FACULTY SENATE MEETING MINUTES
OCTOBER 19, 2021 – 3:30-5:00 PM
VIA ZOOM
Attendance: Paulo Araujo, Julie Bannerman, Sheila Black, Serena Blount, Seth Bordner, Ibrahim Cemen, Spyridoula (Litsa) Cheimariou, Kim Colburn, Jeremy Crawford, Alexis Davis Hazell, Susan Dewey, Rona Donahoe, Amanda Epsy-Brown, Brittany Gilmer, Courtney Helfrecht, Kim Lackey, Matthew Lockwood, Nathan Loewen, Christopher Lynn, Lyndell McDonald, Moises Molina, Alessandra Montalbano, Luke Niiler, Shanlin Pan, Regina Range, Rainer Schad, Edith Szanto, Alexandre Tokovinine, Bulent Tosun, Laura Erin Watley, Bo Zhang, Yong Zhang, Tom Baker, Doug Bish, Todd DeZoort, Chapman Greer, Ruth Ann Hall, Matthew Hudnall, BC Kim, Mary Stone, Brian Britt, Cynthia Peacock, Bharat Mehra, Alyx Vesey, Steven Yates, Cecily Collins, Suzanne Henson, Nelle Williams, Andrea Wright, Tracy Hinton, Joy Burnham, Nirmala Erevelles, Michael Lawson, Sara McDaniel, John Petrovic, Stephanie Shelton, Nicole Swoszowski, Jaber Abu-Qahouq, Xiaoyan Hong, Sushma Kotru, Sundar Krishnan, Patrick Kung, Weihua Su, John Van Zee, Jialai Wang, David Taylor, John Latta, Carla Blakey, Barbara “Babs” Davis, Amy Ellis, Yeon Ho Shin, Heather Elliott, Paul Horwitz, Barbara Dahlbach, Russel Peterson, Michael Callihan, Susan Appel, Rebecca Owings, Kim Parker, Leah Cheatham, Amy Traylor, Robert Riter-Parliamentarian, Hank Lazer-TUARA, Brad Porter-PSA.
Absent with Alternate: Tyler Sasser/Matthew Davis, Jennifer Dempsey/Jeff Martin, Jeri Zemke/Michelle Hale.
Absent without alternate: Sriram Aaleti, Dan Joyner.
Press: Laura Braddick-Strategic Communications.
Guests: Andre Denham-GET, Erik Peterson-GET, Harold Selesky, John Vincent, Dale Dickinson, Mark Weaver.
The meeting began with an update from the General Education Taskforce, whose charge was to compile recommendations and acquire feedback from faculty members. Andre Dunham, Erik Peterson, and Chapman Greer made the presentation and answered questions.
The General Education process is in the third stage, which began with developing models. The Faculty Senate ranked those concepts, which were submitted for a feasibility study (Summer 2021), with two models emerging. The General Education Taskforce recommends, as the next step (at a time to be determined in the future), a faculty-wide vote to select the model with which to move forward. One of the recommendations from the Taskforce includes a structured governance policy, including an ongoing review of Gen Ed, along with other assessments for refinement. The Taskforce will be working with stakeholders to craft when the faculty-wide vote will take place and that information will be brought to the Faculty Senate as soon as it is available.
There are some faculty concerns about the reduction of core hours. SACSCOC requires 30 hours in our general education curriculum in three particular areas: Fine Arts & Humanities, Natural Sciences, and Social & Behavior Sciences. We are currently at 53 hours. Both models have 43 semester hours. One of the things discussed was allowing the student to “own” their Gen Ed experience. The faculty-wide vote will be a recommendation on with which model to move forward (it is a model, not a curriculum). There will be feedback and changes made as the process moves along to curriculum development.
Roll call and quorum check by Faculty Senate Secretary, Barb Dahlbach.
The Faculty Senate meeting minutes of September 21, 2021 were approved as corrected.
President’s Report – (Chapman Greer) The campus-wide Fall Assembly will be held on October 27, 2021 at 1:30 P.M. at Bryant Conference Center. Faculty Senate President, Chapman Greer, will report to the assembly that the proposal for parental leave made by the Faculty Senate has been granted. The Faculty Senate will work diligently to have child care available for faculty, staff, and students.
