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2000-2001
FACULTY COUNCIL
MINUTES
2000-2001
Meeting #8, Tuesday, October 17, 2000
Present:
McKeever (chair), Smelser (vice-chair),
Bitterwolf, Brunsfeld, Chun, Coonts, Finnie, Foltz, Fritz, Goble,
Guilfoyle, Haggart (w/o vote), Kraut, McCaffrey, McClure, Meier, Nelson,
Nielsen, Olson, Pitcher (w/o vote), Thompson, Trivedi
Absent:
Goodwin, Hong Observers: 7
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.
The council, by voice vote, accepted the minutes of the October 10, 2000,
meeting as distributed.
Chair’s
Report. Professor McKeever distributed to
the council copies of the "Report on Noncompetitive Faculty
Salaries," as written and distributed by the Idaho Council of
Higher Education Faculty (ICHEF). This report presents an analysis of the
noncompetitive salary situation and its implications for the state of
Idaho. The final version of the report will have a list of U of Idaho
achievements (approved by the Faculty Council) to complement a list from
the other institutions. The report will then be made available to the
members of the state legislature. McKeever asked council members to email
her with suggested listings of accomplishments. She will also contact the
president’s office to collect achievement information that may already
have been compiled for other reports.
The
ICHEF met with the governor and presented their
case for salary equity. McKeever said that she thought the governor was
very responsive to their presentation. A major realization in that
conversation was that everyone seemed to recognize that retaining students
was more cost effective than recruiting new ones and that the same
parallel could be found in the retention of faculty members. The ICHEF
also discussed the fact that faculty turnover rates are too high and many
faculty members are simply leaving Idaho’s higher education system in
lateral moves by accepting comparable positions at other institutions at
higher salaries and accompanying improved personal and professional
benefits. She said that the faculty leaders explained to the governor and
his staff the life of a typical faculty member and the role he/she plays
in the university/community/state. While the governor could not make any
promises for action, McKeever believes that he now has a better
understanding and appreciation for the inequity in faculty salaries and
the contributions faculty members make to the economy of the state of
Idaho. The governor inquired if there were any other ways to solve the
problem, other than raising the base salary rate? The response was an
emphatic no! They reminded the governor that faculty salaries were far
behind peers now and that the state needed to do something immediately to
address this inequity. McKeever believes that the ICHEF presentation made
a significant impact on the governor and his advisors.
ICHEF
is making a commitment to spend "education week" at the
legislature contacting every representative and senator. Since faculty
leadership changes each year, the group is discussing the concept of
hiring a permanent lobbyist to represent higher education faculty members
during each legislative session.
McKeever
said that she is discussing with SBOE/Regents staff the sponsorship of a
leadership institute (in the late spring or early summer) which would
bring together former and newly elected faculty leaders for leadership
training in Boise. She will be looking into ways of obtaining funding for
the institute.
Provost’s
Report. Provost Brian Pitcher noted that there
was a parallel discussion that is consistent with the faculty leaders’
discussion with the governor. Some of the higher education leadership has
been meeting with the Idaho Association of Commerce and Industry (IACI) to
inform them of the importance of Idaho business leaders supporting the
enhancement of public and higher education. President Hoover will be
addressing IACI’s Public Affairs and Education Committee soon. An IACI
study group has recommended supporting the SBOE/Regents’ recommendation
for salary and program enhancements. IACI will probably support measures
for tax relief this year, but the fact that they are having this
discussion with higher education officials shows that IACI is concerned
about the faculty salary inequity/retention/recruitment problems.
International
Teaching Assistant Training Proposal. The
council then took up for action FC-01-002, a proposal introduced
last week for the training of international teaching assistants. It was
moved and seconded (Thompson, Foltz) to approve the proposal as
presented to the council by the Office of Academic Affairs, as previously
published in the minutes of the October 10, 2000, meeting of the Faculty
Council.
Councilor
Nielsen reported that there were many questions raised by faculty members
in his college that needed to be answered before a vote could be taken. He
suggested that the council wait a week before taking a vote. Chair
McKeever urged the council to ask questions now, and then make a decision
about when to vote on the proposal.
Discussion
of the motion followed between council members, Vice Provost Dene Thomas,
Director of the International Programs Office (IPO), Michael Whiteman, and
Steve Springer, Coordinator of the American Language and Culture program
of the IPO.
Comments/Questions/Answers:
How are the tests given in other countries and are the tests valid if
given to prospective international graduate assistants (ITA’s) in other
countries? For instance, if the exam is given by someone with the same
accent as the prospective student is that going to be a valid testing
procedure? The IPO has done a lot of research on
these tests. The Educational Testing Service (ETS) provides rigorous
training for examiners and graders. The tests are often given at a U.S.
