Minutes - September 22, 2014 - 3:05pm
CCSU FACULTY SENATE MEETING
Present: Anderson, C.; Artamoshin, S.; Baratta, C.; Barr, B.; Bilisoly, R.; Boncoddo, R.; Boscarino, N.; Braverman, S.; Callery, T.; D'Addio, D.; D'Amato, K.; Duquette, J.; Flinn, B.; Foster, P.; Fothergill, W.; Garcia-Bowen, M.; Ghodsi, R.; Givens, E.; He, F.; Hermes, K.; Hernandez, J.; Horan, M.; Jackson, M.; Johnson, D.; Jones, C.; Kapper, M.; Karpuk, P.; Kean, K.; Kim, Y.; King, A.; Knopf, K.; Kostelis, K.; Kovel, J.; Kurkjian, C.; Larsen, K.; Lee, L.; Love, K.; Mahony, M.; Marchese, L.; Martin, M.; McGuire, M.; Melnyk, J.; Moffo Simpson, T.; Mongillo, M.; Nelson, W.; Oyanadel, D.; Paolino, J.; Passaro, M.; Pearson, F.; Pozorski, A.; Ragusett, J.; Reasco, A.; Rice, T.; Rosenberg, J.; Sadanand, N.; Santoro, K.; Sarisley, E.; Shen, X.; Solomon, P.; Stookey, S.; Sweeney, D.; Tellier, A.; White, C.; Williams, C.; Wolff, R.; Wood, R.
Ex-Officio: Adair, S.; Alfano, M; Fitzgerald, G; Lovitt, C.; Malhas, F; Pease, S.
Parliamentarian: Dimmick, C.
President of the Senate: Cohen, S.
Guests: Aram Ayalon (Teacher Education); David Blitz (Philosophy); Barbara Clark (Teacher Education); Nick D'Agostino (Office of Diversity and Equity); Daniel Mulcahy (Teacher Education); Joan Nicoll-Senft (Special Education); Karen Riem (Teacher Education); Susan Seider (Teacher Education)
The Steering Committee recommends the following items for inclusion on the Consent Agenda:
1. Minutes
4c through 4e. Various informational committee reports
6a. Addition of one member to Steering Committee
Items accepted on the Consent Agenda will be approved without discussion or vote. Please indicate if you would like to have any item removed from the Consent Agenda for discussion and/or floor vote.
- Consent agenda approved unanimously
1. Minutes
- Approved as part of consent agenda
2. Announcements:
a. AAUP President (M. Mahony)
- Each department should have an AAUP department liaison. If your department does not have a department liaison who regularly reports to the department about AAUP business, please inform your department chair, or inform Michelle Malinowski or Guy Crundwell.
- You should visit the blog page, CSU CONNects on the web at http://www.csuconnects.org, and on Facebook. Invite people you know in Connecticut to Like it. One of the stories featured has been picked up by 150 news organizations, for a total of one million potential readers.
- Transform CSCU 2020 town halls have been happening at other institutions, and they have been similar to ours.
b. SUOAF-AFSCME President
- CCSU SUOAF-AFSCME chapter elections for executive board will be happening soon.
c. SGA (S. Sonet)
- No report.
d. FAC to the Board of Regents (S. Adair)
- The FAC will meet on October 3, and will present to the BOR on October 16.
- Senator Karpuk and Professor Blitz expressed concerns about certain aspects of Transform CSCU 2020; in particular, the emphasis on "smart classrooms" or "genius classrooms". No one seems to understand what purpose these classrooms are supposed to serve. Broadcasting a lecture given on one campus to several other campuses hardly seems like great pedagogy; it seems that this is an example of technology taking precedence over pedagogy.
e. Office of Diversity and Equity - Red Flag Campaign (N. D'Agostino)
- The Red Flag Campaign is a public awareness campaign designed to address dating violence and promote the prevention of dating violence on college campuses. Many documents and resources intended to address these issues are available on campus.
f. President of the Senate (S. Cohen)
- Faculty members who volunteered to participate in a Transform CSCU 2020 initiative but have not heard from the BOR should inform Stephen Cohen, who will follow up.
