Minutes of the
Second Regular Meeting of the Twenty-Fifth Senate
October 17, 2005
12:00 P.M., Kettler G46
Agenda
1. Call to order
2. Approval of the minutes of September 12, 2005
3. Acceptance of the agenda – J. Grant
4. Reports of the Speakers of the Faculties
a.
b.
5. Report of the Presiding Officer – G. Bullion
6. Special business of the day – Memorial Resolution (Senate Reference No. 05-3) – S. Harroff
7. Committee reports requiring action
Executive Committee (Senate
8. Question Time (Senate Reference No. 05-4)
9. New business
Student Affairs Committee (SD 05-3) – P. Goodmann
10. Committee reports “for information only”
11. The general good and welfare of the University
Chancellor’s Remarks – M. Wartell
12. Adjournment*
*The meeting will adjourn or recess by 1:15 p.m.
Presiding Officer: G. Bullion
Parliamentarian: D. Turnipseed
Sergeant-at-Arms: G. Steffen
Secretary: J. Petersen
Senate Members Present:
B. Abbott, A. Argast, R. Bean, S. Blythe, J. Burg, C. Champion, M. Codispoti, S. Davis,
P. Dragnev, D. Erbach, C. Erickson, B. Fife, R. Friedman, P. Goodmann, J. Grant, T. Grove,
P. Hamburger, S. Hannah, C. Hill, P. Iadicola, A. Karim, D. Lindquist M. Lipman,
L. Meyer, M. Montesino, G. Moss, G. Mourad, D. Mueller, A. Mustafa, E. Neal,
D. Oberstar, E. Ohlander, D. Ross, H. Samavati, G. Schmelzle, J. Tankel, S. Tannous,
J. Toole, G. Voland, M. Walsh, L. Wark, M. Wartell, N. Younis, J. Zhao
Senate Members Absent:
W. Branson, J. Brennan, L. Fox, D. Goodman, L. Kuznar, Z. Liang, L. Lin,
R.
______________________________________________________________________________
Attachments:
“Conference Affiliations for Soccer Teams” (SD 05-3)
“IPEDS Data Feedback Report 2005” (Attachment A)
“Call for Action Reports to the Senate” (Attachment B)
Faculty Members Present: J. Clausen, S. Harroff, S. Sarratore
Visitors Present: P. McLaughlin, K. Stockman (Journal Gazette)
Acta
1. Call to order: G. Bullion called the meeting to order at 12:01.
2. Approval of the minutes of September 12, 2005: The minutes were approved as distributed.
3. Acceptance of the agenda:
J. Grant moved to approve the agenda as distributed.
The agenda was approved as distributed.
4. Reports of the Speakers of the Faculties:
a.
B. Fife: I would like to
report that there is an ongoing discussion about the salary and bonus policies
between the Purdue speaker, the presiding officer, the chancellor, the vice
chancellor for academic affairs and me. These are paramount issues at
IPFW, and I am optimistic that more substantive progress will be made,
particularly with salaries, in the short term. This really needs to
happen soon, and I believe that there is consensus on this point. Our
standing relative to the other public institutions of higher education in
b.
N. Younis: Good afternoon. I would like to bring to your attention three topics: 1) my report to the Board of Trustees, 2) to recognize the fact that faculty have been willing and forthcoming with concerns about this university and, finally 3) I would like to suggest a standard be held for both deans and faculty.
First, my report to the Board of Trustees on September 23 can be found on the Senate webpage. I have consulted with my colleagues from the Purdue University Committee on Institutional Affairs about the topics in the report.
Second, I would like to thank all the faculty who have written to me with their concerns. Some of them have been suggestions for enhancements of the university, others voicing their concerns of important matters to the university as well as shared governance. Please visit the Senate webpage for the minutes of the Faculty Affairs Committee meetings to find the status of some of these issues. I would like to take this opportunity to encourage all faculty to visit the Senate webpage for valuable information. I think Jacqui is doing a terrific job keeping it updated.
Finally, I will try to argue the use of the same standard for faculty and deans. Faculty balance the rigors of teaching, research, and service with the appropriate amount of enthusiasm and dedication given to each of these endeavors. At the end of each year, the faculty are required to submit an annual report that summarizes their accomplishments.
Some faculty have informed me that they have received zero merit raises because they did not submit their annual report. One can argue a penalty for the faculty who do not submit a report, but it is beyond the scope of my discussion at this time. However, it suggests that submitting a report is very important.
