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Minutes of the College of Liberal Arts & Sciences Faculty Assembly

Attending: Adrain, Amert, Birrell, Borreca, Brown, Cowles, Creekmur, Darling, Dominguez, Ehrstine, Fethke, Freeman, Gross, Guentner, Hatasa, Hesli, Honey, Jones, Lara-Braud, Lovaglia, Marra, Michaels, G. Nelson, J. Nelson, Niño-Murcia, Pavlik, Plumert, Randell, Redlawsk, Ringen, Schabilion, Slabakova, Slatton, Strohmer, Thompson, Trevor, Waters, Whitmore, Woodard

Excused absence: Balderston, Geng, Joselson, Larsen, Latham, Leddy, Plapp

Absent: Altman, Aprile, Arthur, Boggess, Buss, Christen, Fielding, Finnegan, Fitch, Frankel, Franklin, Gibson, Gölz, Kim, Kleiber, Lewis, Lutgendorf, F. Nelson, Parratt, Payne, Pienta, Robertson, Schope, Schwalm, Silliman, Snider, Squire, Stroyan, Tomasini, Trachsel, Troyer, Ungar, Vélez, Vlastos, Wilcox, Zebrowski

Visitors: Fred Antczak, Associate Dean; JoAnn Castagna, CLAS Administration; Raúl Curto, Executive Associate Dean; Steve Hoch, Associate Provost for Academic Programs; Linda Maxson, Dean; Jerry Maynard, Exercise Science

1. The minutes of the Faculty Assembly meeting of September 18, 2002 were approved with corrections.

2. College procedures for reviews of the dean. Steve Hoch, associate provost for academic programs, addressed the Assembly regarding procedures for decanal reviews. He explained that all deans are appointed for five-year renewable terms, so a review is generally done in the fifth year of appointment. A dean may be reviewed in conjunction with his or her college, but does not have to be. Because colleges are reviewed every seven years (a Regents rule), collegiate and decanal reviews do not coincide often.

Hoch said that the University's Operations Manual allows colleges to establish their own rules regarding decanal reviews, but only the College of Liberal Arts & Sciences has done so. He said that in the late 1990s, the College had amended its Manual of Procedure to stipulate that the review committee for the dean would consist of faculty from outside the College. He said that the review committees for deans of the other UI colleges usually consist of three faculty from within the college, one faculty member from outside the college, and one staff member. In order to comply with the Manual of Procedure, Hoch said, he chose faculty members for the committee whose appointments were outside the College, but who had a range of perspectives that could be analogous to the range of disciplines within the College. Though he felt that the perspectives of the natural sciences, social sciences, and humanities had been fairly well represented, he said that it was impossible to find faculty from outside the College who were in a field analogous to the fine and performing arts.

Hoch reported that the review committee set up 16 to 20 hours of meetings to interview staff who worked with the dean. The committee also interviewed a sample of DEOs that had a representative balance in terms of disciplines, gender, and department size. He said that David Nelson, director of the Division of Performing Arts, was included in these interviews to ensure that the views of the arts units were represented in the review.

Hoch noted that the Manual of Procedure defined the College's faculty to include the faculty of the College of Education and faculty in departments outside CLAS that offer a major for which a degree is granted in CLAS. He suggested that the College might wish to define the faculty more narrowly in reference to faculty reviews. The Operations Manual calls for a questionnaire to be sent to college faculty, and Hoch reported that he decided to send this questionnaire only to faculty in departments within CLAS. Of the 642 faculty who received the questionnaire, 45 percent responded, a rate identical to that of other colleges whose deans have been reviewed recently. He noted that the College, if it wished, could specify that certain questions be asked on the questionnaire.

Hoch emphasized that the College, if it wishes to change its rules governing decanal reviews, does not need to act quickly, since another review of a dean will not take place for at least five years. He recommended that the Assembly look at the reasons the College decided to establish the current rule and then determine how it wants to proceed. He said that the Operations Manual was in the process of being revised, and he recommended waiting to see what revisions were made before creating rules that the Operations Manual revisions might obviate. He also suggested that the Assembly give some thought to how review procedures might affect the recruitment of future deans.

Member Vicki Hesli (Political Science) noted that revisions to the Operations Manual are sometimes driven by college procedures, giving the example of the joint appointment procedures adopted last year. She said that if the College took the initiative, it could become a model for University procedures. Hoch replied that he did not believe decanal reviews presented the same situation as joint appointments, and that revising College review procedures before the Operations Manual was revised might end up being a waste of time.

A member asked whether Hoch believed that reviews of the dean could be more effective in the future if the College rules were changed. Hoch replied that the current rules made it more difficult to form an effective review committee, but that it had not proven impossible, emphasizing that he felt that last year's review of the dean had been successful and fair. He did note, however, that faculty external to the College required more orientation to the College's mission, policies, and procedures. Associate Dean Fred Antczak concurred with Hoch on this point, saying that when the associate deans were interviewed by the review committee it was difficult to explain to the members what it was like to deal with a faculty of the size and breadth of the College's, noting that the College's funding and admissions policies were very different from other University programs.

