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2000-2001
FACULTY COUNCIL
MINUTES
2000-2001
Meeting #5, Tuesday, September 26, 2000
Present:
McKeever (chair), Smelser (vice-chair), Chun,
Coonts, Foltz, Fritz, Goble, Guilfoyle, Haggart (w/o vote), Hong, Kraut,
McCaffrey, McClure, Meier, Nelson, Nielsen, Olson, Pitcher (w/o vote),
Trivedi, Vaughn Absent: Bitterwolf,
Brunsfeld, Finnie, Goodwin, Thompson Observers: 2
Call
to Order. A quorum being present, Faculty Council
Chair, Professor Kerry McKeever, called the meeting to order at 3:35 p.m. in
the Idaho Commons.
Minutes.
Council member Mark Nielsen called the secretary’s attention to the fact
that there was an inconsistency in the spelling of his last name in the
minutes of the last meeting. Professor Haggart offered apologies for the
oversight and said that he would correct the "official" copy of
the meeting minutes. The council then, by voice vote, accepted the minutes
of the September 19, 2000, meeting as corrected.
Chair’s
Report. Chair McKeever reported:
Several
changes in the agenda for the meeting; adding a resolution
coming from the College of Natural Resources and postponing a further
discussion of diversity issues (including a recently passed resolution
by the ASUI Senate) until next week.
That
Institutional Research and Assessment is developing an advisory
committee. The Faculty Council will be represented on that committee
by Councilor Steve Meier. This committee will be looking at the way the
university assesses programs and gathers data.
That
the College of Letters and Science has announced that Professor
Thomas Bitterwolf had been elected to fill a one year vacancy on the
Faculty Council.
That
at the recent SBOE/Regents meeting it was noted that NASC (the
accrediting body) was beginning to investigate how to assure quality in
on-line courses. Also, in conjunction with building a long-range
financial plan for the higher education system, the auditor will assume
a consulting role in working with the board office on those plans.
That
she would like to see more comments and questions posted on the Responsibility
Center Management discussion web site.
Provost’s
Report. Provost Pitcher reported:
The
chairs of the higher education institution mathematics departments
are working together to develop a common curriculum and course
numbering for the entry-level lower-division courses. They are also
looking at standardized ways to examine/test in these courses and
which courses should be considered as remedial. Their report was given
a first reading at the last SBOE/Regents meeting and will come back
for further discussion at a later date. Local input will be sought by
circulating these proposals on the U of Idaho campus. Part of the
mathematics proposal was not approved. That proposal called for
increasing the admissions requirements in mathematics from 6 to
8 credits. The board’s discussion noted the need for increased
mathematics preparation for college bound students, but could not
decide if increasing the number of credits required was the proper
solution to the problem.
The
U of Idaho Foundation is having a meeting on the campus at the
end of this week. They are in the process of preparing for the
announcement of the new capital campaign, which will begin in November.
The
National Institute of Health awarded U of Idaho researchers a
five year $9.4 million grant to do "cutting-edge"
agricultural and bio-medical research on animal and human diseases. The
project director is Professor Greg Bohach, head of the U of Idaho’s
Department of Microbiology, Molecular Biology and Biochemistry. There
will be a press conference on Friday to officially announce and comment
on this, the largest grant ever to be received by the U of Idaho.
Budget
Liaison Committee Report. Councilor Marla Kraut,
Chair of the Budget Liaison Committee, reported that the committee had met
last week to discuss budget and institutional planning issues. The committee
also continues to discuss changing its name and function statement. The
suggested new name is the Budget and Institutional Planning Advisory
Committee. The U of Idaho’s budget request was reviewed by the
committee, in particular those items which are separate line items from
the base budget: $3.2 million for program and maintenance (including changes
in employee compensation, increased utility costs, occupancy costs, and
library costs), program enhancements (salary competitiveness, computing and
equipment infrastructure enhancements); plus a system-wide request that
includes money for the U of Idaho instructional centers and expansion of
academic programs. All eyes, of course, are on the projected state budget
surplus and how the U of Idaho might capture some of those funds.
