality research.
• A potential sample would be associate professors that never applied for full or full professors who never applied for a PAI. This could be determined through some type of self-assessment instrument.
• Some of this information we already have from our earlier survey of faculty.
• Productivity can be defined in many ways–not just through research. Teaching is productivity as is service. We cannot be narrow about productivity. We are talking about development in three areas. If there are people who are off track and there is something about Eastern that caused that, we need to know this. The purpose is not to evaluate but to learn. A disaffected person is unhappy. If we can change that, all the better. If change requires the help of administration, even better because we will be working together for the benefit of Eastern.
• Productivity has to be conceived of in the three areas–perhaps even a fourth area of balance. It comes down to an amount of time. In a single department there may be an overall balance. This process would have to be anonymous and confidential. Our goal would be understand the phenomenon for the purpose of changing variables that hold people back.
• A self-assessment of productivity could be very helpful. If a person perceives himself as unproductive (even one whom others may regard as productive), this is a development issue as well.
• Explore the feasibility of decentralizing budget processes down to the department level. We need to discuss this item more. Feasibility would include both the pluses and minuses. Perhaps a better term would be desirability. What would departments gain and what would they lose. Departments need more autonomy in determining how money is to be spent on personnel, facilities, etc. Departments would receive a sum of money and manage it. Discussion of this item included the following:
• Some departments are already doing this–except for personnel. We may not want budgetary responsibility for personnel at this time. To a large extent, budgets have been decentralized with the exception of personnel requests.
• There is a university ownership of space–not a departmental ownership as such.
• Create a campus-wide "yearbook" of faculty accomplishments in research, scholarship and creative activity. Some of this is already done for IBHE and BOT. This information could be yearbook material. This could also be done on the Internet. An attractive print form could also be used for potential donors. Discussion included the following:
• Why not teaching and service as well? If we are excited about research and communicate that excitement to the students, they benefit as well. People would be interested in seeing that as well. This would show that these three areas are interactive.
• On the Internet we could have a constantly changing focus on exciting things that are happening.
• This would be dependent on the audience we are targeting and what we need to tell those people. We need to identify the many communities that we have.

4. New Business

Next week’s discussion will center primarily on planning. Chair Irwin will contact the Senators by e-mail to let them know whether Nilsen and Abell can definitely come to the meeting. If they are able to come, Senators need to bring all the planning documents that have been distributed.

5. Adjourn at 3:45 p.m. (Benedict)

Respectfully submitted,

Nancy D. Marlow, Recorder