Draft to be approved 10/19/11

The Metropolitan State College of Denver

 Faculty Senate

Wednesday, October 5th, 2011

3:20pm – 4:50pm

Tivoli 320 A, B & C

 

Minutes

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Attendees: Akrabova, Aubrey, Badwan, Bahl, Baldwin, Balogh, Brodersen, Butler, Capps, Collette, Collette, Cook, Corash, Davis, DelCastillo, DeMuro, Denn, Drake, Duburguet, Dyhr, Elkins, Ethier, Evans, Flemon, Forgash,   Gibson, Graves, Grevstad, Hagen, Hancock, Hasley, Hathorn, Hernandez-Julian, Hill, Holloway, Hutto, Izurieta, Jackson, Jacobs, Karris, Kent, King, Kitzman, Kleinfeld, Klimek, Komodore, Kottenstette, Kuhlmann, Lamb, Liu,  Lubinski, Malpass, Matthews, McKenzie, Meloche, Mollenhauer, Murphy, Odell, Ortiz, Padilla, Posey, Pozzi, Preuhs, Pytlinski, Quinn, Reardon, Reimer, Reyes, Rissman, Rogers, Ropp, Rucki, Sahami, Shopp, Sidelko, Snozek, Stephens, Sundeen, Svonkin, Szypulski, Vowles, Wanberg, Worster, Yeh, Zajdowicz Guests: Lehmann, Nowkhandan, Paul, Rossmiller

 

I.                    Call to Order

  

II.                 Approval of Previous Meetings Minutes (at Senate Website), VOTE.

 Vote called.    Minute approved.  

 

III.             Announcements/Updates

-          The FS Budget Committee created a “Metro State Budget Glossary” http://www.mscd.edu/senate/assets/pdf/attachm/Budget-term-def.pdf  that very clearly explains the terminology used in a variety of different budgets.

 

-          In the Fall of 2011 Metro State launched the Undergraduate Research Program to celebrate traditional types of research as well as original scholarship and any type of creative activity. It is housed in the Applied Learning Center. Tom Davinroy, EAS, and Pam Ansburg, Psychology are co-directors.

o    The 1^st Annual Metro State Undergraduate Research Conference will be held on April 20, 2012. Any students doing research or are engaged in scholarship or creative original work are invited to participate.

 

-          (IT)³ was formally charged and tasked to identify the major issues confronting faculty in terms of IT policies and practices and to propose possible solutions. And to communicate these issues and proposed solutions to the faculty and the Faculty Senate. Senator Fustos was elected chair. President Sahami asked the Senate to communicate any IT issues to a member of the taskforce. Senator representatives, Janos Fustos, Lisa Ortiz, Senate Secretary, Lawrence Glatz, Modern Languages, and Brandon Matthew, Music.

 

-          The SCoB and SPS still need RTP Alternates. Because these seats need to be filled very quickly, President Sahami reminded the Senate that the caucus has the option of electing to go outside the senate for faculty who have not already been selected to serve on any lower levels of review.

 

-          The Tenure Rights discussion group has been finalized with members of the administration, the President of the faculty union, Ellen Slatkin, Eugene Saxe-as lead plaintiff on both lawsuits, President Sahami, and Vice President Worster. Joe Goldhammer, the union lawyer will serve as the consultant. Provost Golich will chair the committee, Deputy Provost Torres, Dean Foster, and General Counsel Martinez will round out the administrative representatives. President Jordan will issue their charge at the first meeting.

 

-          The Faculty Senate Executive Committee has initiated discussion on the evolving role of the Faculty Senate Student Activities Committee. The SAC has no representation at the Senate Executive Committee because it chaired by the Vice President of the Student Government. The Senate Executive Committee has issued an invitation to all current faculty members of the Student Activities Committee to the next Senate Executive Committee meeting on Wednesday at this same time to discuss and look at what possible changes, if any, are logical to make for the SAC.

 

IV.              Committee Reports:  FS Curriculum Committee – Sen. R. Hernandez-Julian http://www.mscd.edu/senate/assets/pdf/FSCC/FSCCReportOctober52011.pdf

A general request was made to put more detail in minutes and to talk briefly about the packets.

 

Report to Metropolitan State College of Denver Faculty Senate

Faculty Senate Curriculum Committee

October 5, 2011

 

Unless otherwise noted, packets are approved unanimously.

 

Packets Approved

 

LAS 1112-8: SABS Program Change

The Department proposed changes to the Anthropology major, requiring more courses in a

broader set of subfields.

 

LAS 1112-18: Course Modifications to THE 2221

Course changes were proposed in order to meet new GS standards.

 

LAS 1112-19: Course Modifications to MUS 1000

Course changes were proposed in order to meet new GS standards.

SPS 1112-7: Course Modifications in Educational Technology

Two Educational Technology courses have been modified to meet current trends.

General Studies Designation Approved::

 

LAS 1011-28: PSC 1010

 

LAS 1112-18: THE 2221

 

LAS 1112-19: MUS 1000

 

 Senator Hernandez called for discussion. There was none.

 

Curriculum approved unanimously by the Faculty Senate Curriculum Committee is automatically approved by the Senate unless there is a question posed by a Senator on the Senate floor.

 

 President Sahami – accepted the report on behalf of the Senate.