The
U of Idaho continues discussing with the SBOE/Regents: 1) flexible
course fees, 2) a better definition/clarification of all professional fees,
3) a redistribution of student financial aid aimed at encouraging students
to finish their degree programs in four years, 4) pre-college economic
development programs, and 5) strategies for the development of student fee
requests (so that if certain items are not funded by the state – fees can
be increased). Chair McKeever told the council that she will invite Wayland
Winstead to address the council in the near future concerning U of Idaho
financial plans and financial issues that we will be facing in the coming
year. It was also strongly suggested by several councilors that Winstead
address these issues in light of the U of Idaho’s land-grant mission.
Core
Curriculum Report. Professor William Voxman,
Core Curriculum Coordinator, brought the council up-to-date on the new
university core curriculum. Voxman made note of the recent $430,000
grant made to the U of Idaho and the fact that the major thrust of the grant
is to bring into the core, in a significant way, all of the colleges in the
university. The core is now centered in the College of Letters & Science
and it needs to be expanded to the rest of the university to take advantage
of the talent and resources in other colleges. To help achieve this goal,
the focus of the grant is on the core discovery courses. The grant will
allow the creation of several more courses. These courses have always been
interdisciplinary, but now the teams of faculty that develop these courses
must be more representative of the total university. Each course team must
now represent at least two colleges and three disciplines. Voxman is hoping
that faculty members from all colleges will take advantage of these grant
funding incentives and develop new courses for the core. He distributed to
the faculty council (and will to the rest of the university) course
proposal guidelines for "Integrated Science Core Courses" and
"Core Discovery Courses." He encouraged the council to speak to
their colleagues about proposing new core courses and helping the university
build a truly integrated core curriculum. Four integrated science courses
have been introduced this year. These courses have a strong focus on active
student learning. All of these courses are full this semester. Next year the
budget calls for six or seven of these courses, and as was the case this
year, several departments will fund additional new core course offerings out
of their own budgets.
Professor
Voxman presented a model for a possible future core curriculum. This
model would allow courses from other colleges (already being taught) to be
brought into the core through the cluster concept (see explanation below).
Current requirements for the humanities and social sciences are 15 credits.
The SBOE/Regents requirement is for 6 credits in each of those areas – or
a total of 12 credits. There has been a considerable amount of discussion
this year about adopting the state requirements for core credit hours, which
would allow the addition of courses from natural resources or agriculture,
for example, into the core. Voxman is going to propose the following as a
possible model for the core:
Year-long,
freshman Core Discovery course (6-7 credits)
plus
Three courses (from distinct disciplines) in a cluster (9 credits)
plus
One elective core course (in a fourth discipline or an approved capstone
course) (3 credits)
Must have: 15 credits in Humanities/Social Sciences, including 3 a credit
course dealing with global issues, foreign language,
or foreign culture
Natural
and Applied Science (7 credits, including at least one lab course)
Mathematics
(3 credits)
Communication
(5 credits, including English 102 or its equivalent)
Professor
Voxman told the council that some student fee money is now being directed to
help fund study abroad opportunities. Currently only 1.9% of our
students have any international experience before they leave the U of Idaho.
The national average is 5% and a number of schools have 40-50% of their
students study abroad. He encouraged departments to include foreign study
opportunities as a part of the core curriculum experience. Voxman invited
the council to visit the core web site at http://www.its.uidaho.edu/core/
to get further information on course development and course proposals.
Questions
and Comments. Professor Voxman then fielded a
number of questions and comments from the council.
Are
the ten sections of the new core courses full this fall? There
are around 325 students enrolled. The cap on each section (except for the
honors section) was 40 – so some are full and others are not. It presents
a challenge to the faculty next year in terms of advising, to try and get as
many students as possible into these courses - from all colleges. This is
still a trial run on these courses. Students have been given opportunities
to drop out after one semester with no penalty, but those who do complete
the year-long course will have to complete only one additional course in the
humanities and social sciences.