My fellow senators, today is October 17, 2005, and many faculty informed me that they have not received the feedback from their deans regarding performance appraisals for the year 2004. In my opinion, this is very problematic for the following two main reasons:
1. There is no documentation to show that the extra merit awards were based on accomplishments, these decisions were made before July. Many faculty have not received the evaluations from their deans yet.
2. Many faculty need this feedback to gauge their performance; for example, for their promotion.
As I mentioned, we expect the faculty to submit an annual report in a timely manner. Indeed, some faculty got zero raises because they did not submit their report for the year 2004. I think the deans should be held accountable for timely feedback of the faculty’s annual faculty report. Therefore, I would like to ask the Chief Academic Officer to apply the same standard to the deans.
Thank you.
5. Report of the Presiding Officer – G. Bullion: There was no report.
6. Special business of the day – Memorial Resolution (Senate Reference No. 05-3) – S. Harroff:
S. Harroff read the memorial resolution for Werner Manheim. A moment of silence was observed.
7. Committee reports requiring action:
Executive Committee (Senate
J. Grant moved to approve SD 05-2 (Approval of replacement members of the Graduate Subcommittee, the Honors Program Council, and the Library Subcommittee). Seconded.
Motion to approve SD 05-2 passed on a voice vote.
8. Question Time:
The circulating draft of “Examples for Documenting and Evaluating Faculty Research, Scholarship, and Creative Endeavor” lists campus-wide rubrics, presented as a series of juxtapositions, for identifying “excellent” versus “satisfactory” accomplishments. It is for example, “satisfactory” to receive an award that does not allow facilities and administration costs, and “excellent” if overhead is
part of the grant. It is “satisfactory” to publish in a peer reviewed professional journal, but “excellent” if the same scholarly work is invited to be published. It is, of course, necessary to achieve “excellence” to be promoted to the rank of full professor at IPFW based on excellence in scholarship or creative endeavor.
Questions: Does the administration believe that faculty at IPFW, a mature
educational institution, should be promoted to the rank of full professor at
roughly the same rate as colleagues at other institutions in the IU and Purdue
systems? Should the types of scholarly accomplishments needed for
promotion at IPFW be similar to those at IUB and PUWL? If the types are
not identical, can you explain some ways the document in question draws
distinctions between campuses with different missions, opportunities and
limitations? How does the document in question assist IPFW faculty in achieving
promotion?
Anne Argast, Geosciences
S. Hannah:
$ Purpose of Document
$ To serve as a resource to departments as they review, revise, update when needed their Promotion and Tenure criteria for competence and excellence in research and creative activity within the framework laid out in SD 88-25 and SD 94-3.
$ Project was prompted by discussions with probationary tenure-track faculty and associate professor ranked faculty and then a department-by-department review of Promotion and Tenure documents which revealed that not all departments have such rubrics. Some certainly do B Psychology, for example is a model B others, however do not.
$ The goal is to provide guidance for probationary tenure-track faculty for Promotion and Tenure and for associate professors intending to work toward promotion to professor by providing key concepts that might be used by a department in developing their own rubrics.
$ Status of Document
$ Circulating on campus. Hopefully every department will discuss.
$ FAC is currently discussing.
$ Many excellent recommendations coming in. ... One key criticism is that the examples of competent vs. excellent were not, in some cases, useful and indeed were counterproductive because of important disciplinary differences.
$ History=s example of regional vs. national journal a good example.
$ The plan is to collect all such comments and revise the document, in some cases quite significantly, in response. Most likely, we will send it out again if necessary to be sure that we got it right. No rush on this important topic. The document will not serve its purpose if it does not ring true. Fortunately, both the teaching and the service resource documents which were developed for the same purpose, thanks to the good recommendations and conversations they engendered, did in the end have that effect and my hope is that the Research document will as well. Excellent and healthy discussion for us all and I appreciate the seriousness and thoughtfulness of the responses.
$ Question about IUB and Purdue WL comparisons
$
Up to campus and department to decide. Both
$ documents lay out a general framework within which departments are to set standards appropriate to their discipline and mission.
$ Although it is theoretically possible within this framework for departments to end up with standards similar to Indiana University Bloomington and Purdue West Lafayette, they generally have not. The differences are often in terms of number and focus; e.g. amount and source of external funding for basic research, as mission appropriate. While I do not have a working knowledge of departmental standards at either of our parent institutions, I do know that external reviewers from those campuses often comment that our standards are different and are appropriate to our mission.
$ Bottom line, thank you for the comments and questions, and I am happy to participate with any group or department that would like to continue the conversation.
