Faculty Senate

Minutes - May 4, 2020 - 3:05pm - Online through WebEx

CCSU FACULTY SENATE MEETING

Present: Adair, S.; Anton, M.; Al-Masoud, N.; Amaya, L.; Austad, C.; Baratta, C.; Bigelow, L.; Bishop, J.; Blitz, D.; Bray, A.; Broulik, W.; Casiano, N.; Chakraborty, S.; Chen, S.; Donohue, P.; Duquette, J.; Fafunwa-Ndibe, S.; Foster, P.; Gamache, J.; Garceau, T.; Garcia-Bowen, M.; Gardner, P.; Ghiloni-Wage, B.; Gichiru, W.; Givens, E.; Gutierrez, S.; Halkin, S.; Holt, J.; Hou, X.; Hughes, H.; Jarmoszko, T.; Kapper, M.; Karas, R.; Kean, K.; Kriscenski, J.; Kullgren, A.; Kurkjian, C.; Langevin, K.; Latour, F.; Leonidas, E.; Mann, B.; Martin, V.; Matzke, B.; Mendez-Mendez, S.; Menoche, C.; Mongillo, M.; Morales, A.; Moreno-Fuentes, G.; Nicoletti, J.; Oyewumi, O.; Pancsofar, E.; Paolino, J.; Phillips, E.; Ruhs, T.; Sakaki, H.; Salama, T.; Schenck, S.; Skinner, L.; Sohn, Y.M.; Spear, E.; Stickland, A.; Styrczula, S.; Sylvester, C.; Wang, W.; Watson, S.; Williams, L.; York, C.

Ex-Officio: Dauwalder, D.; Farhat, J; Kim, J.; Kostelis, K.; Robinson, C.; Toro, Z; Wolff, R.

 

Parliamentarian: Dimmick, C.

President of the Senate: Jackson, M.

Guests: Yvonne Kirby (Associate VP, Planning & Institutional Effectiveness); Matthew Martin (Academic Integrity Committee); Jason Melnyk (UPBC); Paul Resetarits (Sabbatical Leave Committe (AAUP) and University Athletics Board)

1. Minutes

a. Minutes of April 20, 2020 meeting

• Approved by unanimous consent

2. Announcements:

a. AAUP President (L. Williams)

• The AAUP will have a virtual chapter meeting (via Zoom) on Monday, May 11, 2020, at 3pm. A link will be sent soon.

b. SUOAF-AFSCME President (L. Bigelow)

• The Governor has approached SEBAC to talk about our upcoming raises. A SEBAC meeting will be held this evening. Members will be kept updated.

c. SGA (R. Tahir)

• No announcements.

d. FAC to the Board of Regents (D. Blitz)

• FAC Representative Blitz presented two documents to the Senate.
• FAC Report to Faculty Senate on CSCU working group on Online Programs
• FAC Report to Faculty Senate on Budget and Funding during the Pandemic
• Motion (Austad/Foster): The CCSU Faculty Senate approves the three proposals in the FAC report
  • Senator Adair expressed many concerns about the role of the System Office in relation to programs that we will offer. Programs need to be administered by the universities and not the System Office, and thus he supports the resolution.
  • Senator Phillips is concerned about an outside group presenting an RFP (for example, a university not part of CSCU). She supports the resolution.
  • Senator Latour says that decisions made by the System Office regarding the approval of programs, beyond a rubber-stamp approval, will infringe upon our academic freedom.
• Motion approved unanimously (54-0)
• FAC Representative Blitz had a discussion today with the BOR chief of staff, who is on Governor Lamont's reopening team. The current plan is for the reopening of the state to begin on May 20. We should follow this issue closely over the summer. Anyone who has questions should contact FAC representative Blitz

e. President of the Senate (M. Jackson)

• Vice President Bishop mentioned that over 100 people participated in the Physical Activity Challenge; more information is on the Faculty Senate listserv. Thanks to Jay Melnyk and Cassandra York for their involvement.
• Workgroup Framework Document
• President Jackson spoke of these workgroups and encouraged interested parties to contact the chair of the appropriate workgroups if they have questions of comments. One possibility that is being considered is to have on-ground classes that are automatically recorded for students who may not want to be on campus; the Information Technology invites faculty to provide feedback or comments on this issue (to Charles Menoche and Tom Burkholder). Senator Menoche said that such technology is already available in RVAC 009, but one possibility would be to expand it to every classroom. Senator Chakraborty asked whether there is an option to record the whiteboard (Senator Menoche: I'll pass that on). Senator Bray is concerned that the BOR might think that a class could be taught by a single instructor at one campus and streamed to every campus; AAUP's opinion is that such classes would still be covered under the current contract as "distance learning". Senator Anton wonders if instructors can edit the video (Senator Menoche: the intent is for the classes to be streamed synchronously, so probably not). Senator Anton is concerned that students may not want to be on video, and thus it would be better to have the ability to edit. Senator Nicoletti said that Camtasia is available for editing. Senator Bray is concerned about the impact on students with disabilities.
• Senator Mendez-Mendez said that there are several complaints related to ethics and public accounts that the university needs to be aware of.