Are
there "start-up" funds for faculty members developing new courses?
Yes. For faculty members whose course proposals are
approved there is a $5,000 stipend to use as they wish. In addition, where
merited, there is money for departments to cover replacement costs (course
teaching) and there is also money for faculty retreats that would allow
instructional teams to get away from the campus to develop and refine their
courses.
Several
councilors asked about the integration of these new core courses with
departmental major requirements. Is it possible to better integrate the core
requirements with requirements for specific majors? Some
of this obviously involves departmental decisions that would allow majors to
count these courses in their major field of study. At the next stage in the
development of the new core, the "cluster" concept of courses will
be introduced. A cluster would have 8-12 courses that would focus on a
particular theme. These clusters would include courses on several levels
(100-200-300) and departmentally required courses could be included in those
groupings. Of course, part of the reason for the core is to give students
the opportunity to take courses outside of their major. The fully developed
new core will probably bring about a number of curriculum changes in
academic majors and minors.
What
will be the influence of Responsibility Center Management (RCM) on the
desirability of offering core courses? Voxman expressed his optimism that it
will be worked out. This revised core is a program that the central
administration is going to put a lot of weight on because it cuts across all
disciplines and has a significant impact on the mission of the U of Idaho.
If that is not true – then we are wasting our time developing this new
core curriculum.
Provost
Pitcher added a second to what Professor Voxman had said. General
education and interdisciplinary programs need to be a priority for the
institution and thus the weighting of the credit hours will make it
financially rewarding for departments to engage in this kind of course
development and instruction.
How
many of these courses are "distance" courses? At
the present time none of them are offered in that manner. That is a future
plan – but not in the immediate future.
What
happened to the "Communication Across the Curriculum Proposal?" We
are striving to find ways of imparting, in an explicit way, critical
thinking skills to students. One idea is the development of a handbook (now
a work in progress) for faculty to help them integrate critical thinking
skills into their courses. We are still looking at improving writing skills
by having students take several writing intensive courses. We are also
thinking about expanding this to include oral and visual communication
skills.
We
must make sure that critical thinking skills are reflected in the course
evaluation instrument. What we are doing now, in
terms of assessment, is to give critical thinking skills’ exercises now
and at the end of the semester to see how these skills develop over the
course of the semester. Assessment is always a part of any major grant. We
are even having the students (in some selected courses) develop an
evaluation instrument that they think would be a valuable instrument.
Provost
Pitcher reminded the council that the core experiment provides an
opportunity for all departments in the university to offer core courses. It
is no longer a monopoly. There is a very healthy competition for the
development of core courses, which naturally helps advance the quality of
these courses. All of this is consistent with Responsibility Center
Management (RCM). There will be incentives, and revenue will most certainly
follow enrollment. At the same time, there will also be financial incentives
for reducing a large lecture class to several manageable smaller class
sections.
Chair
McKeever asked Professor Voxman to relay to his task force Faculty Council’s
recognition and appreciation of the amount of work that this group
has put into the development of the new core curriculum.
A
Proposed Resolution. Faculty members from the
College of Natural Resources forwarded, through Councilor Steven Brunsfeld,
a resolution speaking to the administrative "step-down" policy
in use by the U of Idaho. The resolution asks the Faculty Council to
call for an end to the policy of providing administrators with "excessive
‘golden parachute’ compensation packages" when they return to
faculty positions. There was a considerable amount of discussion on the
proposed resolution. Many noted that the resolution contained too many
"value" statements and terms that could not be easily defined.
Others were concerned because this seemed to be a purely
"reactionary" statement.
Three
issues emerged from this discussion: 1) is the
current step-down policy the right policy to have?, 2) is the current policy
being followed?, and 3) is this really a concern/issue for the Faculty
Council? Many councilors agreed that these issues should be addressed –
beyond the simple venting of emotions.
The
U of Idaho does have a 2 ½ year old "step-down" policy as a
part of a salary model adopted by President Hoover, April 3, 1998.
