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Meeting of the Faculty of the Senate,

January 12, 1996


Chair, T.J. Ray, called the Faculty Senate to order at 2:05 p.m., January 12, 1996, in Conner 123.

ANNOUNCEMENTS FROM THE CHAIR: Senator Ray opened the meeting referring to copies of letters from faculty to the Chancellor. Faculty have responded to the Chancellor concerning the needs they feel the university has. Senator Ray suggested that we write the Chancellor about what we would like to see happen at the university. He thought the Chancellor has been forthright and would take them seriously. "If he does not get his information (from us), he will get it from other sources."

Regarding some administrative changes, there is to be a new Director of Marketing to manage the campaign strategy on what we can sell the university on. Dr. Cole of Leisure Management has been selected as Assistant Dean of the Graduate School. Dr. Dean's job is to develop training modules for staff, not faculty.

The Academic Council has met twice. One was brief meeting at which Senator Ray was assured that thesis direction would be taken into account and that release time might be arranged. However, no senators present recalled having had release time (related to thesis direction). There was also a meeting December 20 at which was discussed a nontraditional approach to the PharmD degree.

Senator Ray noted that he has been unsuccessful at gaining admission to the Deans' meeting. "I'm bothered by it. Most Deans will tell you what happened. Still, there is no Faculty senate presence in the discussion."

ANNOUNCEMENTS AND REPORTS BY COMMITTEE CHAIRS:

Search Committees: Regarding the provost search, Senator Hopkins reported that there were about 45 applicants received for consideration in March. There was one internal applicant, and there would be about fifty total. The committee would go through a two stage process, first checking to see, if the candidates met qualifications, second assigning points and ranking. The committee will then give the Chancellor list of 10-12 he can comment on. The committee will then shorten the list and give the Chancellor a list of 3-5 unranked candidates.

Senator Klein indicated there was no report regrading the search for Dean of Student Life.

Referring to accomplishments, Senator Ray noted a significant change in the Committee for the Athletic Department. Up to now, the faculty on the committee were chosen by the Chancellor instead of the faculty. In response to public concerns and the NCAA sanctions, the Chancellor had asked if we could restructure the committee. This was discussed at a December 18 meeting with the attorneys for the university. Technically, the NCAA does not require a faculty committee, but only a faculty liaison. Under a new format, the Chancellor will retain appointment of the faculty liaison, now Max Williams, because the position requires a great deal of knowhow and continuity. The number of faculty on the committee will be increased by two and, the Committee on Committees will pick the faculty members. Senator ray noted that, if the committee is going to be advisory, it needs to know of actions in advance, before questions and controversy are generated.

Committee on General Academic Affairs: Senator Landon reported that he had the Undergraduate Council report on University Studies. The Council suggested UNIV 101 be funded. He noted that Mike Harrington is stepping down for other duties and that the Council had raised the question of the need for a director (for the program). Senator Landon will be getting copies to the committee which will consider possible changes to UNIV 101.

Elections Committee: Senator Komara reported that elections had been held for the Tenure and Promotions Committee and the Tenure and Promotions Appeals Committee.

Senator Ray discussed how we can accelerate the appointments to the standing committees. One suggestion was to make appointments before the end of the academic year for the following year and give new faculty the year off before selecting them for committees. The standing committee lists will also be put onto the web page in the future.

Finance Committee: report by Senators Malone and Smith. The following are a number of points that came out of the presentation.

+ The legislature is concerned about rising costs in education.

+ We see a decline in the percentage of education funds going to salaries, not quite as bad in terms of compensation.

+ Faculty salaries have been declining as a percentage of tuition and the total education budget.

+ The teaching load has been decreasing slightly in the past two years, while there had been an enrollment decrease. The number of faculty has remained fairly stable over the past fifteen years, up until the past two years.

+ Comparing ourselves with the SEC peer group defined by Arthur Anderson as those institutions appropriate for us to emulate, we see that instructor and assistant professor salaries are close, but associate and full professor salaries are below, more so for full.

+ Comparing with a group of institutions that have similar salaries, we see that we are comparing with a better group of institutions than we have in previous years of this comparison. However, we are still not comparing with the group we would want to.

+ In short, it was noted that we do not compare well with the Arthur Anderson group. The question was raised for the Board, "why don't we match in salaries, if you want us to match the quality (of the Arthur Anderson group)?"

+ Some caveats were stressed: the figures are a year old; we have major professional schools such as Law and Pharmacy, and we should compare higher in salaries with universities that do not have them; need to consider a twelve month basis because our summer compensation is worse than many others.

+ When we look at compensation, we are slightly below parity. The question is high much poorer?

+ A salary comparison for continuing faculty shows that a significant gap developed in the latter part of the 1980's. The gap is larger for full professors than for instructors or assistants. Comparing data with those from Southern indicates that they have pursued a different strategy of keeping salaries of continuing faculty up. In percentage change terms, they are ahead of us at two or three levels.

OLD BUSINESS: The Faculty Senate minutes for December were approved.

NEW BUSINESS: Senator Ray: we shall invite the Chancellor for a spring meeting.

Chair T.J. Ray adjourned the meeting at approximately 3:10 p.m.