Vice President’s Report – (Matthew Hudnall) Faculty Senate Parliamentarian Robert Riter has composed a set of rules of order to be followed during meetings conducted on zoom. The main observance should be to use the raised hand feature to be recognized to speak. The chat feature will be monitored and relayed when appropriate.
Secretary’s Report – (Barb Dahlbach) No report.
Diversity, Equity & Inclusion – (Lyndell McDonald & Luke Niiler) Information about diversity, equity and inclusion events held this month has been distributed. Registration is required and details are available at diversity.ua.edu.
Proposed legislation concerning CRT continues to be discussed by this committee and the Faculty Senate. Points of discussion included: the rules governing political activity by State employees, academic freedom and freedom of speech, any efforts to quell what faculty members are allowed to teach, fear about loss of jobs, and Faculty Senate speaking out about and taking action on this issue. A motion was made to conduct a survey to assess faculty opinions of agreement or disagreement with the proposed CRT legislation through an anonymous Qualtrics survey. A second was made and the vote of the Steering Committee was 93% in support of conducting this survey, which will include copies of the pre-filed bills. A senator suggested the survey include what impact the passage of these bills would have on the function of the University.
Faculty & Senate Governance – (Jeri Zemke & Ibrahim Cemen) Lance Kinney has agreed to serve as Ombudsperson, replacing Janie Hubbard. Kinney will begin serving immediately.
The Faculty Senate Governance Committee is currently seeking two nominations for current or upcoming openings on the Merger and Discontinuance of Academic Units Committee. The deadline is 5:00 PM on Friday, November 12, 2021.
December commencement will be platform party only, with no need for Marshals.
Academic Affairs – (Rona Donahoe & Babs Davis) The committee has some proposed changes to the Academic Misconduct Policy. The first change concerns the time limit a student has in which to respond to a charge of academic misconduct. If a response is not received within five days, the student will receive a second notice from an academic monitor. After that, if there is no response from the student, the charge will move forward without the involvement of the student. The second issue concerned the possible need of a translator for a student with language difficulties. The University will be responsible for scheduling and providing a translator. The guidelines are not clear concerning who can be a monitor. The committee recommends previous classroom experience be required to serve as a monitor. This revised policy is being presented at this month’s Faculty Senate meeting, with a vote to be taken at the November meeting.
Rona Donahoe, Babs Davis , Dana Patton, and Andre Denham met on September 21, to hear three basic concerns from the Graduate Council. The first item concerned the Graduate Council wanting research faculty who hold terminal degrees to be full or associate members of the Graduate faculty, which would allow them to chair student research committees, namely dissertation committees. The Academic Affairs Committee gave feedback, with some concerns that research faculty may not have familiarity with the academic process itself, since they do not teach, and the same could technically be applied to research faculty.
A concern is that the Graduate Council wishes for the Graduate School to set minimum qualifications for Graduate faculty membership, but wants to allow departments to set other qualifications that must be met for faculty members to qualify as full and associate members of the graduate faculty. Depending on the program, this could cause a problem with unevenness across campus.
Another concern is the renewal of graduate faculty membership. Currently this is done every six years for full and associate members, and every three years for affiliate members. The terms expire either in May or December of each year. Currently, Susan Carvalho and one of her assistants review every single one of the renewals, which is administratively burdensome. The Graduate Council Committee wants to couple graduate faculty status with annual faculty reviews. It would then be placed in the hands of department chairs or deans to determine annually if qualifications for graduate faculty membership have been met. The Academic Affairs Committee sees no problem with this particular matter.
The third item concerns Appendix J of the Faculty Handbook, which stipulates graduate faculty membership. The document is apparently repeated in the Graduate catalog, along with other information that the Graduate School provides for graduate faculty. It is suggested that there be only one working version, which rightly belongs in the Faculty Handbook. The graduate catalog should simply have a link to that appendix, preventing two documents with possible discrepancies between the two. This suggestion was accepted.
Provost Han sent the Academic Affairs Committee a proposed Academic Program Review Council. Previously, this was done only for programs in Arts and Sciences, but is now being expanded to the entire University. All academic departments will go through a program review every eight years, with the process itself taking one year. The Academic Program Review Council will consist of thirty-eight faculty members, with at least two members from each college. An incentive for serving a three-year term on the council will be a $1,500 stipend, with the chair receiving a $3,500 stipend. Pending further comments and feedback, this proposal will be brought to the Faculty Senate in November, for a vote to be held in December.