Member Virginia Dominguez (Anthropology) asked whether evaluators from outside the University might be considered for decanal reviews. Hoch replied that it was not customary, and was possibly in violation of Regents rules, to use external evaluators in University personnel reviews.

Member John Nelson (Political Science) moved to request that the Executive Committee propose new Collegiate rules for decanal reviews. The motion was seconded.

Another member suggested that the EC was not representative enough of the faculty to undertake the task. Nelson countered that as an elected body, the EC was as representative a group of faculty as could be formed for this purpose, even though its membership now excluded faculty who were not on the College's budget. He also noted, as did other members, that the Assembly would have the opportunity to review and alter any proposals the EC made.

Chair Doug Jones (Computer Science) called for a vote and the motion passed on a voice vote with some opposition.

3. Proposed major in athletic training. Jerry Maynard, DEO of the Department of Exercise Science, presented the proposal for a new major in athletic training to the Assembly. He said that athletic training was currently a track within the exercise science major, and that the proposal to make it a major had three significant advantages:

1) The curriculum for athletic training is markedly different from the exercise science track, and a separate major would better identify both groups of students.

2) The faculty of the Department of Orthopaedic Surgery in the College of Medicine is a very important part of the athletic training track, and a separate athletic training major would give them official recognition and credit for their participation in the program.

3) Athletic training, as an allied health profession, must be reviewed for accreditation, which requires a certain number of faculty. If there is a major in athletic training, faculty from Orthopaedic Surgery can be counted. If athletic training remained a track within the exercise science major, the department would have to hire more tenure-track faculty or visitors to meet accreditation requirements, so establishing the new major would actually be less expensive.

Dean Antczak noted that the EPC was unanimous and enthusiastic in its support of the proposal, which the EPC believed would enhance a popular track. He also said that it had the endorsement of the College of Medicine, which was willing to devote resources to the program at no cost to CLAS.

Chair Jones called for a vote on the proposal, which passed without opposition.

4. Diversity Committee. Chair Jones commented that continual increases in tuition could adversely affect the diversity of the student body, whether one defined diversity narrowly or broadly, and it was important for the Assembly to address whether its standing Diversity Committee should be reconstituted and what its charge should be.

A member asked why the Diversity Committee had not been active last year. Jones responded that it was his understanding that committee members had not been able to manage the time commitment. Hesli said that the committee had produced useful reports in the past and it simply had had a dormant year. She recommended reconstituting the committee and giving it a specific charge. Executive Associate Dean Raúl Curto remarked that he had worked with previous committees and thought the process had been very positive. He said he would have been happy to work with the committee last year, but no requests for information or collaboration had been made to the Dean's Office.

Member Rex Honey (Geography) said that he was sorry the committee had lapsed last year. The previous year, the committee met with many organizations from across the University and made good progress on reviewing activities. He explained that the committee's chair had left the University, communications had slipped, and the committee lost momentum. He said that the committee should be reformed in the interests of justice and a culturally rich learning environment.

Dean Antczak suggested that committee reports could take different shapes. He favored a narrative rather than data-driven report, one that examined faculty and student recruitment and retention problems and that presented best practices for dealing with those problems.

Member Glenn Ehrstine (German) asked whether the committee's reports could be made available. Dean Curto said he thought they were currently available on the web, but if they had been removed from the CLAS website, they would be posted again. [The reports are available at http://www.clas.uiowa.edu/reports/] Dominguez asked what the committee's mission had been and whether it had any power to effect its recommendations. She said that the committee should consider diversity from a broad and international perspective.

Dean Linda Maxson said that it was important that the committee be able to see progress in terms of its mission, in order for it to stay engaged in its work. Chair Jones noted that statistics would be difficult to get, especially for invisible minorities. Dean Maxson said that they did not have to gather data to know that the College is not where it wanted to be in terms of diversity. She recommended focusing on policies.

John Nelson remarked that the Office of Affirmative Action could be detrimental to diversity efforts in terms of faculty recruitment. Another member suggested that a key charge for the committee might be to establish a relationship with Affirmative Action. She noted that the committee's charge needed to be goal- and action-oriented, because it would be difficult to recruit committed participants without specific goals.

Honey suggested that Assembly members go back to their departments and solicit suggestions regarding the committee's mission and forward them to the Chair. Chair Jones endorsed the suggestion and said that he would meet with members Honey and Dominguez to compile the suggestions, or compose their own as necessary, and bring a proposal to the next Assembly meeting.

5. Adjournment. Having completed the business on the agenda, the Assembly adjourned.

Respectfully submitted,
Fredrick Woodard
Secretary, 2002-03