Embassy Office or USIA Office by native English speakers. The SPEAK test
that is given on the Idaho campus is a "retired" version of the
test provided by ETS. If the test is given on the U of Idaho campus it is
free and comes with the course instruction given to ITA’s However, the
cost can run up to $125 if the test is given at another location.
Does
the testing include a section on listening comprehension? Yes, both the
TOEFL and SPEAK tests include listening and comprehension skills. A
councilor shared his experience with using the test scores to gauge the
ability of a teaching assistant to operate successfully in a classroom
environment. He said that international teaching assistants who scored 6
on the Listening and Speaking test had no problems communicating with
students. A score of 5 required some break-in period, but the ITA adjusted
quickly. He also thought that the SPEAK test was a better indicator of
readiness for the classroom than the TOEFL test.
What
does a score of 50 on the Test of Spoken English (TSE) indicate. That
score indicates that the ITA is ranked as being a generally effective
communicator.
What
happens if the ITA arrives on this campus and fails the examinations? The
proposal specifically calls for a negotiation between all interested
parties to seek a resolution to the problem. That resolution might involve
course work or reassignment of the ITA to other non-teaching duties. No
offer should be made with a contingency clause. Arriving without the
necessary language skills will cause problems and it will probably be a
challenge to find the right solution. A telephone
call to the prospective ITA is probably the most cost-effective and
efficient way to gauge their ability to speak English. That call would
make the decision of offering an assistantship much easier.
Will
existing policies be superseded by this new policy? Where
the department/college requirements are weaker, they will need to be
upgraded. Where the requirements are higher than the proposal, the
departmental or college standards would prevail.
Provost
Pitcher encouraged the council to support the proposal so that the U of
Idaho can meet its responsibility to have qualified instructors in the
classroom. Councilor Bitterwolf pointed out that another reason to support
the proposal is that the Office of Academic Affairs has agreed to pay the
full cost of the proposal, and he commended Pitcher and Thomas for
agreeing to cover those costs. That is a major change that takes the
financial burden away from the colleges and departments seeking ITA’s.
Over
the objection of Councilor Nielsen, the question was called by
Councilor Goble. The council voted to proceed to an immediate vote
on the motion on the floor, exceeding the 2/3 majority requirement with a
vote of 15 to 5 in favor. The vote on the previous motion was 18 in favor,
0 opposed, and 1 abstention. Therefore, FC-01-002
was adopted by the council.
Differential
Mandatory Fee Policy. The Faculty Council turned
its attention to a presentation and discussion of the "Differential
Mandatory Fee Policy" with the Executive Director of Institutional
Planning and Budget, Wayland Winstead. Winstead first presented this
information to the council when he addressed the council on September
12th to report on Responsibility Center Management (RCM).
Within that presentation he outlined the way RCM builds on our present
system and promotes change. In that presentation it was recorded in the
minutes that:
RCM
should foster entrepreneurship using predictable resource allocations
and by allowing flexibility and liquidity in dealing with finance and
personnel issues. This flexibility would
include such things as using carry-over funds, salary savings,
employment contracts, teaching load distributions, loans, and
flexible course-based pricing (currently being presented to the
SBOE/Regents) which would permit some departments, for instance, to
charge higher matriculation fees for upper-division courses. The
increased revenue would then flow directly back to the department. There
is also some thought being given to allowing colleges to balance out
course load levels by charging a higher fee at the most popular class
time periods and offering a reduced fee at the less desirable time
periods. (emphasis added)
At
the October 10th council meeting, the chair of the Budget
Liaison Committee, provided the council with the details of the new
fee policy being discussed by the administration with the SBOE/Regents. At
the end of that meeting the council invited Wayland Winstead to join them
for a further discussion of differential fees at the next meeting (today).
Executive
Director Winstead reviewed the public policy issues that frame any
discussion of fee issues and the charge that he has been given by the
administration and the SBOE/Regents, which is all based on the U of Idaho’s
Strategic Plan.
He
emphasized that the university is not presenting an actual fee
structure, but is seeking guidance from the SBOE/Regents as to the
direction the U of Idaho should take in enhancing its ability to pay the
costs of instruction in light of the shrinking dollars appropriated by the
legislature. One option is getting board permission and guidance to use
differential fees in the areas of summer, off-campus, matriculation,
graduate, and part-time fees. The main question is: will the
SBOE/Regents entertain a proposal for differential fees?