 

V.                 PRESENTATION and QUESTIONS:  IT Maintenance and outage schedule: GUEST: CTO- J. Zerkovich [Time certain: 7.5 min. Presentation+ 7.5min. for questions] http://www.mscd.edu/senate/assets/pdf/attachm/AdminComp_Maintenance100511.pdf

http://www.mscd.edu/senate/assets/pdf/attachm/banner_maint_cal.pdf

 

 Joan Zerkovich described her academic experience at U of California, Davis Campus and then at the Office of the President with the California Digital Library.

 

She gave a brief overview of the systems that Metro’s Administrative Computing manages to give perspective of why there is a need to maintain systems through outages:

 

1.      Sungard Banner

2.      MetroConnect

3.      Data Centers (2)

4.      Networks

5.      Purchasing and Deployment of software and hardware

6.      Security incidents (stolen laptops)

7.      Databases to manage and moving it over to a data warehouse for reporting purposes.

 

CTO Zerkovich has learned that there are a lot of varied expectations about system availability and that IT has not always accommodated the changing classroom environment and the use of online resources and other services and it has caused problems. Points she touched on:

 

·        IT needs to improve planning and get feedback from faculty on how to improve communication channels and she asked the Senate for help with that;

·        Options currently available to post planned and unplanned maintenance for faculty and feedback on whether these options were useful;

·        Distilling what works for the faculty on how to send feedback to IT into the outage planning schedule and how to communicate going forward; and,

·        IT’s plan to then work up a new process with IT³ , update the maintenance calendar, and then post it according to the final notification recommendations.

 

Any faculty feedback can be emailed to Joan Zerkovich, any member of IT³, or the Faculty Senate president.

 

VI.              PRESENTATION, DISCUSSION and MOTION (VOTE on 5/12/11):  Clarification and Reclassification of the “NC” – Academic Policies Committee – Sen. G. Denn http://www.mscd.edu/senate/assets/pdf/motions/2011/AP_Motion_092911.pdf

--------------------------Correction of proposed VOTE is 10/19/11-------------------------

 

President Sahami asked the Senate to share this policy change proposal and discussion with their department faculty and find out where they stand and to bring back their comments to the next Senate meeting.

 

 Vice President Worster introduced the policy change as separating “NC” into three separate codes depending upon the reason for student withdrawal (NC-used only for a course where grade forgiveness was exercised; W-voluntary withdrawal by a student after census until withdrawal deadline; and AW for instances such as tuition and fee appeal filed by a student due to extreme circumstances). A call was made for discussion.

 

 Senator Hasley, CIS, asked if “W” or “AW” are permanent if the student retakes the class.

 

 Senator Kitzman, Psychology, asked for the history of why Metro is looking at this policy change.

 

 Senator Meloche, Biology, asked if the change has been proposed for internal use because he believes it could have a big impact on the students who like the ambiguity of “NC”.

 

 Senator Pytlinski, Art, asked what kind of comparison research was done with other institutions’ practices.

 

 President Sahami spoke to the issue as a Physics Department faculty. He commented that approximately 60% of Physics students go on to graduate school and transcripts are very important. The feedback from their students has been that “NC” has been interpreted more as poor performance versus a “W”.  

 

 Vice-President Worster summarized his calls to and research on graduate schools and the screening agency for medical school application. The graduate schools he talked to take into account a student’s academic record as represented on their transcript separate from the CAPP report.

 

 President Sahami asked the Senate to take this information and poll their departments to see where they are at on this issue and bring their input.

 

VII.           PRESENTATION and DISCUSSION:  New on Continuing Charges from the Issues Priority List.

 

 President Sahami listed the continuing charges and their ranking of issues.

 

 He summarized the new list of six items and opened discussion were they should be charged:

 

 14. Faculty Benefits Package A (direct items—retirement, insurance, sick leave bank, etc.) and B (secondary benefits—child care, extended tuition for family members, campus parking, bus passes, etc.) were charged to an ad hoc committee from Budget and Faculty Welfare.

 

 15. Space Allocations – Instructional Resources was charged to address this issue.

 

  16. Intellectual Property Rights – will be address by a Task Force and a call was made for faculty members to come forward (a general invitation would be sent out).

 

 Senator Hagen asked about the group that was working on it some time ago that she had turned over research to and where that work was at this time.

 

 Vice-President Worster volunteered to work on this taskforce. Question came from the floor as to whether General Counsel Martinez had commented on this topic and wanted to know if it was ever put in writing.

 

 17. Policy on Visiting Faculty – The Faculty Welfare Committee was charged with looking into the process of the contract negotiations. A survey and discussion groups are being developed.

 

 18. Curriculum Policy – charged to Curriculum Committee.

 

 Senator Hernandez commented on the 2+2 Programs and asked the Senate for information on what questions need answering on the Curriculum process at rherna42@mscd.edu.

 

 

 

 Vice-President Worster clarified an item after looking at his research on withdrawal codes. He used the thirteen comparative institutions that Metro has designated and how he stopped after looking at the first five institutions because in every case after a student’s grade is replaced with last grade stance, the previous grade remains on the transcript but is not counted in the GPA. He would be happy to share his research with anyone who requests it.

 

VIII.        Adjournment

 

Vote called.  Adjourned.