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• Attendance
• Provost Whitmore on government relations
• Collegiate standards for tenured faculty review
• Motion to revise eligibility criteria for Executive Committee

Minutes of the College of Liberal Arts & Sciences Faculty Assembly

Attending: Abbas, Adrain, Amert, Anderson, Bonacina, Broffitt, Buss, Darling, Dominguez, Ehrstine, Fethke, Fielding, Freeman, Gibson, Gidal, Gross, Guentner, Hatasa, Kleiber, Kuntz, Lara-Braud, Larsen, Latham, Lewis, Marvin, Maynard, Miller, Niño-Murcia, Oden, Peters, Polumbaum, Randell, Redlawsk, Silliman, Solow, Ton-That, Trachsel, Troyer, Young

Excused absence: Boggess, Franklin, Hanley, Hesli, Leddy, Lutgendorf, Norbeck, Pietrzyk, Plapp, Reno, Schwalm, Slatton, Snider

Absent: Arnone, Arthur, Beckman, Borreca, Creekmur, Farrell, Fitch, Gölz, Heard, Heilenman, Helms, Hendrix, Hochstrasser, Honey, Jones, Lafky, Lang, Méndez Rodenas, Mills, J. Nelson, Rigal, Robertson, Schnell, Spiess, Squire, Thompson, Tomasini, Vlastos, Whitmore, Wilcox, Woodard

Visitors: Fred Antczak, Associate Dean; Amitava Bhattacharjee, Physics & Astronomy, Faculty Senate; Helena Dettmer, Classics, Executive Committee; Linda Maxson, Dean; Mike O'Hara, Associate Dean; Jon Whitmore, Provost

Vice Chair John Solow (Economics) presided over the meeting in Chair Vicki Hesli's absence.

1. The minutes of the Faculty Assembly meeting of December 12, 2001 were approved with corrections to the attendance record.

2. Provost Jon Whitmore on government relations. Provost Whitmore said there was good news for the University in Governor Vilsack's recent budget recommendation. First, the governor recommended that the base budget under which the University is currently operating be next year's base budget, without further reductions. Second, he recommended full funding of salary increases for faculty and staff. Other requests for additional funding were not included, however, such as additional funds for the College of Public Health and for instructional improvements (primarily library acquisitions and instructional equipment). Whitmore said this was not unexpected in the current fiscal climate.

Whitmore said there was more good news in the governor's capital budget recommendation (a separate budget for building construction and renovation). The governor recommended funding for phase II of the Biological Sciences building plan, a new building for Art & Art History, as well as a new building for Journalism & Mass Communication, which would include general classroom space.

The state's Revenue Estimating Conference would convene in March, Whitmore said, and at that time there would be more news on the budget front. The worst case scenario would be another round of current-year cuts, and the best case would involve funding increases for next fiscal year.

Dean Fred Antczak asked whether the increase in tuition and fees approved by the Regents had had any effect on the legislature's support for educational funding. Whitmore replied that it was too early in the legislative session to tell, but that there had been no negative reaction from any individual legislators to this point. He said further that the 19.5% increase sounded significant, but that Iowa's tuition was so low to begin with that the dollar amounts were well under $700 per student for the academic year, which included increased computer fees.

With respect to government relations in general, Whitmore said that the University has a full-time lobbyist, Mark Braun, who is based in Des Moines when the legislature is in session. Faculty contact with the legislature and other government officials is coordinated through the Faculty Senate's Governmental Relations Committee. Amitava Bhattacharjee (Physics & Astronomy), president of the Faculty Senate, said that several faculty members would soon meet with members of the appropriations committee. During this meeting, Donald Gurnett of Physics & Astronomy and Kate Gfeller of Music would each give presentations on their work. Bhattacharjee said that the Faculty Senate periodically sent out calls for participants in these kinds of visits, and he encouraged anyone who was interested in becoming more involved to contact the Senate.

Whitmore reminded the Assembly that individual faculty members are welcome to contact government officials as private citizens of the state. However, if they do so, they must not use University email or University letterhead.

3. Collegiate standards for tenured faculty review. Vice Chair Solow turned to the Executive Committee's motion to approve the new collegiate standards for tenured faculty review, which were revised last semester. Member Roberta Marvin (Music) moved to amend the language in two places (deletions are struck through and additions boldfaced):

Under the heading TEACHING, the first sentence would be changed: "The departmental standards must include the expectation that faculty will regularly revise update existing courses, develop new courses as appropriate, and teach to appropriately sized classes, with evaluations of classroom teaching that meet departmental expectations."

