Faculty Senate

Minutes - November 10, 2014 - 3:05pm

CCSU FACULTY SENATE MEETING

Present: Anderson, C.; Antonucci, C.; Baratta, C.; Barr, B.; Best, F.; Bilisoly, R.; Blitz, D.; Boncoddo, R.; Boscarino, N.; Callery, T.; Cistulli, M.; D'Addio, D.; Dukes, C.; Emeagwali, G.; Flinn, B.; Fothergill, W.; Garcia-Bowen, M.; Ghodsi, R.; He, F.; Hermes, K.; Horan, M.; Hou, X.; Jackson, M.; Johnson, D.; Jones, C.; Kapper, M.; Karpuk, P.; Kean, K.; Kim, Y.; Koplowitz, B.; Kullgren, A.; Kurkjian, C.; Larsen, K.; Lee, L.; Mahony, M.A.; Mamed, O.; Martin-Troy, K.; McGuire, M.; Melnyk, J.; Mongillo, M.; Nelson, W.; Paolino, J.; Passaro, M.; Pearson, F.; Phillips, E.; Pozorski, A.; Ragusett, J.; Reasco, A.; Sadanand, N.; Santoro, K.; Sarisley, E.; Schlickmann, P.; Shen, X.; Simmons, R.; Sweeney, D.; White, C.; Williams, C.; Wood, R.

Ex-Officio: Adair, S.; Lovitt, C.; Malhas, F; Root, P.

Parliamentarian Pro Tem: Latour, F.

President of the Senate: Cohen, S.

Guests: Wyatt Bosworth (SGA); Evadne Ngazimbi (Counseling and Family Therapy)

1. Minutes

Minutes of October 27, 2014

• Approved unanimously

2. Announcements:

a. AAUP President (M. A. Mahony)

• The Executive Committee meets on Wednesday at noon.
• The next Chapter meeting is on Thursday at 11:30am.
• Faculty members are encouraged to read "First Monday" messages from BOR President Gray.
• There is a members-only discussion forum on the CCSU-AAUP website.

b. SUOAF-AFSCME President (O. Mamed for M. Ansarra)

• The election for President of (systemwide) SUOAF-AFSCME has concluded, with Jody Barr (ECSU) as President, Rebecca Woodward (WCSU) as VP, Jordan Jones (SCSU) as Secretary and Laurie Aparo (CCSU) as Treasurer.
• The election for Council 4 delegates will be held on November 19, in the Student Center.

c. SGA (W. Bosworth for S. Sonet)

• Departments are encouraged to participate in Competition for a Cause, which ends on November 24.
• The SGA has $10,000 available in scholarship money for study abroad programs.

d. FAC to the Board of Regents (S. Adair)

• The FAC will meet on November 14. A major topic of discussion will be how to respond to Transform CSCU 2020 and the roadmaps.
• Systemwide Provost Mike Gargano has resigned, effective immediately.

e. Community Engagement Committee (R. Simmons)

f. Information Technology Committee (J. Melnyk for C. Menoche)

• Watch your e-mail for two important messages, one about software requests (which are due December 1) and one about classroom hardware.

g. President of the Senate (S. Cohen)

• The President of the Senate has been asked to create an ad hoc committee to revise the Faculty Handbook. So, far, Secretary Latour has volunteered for the committee. Most of the work will be done in the Spring.
• Grades will be due on December 24; however, the system will be down on December 23. Please remind your colleagues of the importance of submitting your grades by the deadline.
• A petition has been signed by 33 faculty members, asking for a special session of the faculty to discuss the Faculty Senate's endorsement of Dean Alfano's SEPS reorganization proposal, pursuant to Article 4.1 of the Constitution of the Faculty Senate.

3. Committee Reports

a. University Planning and Budget Committee (K. Martin-Troy)

• 2013-14 UPBC Vice Chair Kathy Martin-Troy presented the report, which was accepted by the Senate.

b. Curriculum Committee (M. Jackson) FS.14.15.011B

• Curriculum Committee Chair Mark Jackson said that the Reading and Language Arts Master's is popular with students from Jamaica, whose Ministry of Education requires 36 credits for a Master's degree.
• Curriculum Committee report approved unanimously

c. Community Engagement Committee (R. Simmons)

• report not available yet

d. Student Affairs Committee (K. Sugg)

• report not available yet

4. New Business:

a. Addition of a member to the Academic Assessment Committee FS.14.15.012B

• Approved unanimously

b. Department Name Change

• Counseling and Family Therapy -> Counselor Education and Family Therapy FS.14.15.013B
• Approved unanimously

c. Transform CSCU 2020

• BOR President Gray's Response to "An Academic Imperative for Transform CSCU 2020"
• BOR President Gray's Strategic Plan for CSUS
• Discussion of Roadmaps (select "Documents" to access them)
• The Senate discussed this item as a quasi committee of the whole.
• The AAUP has made it clear that, while it is looking at the documents to find possible contract violations or problematic elements, failure to identify such violations or problems does not imply that AAUP faculty are giving up their rights. There shall be no contract negotiations outside of the normal contract negotiation process.
• FAC representative Stephen Adair said that there is still no answer to whether the BOR plans on voting on Transform CSCU 2020 as a package, or piece by piece.
• According to President Cohen, because of the current timeframe, we should send our feedback to the BOR by the end of the semester.
• Senate President Cohen suggests a three-pronged approach to responding to the roadmaps: asking senators to share BOR documents with their departments to obtain feedback, referring specific roadmaps to appropriate committees, and setting up discussion boards.
• It seems that these roadmaps were developed by the system office, rather than through an inclusive process. Faculty had no say in what was included in the roadmaps. The executive sponsors and leads are mostly administrators; FAC representative Adair is one of the leads (for the Faculty Development initiative), but he may be the only one who is a faculty member. The Faculty Development initiative is the one that mentions research.
• Senator White asked about the BOR's business survey; why do the people who responded get to decide what the needs of our students are?
• Senator Blitz talked about many problems with Transform as a whole. It includes plans to expand online education, even though the BOR did not ask us (or ask Charter Oak) whether we wanted to do this. The online education initiative, among other parts of Transform, violates the Contract and the autonomy of our institution, CCSU, which is a system made up of parts that interact with one another, unlike CSCU, which is not a true system because it lacks a key component (UConn). He feels that the goal of Transform is to create a system at the expense of our status as a university. He said that we, the faculty, should follow Dr. Gargano's lead and withdraw from Transform, which is an exercise in bureaucracy written by the system office staff. The whole process is going in the wrong direction, and we need to say that the Emperor has no clothes. When do we get off this train and say that enough is enough?
• Senator Karpuk said that the initiatives are poorly written (what does "optimizing the mix of institutions within institutions" mean?) and said that, in the online learning initiatives, most the key risks involve faculty (we don't know how to do it); where are the risks to students? Students are at risk because some of what is proposed is poor pedagogy.
• Senator Dukes pointed out that online education may be problematic from the point of view of academic integrity, given that the form of assessment that typically sees the most academic dishonesty is the take-home examination.
• Senator Sarisley questioned whether the business survey is a representative sample of Connecticut employers.

5. Adjournment

• The meeting adjourned at 4:36pm.