- The 4 CSU Faculty Senate Presidents will meet with BOR President Gray next week. There will also be a similar meeting with union presidents.
- President Miller's Open Forums will be on October 23 and December 0, at 3:00pm in the Constitution Room.
- The second General Education forum will be on October 16, at 3:00pm, in Social Sciences Hall 106.
- An ad hoc committee to consider possible speakers for the Vance lecture will be formed, as it was last year. The Vance lecture is normally given by prominent people in politics or journalism. Contact Senate President Cohen if you are interested in serving.
3. Election of Standing Committees of the Senate
a. Committee on Committees
- Senators Barr, Foster and Jones elected unanimously
b. Committee on Academic Freedom
- Senators Larsen, Martin and Wood elected unanimously
c. Committee on Constitution and By-Laws
- Senators King and Love elected unanimously
d. Committee on Appointments and Personnel
- Senators Duquette, Kostelis and McGuire elected unanimously
4. Committee Reports
a. University Planning and Budget Committee (C. Valk)
- report not available yet
b. Promotion and Tenure Committee - addendum (P. Foster)
- report not available yet
c. Community Engagement Committee (R. Simmons)
- report not available yet
d. Academic Integrity Committee (K. Love)
- Report accepted as part of consent agenda
e. Student Affairs Committee (K. Sugg)
- report not available yet
5. Unfinished Business:
a. International Education Committee bylaws
Secretary Latour pointed out that the clause, "there is no term limit for individual faculty members on the committee", contradicts the bylaws of the Faculty Senate.
Motion (Cohen/Wolff): To strike the sentence "There is no term limit for individual faculty members on the committee."
- Approved unanimously
- Bylaws of the International Education Committee approved unanimously
6. New Business:
a. Addition of one member (Mark Cistulli) to Steering Committee
- Approved as part of consent agenda
b. Promotion and Tenure evaluation form for Counselors
- Motion (Cohen/Jackson): To approve the correction to the Promotion and Tenure evaluation form for Counselors.
- Approved unanimously
c. School of Education and Professional Studies restructuring of departments (M. Alfano)
- Rationale for restructuring SEPS departments
- Teacher Education department chair's response
- Teacher Education department's statement
- Dean Alfano spoke about his proposal for restructuring SEPS departments. He said that the state and accrediting agencies are now expecting more of teachers, and reorganizing SEPS would allow us to better meet the challenges.
- Teacher Education Department Chair Ayalon responded with a PowerPoint presentation highlighting the strengths of his department, and his concerns about the plan.
- Senator White asked whether the Department of Teacher Education endorses the idea that some kind of change is required. Professor Ayalon responded that, since the rationale from the Dean only came last week, there has been no time for the department to voice its opinion.
- Professor Blitz said that, in his 25 years at CCSU, the Faculty Senate has never approved a departmental reorganization without the affected department's approval.
- Teacher Education Professor Seider said that she enthusiastically endorses the proposed changes.
- Senators Anderson, Karpuk, King, Lee and Wolff said they do not feel ready to vote on this matter at this point.
- Several members from different departments of SEPS indicated
that Teacher Education is a highly regulated field influenced by state and federal laws, regulations, and mandates. Our current structure is making it difficult to adapt to these changing requirements. - AAUP President Mahony wondered why structural (departmental) change was required to adapt to these regulations. Why can't program change
address such requirements? - Dean Alfano responded that structural change makes all of
these pathways clearer than program change can. - Motion (Karpuk/Lee): To postpone this item, so that an effort can be made to arrive at a consensus, within the department of Teacher Education, as well as between the departments involved and the Dean.
- Approved (five Senators opposed)
d. Central Teacher Education Committee proposal (M. Alfano)
- Postponed by unanimous consent
7. Adjournment
- The meeting adjourned at 4:45pm.