Winstead
said that this is a discussion about rate setting of permissible fees, not
the establishment of new fee categories. The traditional approach in
Idaho has been to set a uniform mandatory fee in each fee category.
The SBOE/Regents has consciously adopted what could be called a policy of "low
fee – low financial aid – high state support" model for
funding higher education. Unfortunately, over the last 25 years the share
of the general education budget allocated to higher education has declined
to about 12% of the general fund. Thus, the model equation will not
work any more. The U of Idaho’s ability to offer programs is all too
dependent on the marginal revenue that is generated from the uniform
mandatory fee. In summer school for instance, our ability to offer a
course is driven by getting enough students to take the course (paying the
uniform summer fee) to generate enough revenue to pay the instructor to
teach the course. Off-campus compressed video courses must also pay
transmission fees on top of salaries.
He
noted that there is a fundamental issue of "fairness." We
charge every student the same fee, irrespective of the degree that they
earn from the U of Idaho. An engineering major who will graduate to a
starting salary of $55,000 plus a signing bonus is charged the same fee as
an education major who is expected to work in an Idaho school district for
$24,000 a year. The lifetime economic value of an engineering degree is
three to four times the value of an education degree and yet we don’t
reflect any of those issues in the way that we charge mandatory fees. When
fees are a major part of university funding, then students from low cost
majors are subsidizing students in high cost majors. Instructional
costs are not uniform. An engineering degree is much more expensive to
deliver than an education degree, considering the reliance on higher
faculty salaries, equipment, and operational and laboratory expenses. The
present fee structure does not reflect the value or the cost.
Winstead
indicated that we already have differential pricing – only it is
called by other names. Video Outreach can be priced on a course-by-course
basis based on the cost of providing the course. The College of
Engineering uses this method and produces about 40% of its graduate credit
hours via outreach courses. Those courses are priced much higher than an
on-campus course offering. The College of Engineering offers prospective
students several choices. They can take the course on-campus, by video
outreach, or by compressed video at an off-campus site. In each case the
same course is priced differently. We also have professional fees –
another form of differential pricing. Some majors pay a higher fee than
others, like law and architecture. Some departments can also charge lab
fees – another form of differential fee.
The
Constitution of the State of Idaho prevents some academic areas from
ever charging a professional fee. These are areas of teaching that
were originally in the general areas of arts and sciences when the
university was created by the Territorial Act. All programs that are not
enumerated as arts and sciences by that Territorial Act are considered to
be "professional programs" that can make application, on a
case-by-case basis, to the SBOE/Regents to charge professional fees.
Winstead said that our current professional fee practices are unfair.
Architecture can charge a professional fee – Art cannot. Another issue
to consider is that the university will have professional program students
from different academic areas all sitting in an English literature course
and all paying a different fee to take the same course. So, professional
fees cannot solve the problem, even though the professional fee programs
do work. It is also clear that students can avoid the fee by not declaring
a major until the last possible moment. The solution to this problem
is a differential fee structure based on individual courses, not majors.
Winstead
believes that differential fees may offer a more effective
alternative to the kind of fees that we now have. Having differential
fees for summer and off-campus offerings might let the university enjoy
the same success it has had with the video outreach course offerings. The
idea is that the student will have a choice to pay a higher or lower fee
based on the enrollment in the course, rather than not being able to take
the course at all.
Another
issue he noted in the proposal is that some fees could be lower or
higher for the same course. A course offered at a not so popular time
period could be priced lower than the section offered at the popular time.
Students and faculty alike do not seem to like this idea at all. So it is
unlikely that such a price differential based on offering time would ever
be proposed.
Winstead
said that since these are highly debatable public policy issues they
create lively discussions on the campus. Reasonable people looking at
the same set of evidence, based on differing values and weight given the
evidence, will come to different conclusions about the desirability of any
of the options. Students have opposed, and will continue to oppose most
all types of fee increases. Their solution is to have the legislature
provide more money to higher education, as it did decades ago. A number of
faculty members have serious reservations about how this "test"
of differential mandatory fees might turn out. They are all thoughtful and
perceptive comments about the negative and positive aspects of the various
approaches or scenarios. Winstead said that he does not think that the
U of Idaho administration believes that we can resolve all of these issues
theoretically, that the best technique is to test this approach.
That is the permission that is being sought from the SBOE/Regents.
If differential fees are set, then we want to discover under what
circumstances they are effective. If they are effective and permissible,
then we would like to continue their use. If they prove to be ineffective,
then we would discontinue their use.