Under the heading SCHOLARLY AND CREATIVE WORK, the third sentence would be changed: "Departmental standards must specify the department's expectations for the regularity with which ongoing scholarly/creative work is to be published, presented, performed, and otherwise disseminated."

The motion was seconded. A member asked what the rationale for the proposed change was, and Marvin replied that her unit felt that there should not be an onus to thoroughly revise courses or develop new ones unless there was a need for them. With respect to scholarly and creative work, she said it would be difficult to define what "regular" was, since the faculty in her unit engaged in such a wide variety of work. The word "regularity" might imply the need to define a pace for publication or performance which could not be applied fairly across the unit. Member Virginia Dominguez (Anthropology), who is also a member of the Executive Committee, said that she considered the proposed amendments to be friendly and entirely within the spirit of the EC's intent, which was to allow departments to set their own standards. The amendments were approved on a voice vote.

Member Richard Randell (Mathematics) asked what the meaning of "increasing" was in the following sentence under the SERVICE heading: "Departmental standard must include the expectation of increasing leadership and service to the department, the institution, and the profession consistent with each tenured faculty rank." He was concerned that faculty who took on major service responsibilities would be asked to do more all the time in order to meet and "increasing" standard. He made a motion to strike "increasing" from document.

Dominguez and Helena Dettmer (Classics), another member of the Executive Committee, said there had been a long discussion in the EC about this language, and that the committee had decided it was important for faculty to be expected to take on more responsibility for leadership and service at higher ranks. Dean Linda Maxson said that it was reasonable to expect a maturing of roles for faculty, with increasing expectations for increasing ranks. Solow commented that faculty who take on major service obligations as associate professors would be performing above expectations and that they would not necessarily be expected to do more as full professors to meet an increasing standard. Randell withdrew the motion for amendment.

The standards were approved, as amended, on a voice vote.

4. Motion to revise eligibility criteria for the Executive Committee. The Executive Committee submitted a proposal to amend the College's Manual of Procedure to allow only those faculty with a 50% or more appointment on the College's budget to serve on the Executive Committee. Dettmer spoke for the Executive Committee, saying that the rationale for this change was that nearly all Executive Committee agenda items touch on personnel issues, budget issues, or strategic planning issues in the College, and that only faculty with appointments in units the College administers should take part in such discussions and decision-making.

Member Jerry Maynard (Exercise Science) observed that the amendment would be subject to a vote by the entire faculty and urged the Assembly to give the faculty an opportunity to vote on the matter.

Solow noted that the Manual of Procedure charged the Faculty Assembly with determining which amendments would be put to a vote by the full faculty, and he encouraged discussion of the amendment. He argued against it, saying that if the EC was an advisory committee and not a policy-making body, it should not exclude faculty from giving advice. Furthermore, he said, it did not make sense to single out the EC, because the Educational Policy Committee and Faculty Assembly also have an impact on strategic planning and budgeting. He noted that Economics was the ninth largest major in the College, and he said to exclude Economics faculty from advising the dean when they took such a large part in the the life of the College seemed odd and wrong.

Another member asked why the EC was singled out for this restriction. Dettmer replied that the EC dealt with more sensitive issues. Maxson elaborated that the EC discussed and acted on highly confidential budgetary and personnel issues, and that it became awkward when people who had no budgetary stake in the College took part in these deliberations. The EPC and Faculty Assembly did not deal with such confidential issues, but did act on academic issues, and so it was appropriate for faculty with an academic stake to participate even if they had no budgetary stake. She noted that no other college allowed faculty who were not on its budget to participate in executive decisions.

Member Carol Fethke (Economics) asked who would be excluded under the proposed amendment. Maxson responded that the amendment would exclude faculty in Economics, Education, Microbiology, and Biochemistry, unless they had a 50% appointment in another unit administered by the College. Fethke commented that other colleges do not exclude their faculty because they hold an appointment in another college.

Maynard said that he had a partial appointment in the College of Medicine, but that he would not be allowed to serve on its executive committee and he saw nothing wrong with that. He said he should not have a say in the executive decisions of the College of Medicine since the majority of his appointment was in CLAS.

Member Tuong Ton-That (Mathematics) called for a quorum, and a count of members showed that fewer than 42 were present.

5. Adjournment. Lacking a quorum, the meeting adjourned without conducting any further business.

Respectfully submitted,
James Broffitt
Secretary pro tem