P. Iadicola: I am just a bit confused about how this process of tenure and promotion occurs. It seems to me the criteria that are established by departments are the most specific criteria. The criteria that are developed by departments are also developed in line with other Senate documents, as well as their university – Indiana or Purdue. This document, that is now circulating, is circulating because of a perception on the central administration’s part that some departments are not providing the correct guidance because faculty are coming to you and basically saying that. It is also an issue of maturity in that some departments are maybe immature in terms of the standards. I am curious, if departments had standards that were not appropriate, if there is some kind of feedback along the lines, from a dean, from a vice chancellor of academic affairs, or from a chancellor who would basically tell that department that their standards are not specific enough. Certainly, I would not want to have candidates developing a case for tenure or promotion in my department developing it in terms of standards that were not viewed as being appropriate. Instead, is seems we are sending out a document which everyone can look at, for everyone to consider and weigh their own documents; and for many of us, this may be a waste of time and effort. Would it not have been more efficient to have those departments, which have perceived inadequacies, to receive this document and say specifically, “You may want to look at that document in light of your particular stance and document.”? Many departments seem to have gotten in some sort of uproar about this document coming down and passing judgment about their expectations – in most cases, probably erroneously. But it seems like it unnecessarily ruffled feathers when we could have been more strategic in terms of making these types of recommendations.
S. Hannah: It has been interesting to me, too, since we have gone through this exercise with teaching and with service: very same purpose, very same goals. People have looked at the document as a resource document, have used parts of it that looked interesting to them, and ignored the parts that were not. Some departments have adopted pieces of it as it was useful to them. It was meant as a resource, as a set of things that might help you. It seemed to ring true to people and seemed to have been helpful. That was the sole intention here behind this, not to substitute anybody’s standards, but to be used by departments as a guide. Some departments do not even have a statement. It can be very dangerous for the faculty member and for the department to be operating in that way. Some departments do not have any standards as to what is excellent. This document provides some guidance and, if the department feels it has already covered that base, they may not need it further. The same goes with the research document. Departments may look at it and find some useful ideas, but maybe some of it does not apply. So it was an attempt to provide a resource for departments. I cannot force a department to fix their documents. I went through the entire campus and made a list of what people say is “excellent”
and what people say is “competent.” There are an awful lot of blanks. In fact, through the deans, we called attention to the departments that perhaps could use a little guidance here, and this document was meant to provide that guidance. If the department feels they have done that satisfactorily, they might look at this and say, “We passed.” Others might find it useful to think about. That is the sole purpose of it. I have not found, in the teaching or in the service document, that it has in any way been used as a substitute. It is not ever referred to in anybody’s promotion and tenure case. It is a resource for the department to use, or not, as they see fit.
A. Argast: I appreciate your responses to my questions. I actually have two questions: one stemming from what you have been discussing, and one that I do not think got answered. In your opinion, should the rate of people approaching full professor here be roughly equivalent of what it is at Purdue West Lafayette and Indiana University Bloomington? If they have 40 percent full professors on staff, do you think it is appropriate that we might aspire to that as a goal at IPFW?
S. Hannah: I have no idea what the magic number is. If you look across the country, in general the research one universities have higher proportions than teaching institutions. So, I would generally suspect not. I do not know what our number should be. The last time we looked at this, when we got started on the strategic plan in 2001, our percentage of full professors was about half of our peers’. That did not seem to ring true. We spent a lot of time talking about why. So my office kind of went on a campaign to encourage a lot of extremely capable people on this campus, who should have gotten themselves promoted, to get promoted. We keep retiring them faster than we are making them, so I am not sure we are making as much progress as I might have hoped. I do not even know what the standard is or the percentage, but I know that looking across the country, by and large, the percentage follows mission.
A. Argast: That helps. It would seem like if we are substantially below our peer institutions in promotion rates to full professor, one needs to do some inward searching to the way departments, school, and campus committees and administrators act in approving or disapproving promotion cases. One might come to the conclusion that we apply an inappropriate set of criteria for promotion cases to full professor. That is why I bring that up in this context: we are discussing criteria here. Maybe we, as an institution, apply an inappropriate set of criteria that holds professors back from being promoted at an appropriate rate. Now, along that line, and this comes off of what you have said, my fear is this: a department has a promotion document that has been well thought out, denoting things as being excellent or satisfactory and so on. I can just imagine this process at the school or campus committee: a committee member pulling out this university document and saying, “Well, this document says that so and so is excellent, and they only did this, but their department calls it excellent.” One can imagine that kind of application of personal opinion at school and campus committees that override department-level decisions. We say, right in our documents, that the majority of the evaluation process should happen at the local level. But there seems to be enough anecdotal evidence that an awful lot of evaluation goes on at school and campus levels that sort of countermand the local decisions. And one would wonder if this document just becomes another tool to be used for people making decisions that run counter to what departments have made.
