The Faculty Senate met April 6 in Chao Auditorium, with Chair Pamela Feldhoff presiding.
Action Item: Senators approved minutes from the March 2, 2016 meeting.
Staff Senate Report – Ginger Brown: a new director of the Shared Services Center has been announced. Melissa Long Shuter will be leading this effort. The Community Day of Service plans were announced.
SGA Report – Alexander Stewart: provided a report on the Student Government Association meeting.
Students discussed the university’s culture of diversity, new foodservice contract with Aramark and the confidence/no-confidence vote on the Board of Trustees agenda for President James Ramsey. Students continue to discuss/poll this issue.
The Faculty Senate Redbook Committee held a second reading of the CEHD revised personnel documents and postponed a vote until the May meeting. The second reading of the revised Sabbatical Leave Policy, which includes clarified language on when a tenured-track or tenured faculty member may apply for sabbatical, was approved.
Professor Enid Trucios-Haynes gave the Faculty Grievance Officer Annual report and indicated that, although there were fewer consultations in 2015, some were lengthy. Therefore, the number of consultations doesn’t accurately reflect the amount of time spent on the process. More information is available in the 2015 Annual Faculty Grievance Report.
Responding to a request from Chair Pamela Feldhoff, senators announced results of their polls of constituents as to how Dr. Feldhoff should vote on the confidence/no-confidence issue at the Board of Trustees meeting.
Senators also discussed the possibility of having the Senate as a body take a position on the confidence/no-confidence issue. It was agreed that the 66 faculty senators themselves would be polled anonymously.
To conclude the meeting, reports were read by the Faculty Senate Standing Committees. The FS Academic Programs Committee, stated that the Interdisciplinary B.A. in Sustainability “is coming along” and APC is awaiting input from the FS Planning & Budget Committee. The FS Part-time Faculty Committee announced that there is a vacancy for a part-time faculty senator.
The next Faculty Senate meeting is May 4 from 3-5 p.m. in the Chao Auditorium of Ekstrom Library.