Winstead
said that what the U of Idaho is proposing is "permission to
propose" differential fees. The SBOE/Regents retain the power
of approval of all fees. The U of Idaho is not proposing that the board
delegate fee approval to the institutions. If the SBOE/Regents is willing
to entertain differential proposals, then the U of Idaho will encourage
colleges to propose differential fees within any of the existing fee
categories. Differential fee proposals would then be presented to the
administration and that would trigger a broader discussion with the U of
Idaho’s constituent groups on and off-campus. Only after that process
was complete would a specific differential fee proposal be brought to the
SBOE/Regents. He reiterated that the administration sees the differential
fee proposal as a way to inject flexibility into the financial picture.
Winstead
noted that it is difficult to tell how any form of higher fees will
affect accessibility to academic programs. It is clear that, if we do
raise fees, there will have to be an appropriate response in the area of
increasing need-based financial aid to prospective students. We do not
want to drive out needy students and make education unaffordable. He said the
legislature can also play a key role. If they do not want to see fees
increase, then they should see to it that appropriations increase for
higher education – particularly when the state is enjoying a surplus of
funds. The legislature also has the ability to preserve accessibility when
the price of higher education goes up, by providing funding for need-based
financial aid. The legislature, in fact, has the power to either reinforce
the "low fee – low financial aid – high state support" model
or change it through their appropriations.
He
said that a scenario, ten years from now, might be that when a
student entered the U of Idaho, the first two years of core curriculum and
general education courses would be priced relatively low and uniformly.
Then as the student progressed to a particular major, the course fees
would reflect the actual cost of offering the degree program. Obtaining a
degree in engineering would cost more than earning one in the social
sciences. Another scenario might involve the offering of web-based
courses. The particular expertise of a department might lead to
web-courses that generated a considerable amount of income.
Comments/Questions/Answers.
Is this plan consistent with the land-grant
mission of the U of Idaho? This is a public
policy issue where I would say to you that the current level of
state funding is inconsistent with the noblest ideals of a land-grant
university. We are already making trade-offs with these ideals and what is
currently financially viable. We are unhappy with current conditions and
the U of Idaho Strategic Plan provides some good ideas for solving those
problems. The legislature could solve the problem – but absent that, the
university must come up with a solution to enhance the revenue streams to
the U of Idaho. Differential fees provide just one tool that we could
effectively use.
We
don’t seem to have anything tangible – something that we can grab a
hold of – with this proposal! We have been
prevented by the SBOE/Regents from presenting a policy statement. If the
board is willing to entertain differential mandatory fees – if they are
permissible – they will direct their staff to work with the institutions
to propose a tangible policy that contains the framework within which they
will consider differential mandatory fee proposals from the institutions.
Why
won’t expanding our present fee authority be a way to solve the issues?
For instance, why not just use this differential fee for summer courses
and outreach programs – don’t impose it on matriculation fees! If
the SBOE/Regents finds that summer and off-campus fees were permissible
and others were not permissible – then that is what we would do. We are
asking for guidance from the board in each fee category. The board has
restrictions in place that would only allow us to make adjustments in
limited areas. However, the board has the ability to do any number of
things with the fee structure.
Winstead
concluded his presentation by explaining to the
council that the U of Idaho’s Strategic Plan is not set upon the notion
that it cannot work unless the legislature or the regents provide all of
the requested funding. The U of Idaho said in that plan that we were
willing to do what it took to meet the plan’s objectives. Winstead would
recommend to the president that if it comes down to a choice between
access and quality, that we should choose quality. He would recommend
the fee increases necessary to help the university achieve the objectives
that are in its Strategic Plan and to sustain the quality of what we do.
Some
councilors commented that, if Winstead could argue the need for more state
support as eloquently as he has argued the case for differential fees,
that there would be no need to change the fee system. Winstead responded
by reminding the council that on a previous occasion the U of Idaho was
unsuccessful in getting the legislature to use surplus funds to help
higher education and he saw little chance that the sentiment will change
this year. The state of Idaho no longer sees higher education as a
"public" good, worthy of significant state financial support. The
U of Idaho cannot take a "vow of poverty."
Chair
McKeever said that this discussion would continue at a later date,
probably after we know the initial reaction of the SBOE/Regents to this
proposal. She encouraged council members to post comments to the council
web discussion site.
Adjournment.
It was moved and seconded (Foltz, Goble) to adjourn the meeting. By
unanimous voice vote the meeting was adjourned at 5:07 p.m.
Respectfully
submitted,
Peter
A. Haggart
Secretary
of the Faculty Council
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