"For faculty members serving in administrative roles, a shadow
salary will be maintained at the faculty salary level and updated by all
salary increases. When an individual steps down as an administrator the
salary will be returned to the shadow salary. If >15% reduction is
required, the reduction will be phased in at 15% per year." The
full text of this part of the salary model can be viewed at http://www.uidaho.edu/ipb/final_text.html
In
the interest of full disclosure, Provost Pitcher said that he cannot say
that the U of Idaho has a "shadow" salary established for all
administrative personnel, but that the most recent administrative hires
probably do have a "shadow" salary.
It
was moved and seconded (Chun, Meier) to reject the proposed resolution and
send it back to its author(s). There followed
another round of spirited discussion on the proposed resolution. There was
considerable concern that the heading of the resolution implied that it had
come from the Faculty Council, when in fact it had not. The council returned
to the major questions asked above. Some councilors felt that it was
difficult to know if the assertions made in the resolution were true or
false. Others encouraged the council not to act, but to simply let the issue
sit and come back and discuss it next week. The originators of the motion
(Chun, Meier) withdrew the motion. The council then urged Councilor
Brunsfeld to collect the data to support the statements made in the proposal
and to submit it in the form of a motion.
Teaching
Evaluation Task Force Report – Continued Discussion.
Councilor Mark Nielsen brought the council a plan of action for the Fall
2000 experiment with on-line course evaluations. This plan grew out of last
week’s discussion by the council.
Fall
2000 Experiment With On-Line Course Evaluations
Purpose.
The
experiment will investigate two possible effects of an on-line format
for course evaluations:
Will
student participation drop, or possibly increase?
Will
results of the evaluation be influenced by the on-line format?
Nature
of the Experiment.
Participation
in the experiment will be strictly voluntary.
Participation
will require approval of the instructor’s departmental administrator.
Volunteers
will be sought through Faculty Council representatives and a DDD email.
The
experiment will compare an on-line copy of the current written form to
the current form itself.
Wherever
possible, we will seek to use two parallel sections of the same course.
One using the on-line format and one using the traditional written form.
We
will offer a modest incentive for student participation in the form of
one or two prizes awarded in a lottery of students completing the
on-line evaluations.
Discussion
of this plan centered on the idea of offering an
incentive to students who participate in the on-line portion of the
experiment. Many councilors felt that this would be comparing different
samples ("apples and oranges") because you would not be looking at
groups of students following the same procedures. In order for it to work,
they argued, you would have to offer incentives to both the on-line and
paper participants. Nielsen responded that the task force wanted to compare
the on-line group with a group that does the evaluation the way it is
currently done – and that group does not currently get rewarded for doing
the evaluation. In response to another question, Nielsen said that the
incentives would continue if the on-line system was adopted – probably
being funded by the considerable savings (estimated at $20,000 per semester)
from doing away with the paper forms and the labor to record them. Councilor
Steve Meier reminded Professor Nielsen that he would need approval by the
Human Assurances Committee to conduct the experiment this fall and urged him
to contact the committee chair as soon as possible to arrange a presentation
to that committee.
Chair
McKeever asked council members to be prepared to discuss diversity issues
at the next meeting, including the resolution passed by the ASUI
Senate concerning the communication process between teachers and
students. Citing effective oral communication as being vital to the
educational experience, the ASUI Senate proposes that the U of Idaho
implement a more comprehensive instructor selection process that would
require the testing of English language verbal communication skills as a
part of the hiring process. Provost Pitcher noted that there has been a task
force at work on some of these same issues, and their conclusions are
consistent with many of the suggestions made in the ASUI Senate resolution.
McKeever will see to it that there will be people at the next meeting who
can speak on the student resolution and the work of the administrative task
force.
Adjournment.
There being no further business to come before the
council, Chair McKeever adjourned the meeting at 5:00 p.m.
Respectfully
submitted,
Peter
A. Haggart
Secretary
of the Faculty Council
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