S. Hannah: After eight years, you can imagine anything about department promotion and tenure decisions. The campus committee has occasionally looked at department criteria and department decisions and have not been able to make them match. If someone were to pull out this document at a campus meeting, I would call that person out of order. I cannot vote in that meeting, but I can call people out of order. This document has no jurisdiction, validity, or
authority. You could not base a grievance on it, you could not base a lawsuit on it, nor could you base an appeal on it because it has no standing.
A. Argast: So you see the document as one helping departments write their documents.
S. Hannah: It is a resource and has no authority. It is an OAA memorandum, so it can change, it is dynamic. Just in my eight years, how many times have we redone the Brown Document, which doesn’t have any standing, either?
C. Erickson: I am glad to hear you say that this document will not be used in tenure and promotion cases, and that gives us some kind of assurances. The History Department has come out squarely against this kind of document, and not just that it needs revising or tweaking or whatever, but this document is not as helpful as the other two documents that you put out: the service one and the teaching one. Those are non-discipline specific for the most part. I would suggest that research and publication and giving conference papers are much more discipline-specific and, as such, they are going to vary greatly between the departments and within disciplines themselves. Political science, for example – not so much history – are divided along quantitative folks and more humanities-ended folks. There are just so many differences among departments that I fear that this document will serve as some sort of one-size-fits-all model. I would hope that the administration would not try to fit the departments in that category.
S. Hannah: Absolutely not. The Senate documents look for some core concepts; for example, full professor: nationally recognized by peers or authorities in the field. Now, that is one size fits all, but it fits music and history and engineering, and biology. That is the level that we are looking at. We are looking for those kinds of commonalities, and we will keep looking at it until we can get it right. And in the first round we clearly did not get it right. So we will keep at it. There has been enough feedback to me, however, particularly from junior faculty who very much want such a document. For whatever reason, they do not feel they have that guidance, either in the interpretation or the actual words in their own department documents, so they are asking for it, and all I am doing is asking you to help us keep at it. I am not in any hurry. It may take a couple of years until we get something that rings true. And I think that the criticisms that the History Department made were extremely well taken and right on.
9. New business:
Student Affairs Committee (Senate
P. Goodmann moved to approve SD 05-3 (Conference Affiliation for Soccer Teams). Seconded.
A. Argast moved to amend SD 05-3 as follows :
“WHEREAS, conference affiliation of all IPFW athletic teams is the most an
important goal of IPFW athletics; and”
Seconded.
Motion to approve the amendment to SD 05-3 passed on a voice vote.
Motion to approve SD 05-3, as amended, passed on a voice vote.
10. Committee reports “for information only”: There were no reports.
11. The general good and welfare of the University:
N. Younis: Just going back to the research document, I have received several concerns and points, and I shared all that with the Faculty Affairs Committee. Pretty much I agree with the overwhelming majority of the concerns and the points. Respectfully, however, I disagree with one of them which is not to have this document at this time. The reason I am saying this is because we already accepted one as guidelines for teaching and another one for service. If we do not have one for research now, it seems to me there will be a vacuum there because we are talking about teaching, about service, yet there is a vacuum for research. You were very patient with us in the past with the Faculty Affairs Committee, with the teaching and service. We are working on it now, and we started a discussion in the Faculty Affairs Committee last meeting. We are going to continue on Friday, I think, until we polish it. Remember, this is a draft.
J. Tankel: I just want to remind people, with regard to the Educational Policy Committee-sponsored project on revising goals and objectives, that we are taking comments on the draft document, and those need to be to the Educational Policy Committee by November 1. So, we are getting close to that deadline.
P. Hamburger: I did not have a chance to ask this question from the Speaker’s remarks regarding the request for feedback from the deans. I am a little bit confused here. In mathematics, we received feedback from the chair, but I have not received any feedback from the dean. Who is supposed to give you the feedback, the chair or the dean, or is it different in different schools?
N. Younis: According to university documents, that has to be coming from both the chairs and the deans. For example, the OAA memorandum titled: “Authority and Responsibilities of the Academic Dean” states that the dean is “to provide written evaluations of faculty and staff in keeping with campus policies/procedures.”
M. Wartell: The latest
Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System report just came out. This
is the feedback report that specifically talks to IPFW and gives a comparison
group of universities that the
12. The meeting adjourned at 1:15 p.m.
Jacqueline J. Petersen
Secretary of the Faculty