The Academic Affairs Committee and the Research and Service Committee held a joint meeting with Lesley Reid and Lauren Wilson, who is a legal staff member for the sponsored programs in the Office for Innovation and Commercialization. The purpose of the meeting was to discuss the revisions to the copyright and intellectual policies. The current policies in the Faculty Handbook are not compliant with Federal regulations. This is an issue for certification and auditing, since it could directly affect Federal funding. These revisions will be taken back to each committee. The Office of Sponsored Programs has requested feedback from both committees.
The royalty policy has been discussed. UA would like to have the ability to incentivize faculty and staff innovations, with the ability to give faculty and staff more than the 50% royalty share that is currently stipulated in the existing document. This policy will be reviewed by this committee in upcoming meetings.
Community & Legislative Affairs – (Steven Yates & Joy Burnham) The Community and Legislative Affairs expressed their sincere appreciation to all those contributing to the United Way campaign. A total of $406,720 was donated, with the campaign reaching their goal.
This committee is working on organizing the annual Legislative Reception, with details to come.
The Brewer Porch Teacher Appreciation Day will be held May 5, 2022.
Faculty Life – (Heather Elliott & Ruth Ann Hall) The Faculty Life Committee is working diligently on the childcare issue. A meeting was held with the Dean of CHES and CDRC representatives. The committee has also met with the Dean of the College of Education, receiving good support from that college. The committee is working to set up a meeting with the Dean of Social Work. A childcare proposal will be presented when completed.
Financial Affairs – (Mary Stone & Byung-Cheol Kim) No report.
Research & Service – (Shanlin Pan & Douglas Bish) There will be an open house for the Center for Convergent Bioscience and Medicine on October 27, 2021 from 3:00 until 5:00 P.M. A meeting with Russell Mumper is scheduled. The committee is looking at post-doc policy and software purchases.
IT & Strategic Communications – (Patrick Kung & Nathan Loewen) There has been a change in how Blackboard is hosted, which has resulted in updates being done without shutdowns.
A pilot is ongoing in the College of Engineering, with hopes of rolling out next summer, to ease access to buildings and classrooms, particularly for those running labs.
The committee is working with a Faculty Senate subcommittee on the rollout of a new MyBama site, which will be piloted in the Spring of 2022 and given to the full faculty in the Fall of 2022.
A new app for DUO might be forthcoming. The PCard shift is an issue assigned to this committee by President Greer.
Student Life – (Jennifer Dempsey & Amy Traylor) The Student Life Committee met with Alabama REACH to determine the needed support. There were 21 students enrolled in the program last summer, giving a total of 45 participants. Applications are still coming in. Amy will send out an updated wish list. The program is considering organizing an ambassador program.
The co-chairs met with Dr. Myron Pope to discuss proper signage on campus. An emphasis will be made on the Capstone Creed to reiterate behavioral expectations for students.
There will be a student-led campaign for sexual assault incidents on campus.
The web site for housing reservations crashed on the first day, indicating high enrollment for the fall.
There will be a mental health town hall meeting on November 10, 2021 at 4:00 P.M. If interested, registration is required.
Other committee reports —-
Approval has been given to move compliance training to the fall.
Faculty & Staff Benefits – UA will send an email stating that all faculty and staff that are full-time will receive paid parental leave. Human Resources is writing the policy and this policy should be in place by January 2022.
The educational benefit of fifty percent tuition granted to dependents of faculty/staff and retired faculty/staff currently states the benefit ends at the end of the semester if the employee’s death should occur. The policy is being reviewed to extend to any enrolled dependent student in a degree-granting program the ability to continue to receive those benefits until they receive their degrees. The revised policy would apply to current faculty and staff members, as well as to retired faculty and staff. This applies to dependent graduate student tuition benefits as well.
A newsletter sent out by Human Resources on October 6 contains a two-part seminar for employees who are within five years of Teacher Retirement System eligibility.
Open enrollment ends on October 30th. If there are no changes, no action is required.
Next meeting November 16, 2021 at 3:30-5:00 P.M. in NL #1018.
Meeting adjourned 5:00 P.M.