3. Committee Reports

a. Graduate Studies Committee (E. Leonidas)

• Approved (54-1)

b. Sabbatical Leave Committee (P. Resetarits)

• Sabbatical Leave Committee Chair Resetarits said that it is not optimal to have 6 members elected one year and 3 the next year. Senator Latour said that the original plan was for 5 members to be elected one year and 4 the next, but it got changed to 6 and 3 on the floor of the Senate for an unrelated reason.
  • Motion (Latour/Foster): For the Sabbatical Leave Committee (AAUP) election in Spring 2020, the winning candidate with the lowest vote total shall have a one-year term.
  • President Jackson said that balance is crucial for this committee because it has co-chairs, one of whom must have two years left on their term. Committee Chair Resetarits spoke in favor of the proposal.
  • Approved (50-1)
• Committee Chair Resetarits also asked AAUP faculty to push for more sabbaticals in the next contract (the current number of sabbaticals systemwide is 70, and that is too few - we should aim for 100).
• Senator Chakraborty asked if the committee is willing to provide score and feedback to applicants; Committee Chair Resetarits said that this is a confidential process that does not allow for this kind of feedback.
• Report received by the Faculty Senate

c. University Athletics Board (P. Resetarits)

• Senator Bigelow said that outsourcing the fundraising for Athletics would be in violation of the SUOAF-AFSCME contract.
• Senator Halkin wonders about the various opinions on whether student-athletes can make money by being athletes. UAB Chair Resetarits acknowledged that there is a diversity of opinions on the subject.
• Report received by the Faculty Senate

d. University Planning and Budget Committee (J. Melnyk)

• Senator Blitz is wondering whether there is a list of priorities in the Strategic Plan; UPBC Chair Melnyk said that UPBC was asked to narrow down the activities for Year One; information will be forthcoming. Senator Bigelow has seen some of these recommendations which were sent to the workgroup chairs, and is wondering if they are a draft or a final version. President Toro clarified that the final recommendations were approved on May 1. She will check with Marketing and Communications, as many things that are marked as "Draft" were approved by the BOR.
• Report received by the Faculty Senate

e. Grade Appeals Committee (T. Vasko) - informational report for consent agenda

f. Council of Academic Chairs (D. Carter) - informational report for consent agenda

g. International Education Committee (M. Ciscel) - informational report for consent agenda

h. Information Technology Committee (C. Menoche) - informational report for consent agenda

i. BOR Research and Teaching Award Committees - no report because there was only one nominee for each award

• Information Technology Committee report postponed to the September 14 meeting; other reports (e-h) received by the Faculty Senate.

4. Unfinished Business

a. Academic Integrity Policy (M. Mongillo)

• Academic Misconduct Policy
• Academic Integrity Guidee
  • Senators praised Committee Chair Mongillo's work in creating a two-column comparison.
  • Policy approved unanimously (48-0)

5. New Business

a. Constitution and By-laws Committee

• Proposal to amend the By-Laws of the Faculty Senate
• Senator Chakraborty asked about the proposal to amend 2.6.2.3. - instead of waiting until there are enough nominees to fill every seat, could we relabel seats as "at-large" when there are not enough nominees? Senator Latour: there is already a provision to do this for committees that do not affect remuneration in Article 2.15. For committees that do affect remuneration, former AAUP President Jason Jones is the one who requested that the requirements should not be waived. In addition, we have never had to reopen the call for nominations more than once in recent years.
• Bylaws amendments approved unanimously (51-0)
• Proposal to amend the Constitution of the Faculty Senate
• Senator Duquette asked about the justification for 3.6.6; political scientists generally do not support term limits. He pointed to an article to clarify his position of opposition. Senator Latour: this is something that was requested by many senators in the past. Some senators pointed out that the situation arose in the 2018 election for Faculty Senate President. Senator Duquette said that in that case, the Senate did not reelect the sitting President, thus providing evidence that term limits are not needed. Several senators expressed support for term limits. Senator Anton says that we need good Senate Presidents and so we need to have a rotation to create a larger pool. Senator Bray said that there could be a situation where no current senator wishes to serve as President given the amount of work it requires, and if the current President wishes to continue then we may want them to do so.
• Two more amendments were proposed (Phillips/Bishop):
  • Proposed 3.4. All of the following administrators shall be non-voting members of the Faculty Senate ex-officio, without the power to make or second motions, to become President, Vice President or Secretary or serve as officers on any committee: the President of the University, the Vice President of Academic Affairs, the academic and graduate Deans or their chosen representatives, the President of CCSU-AAUP, the President of the CCSU chapter of SUOAF-AFSCME, and the CCSU representative to the Faculty Advisory Committee to the Board of Regents.
  • Proposed 3.6.6. No person can serve for more than two consecutive full terms as President of the Faculty Senate, Vice President of the Faculty Senate, and Secretary of the Faculty Senate.
  • Senator Halkin asked for the justification; Senator said that it would prevent the accumulation of too much power for one individual. CCSU-AAUP President Williams said that there would be an issue of conflict of interest (for instance, if the President of CCSU-AAUP were to be Chair of the Promotion and Tenure Committee. Senator Blitz agreed. Senator Adair is not clear about what the amendment specifically would do. Senator Mendez-Mendez tends to agree with Senator Williams but is not sure that right now is the time to address this.
  • Motion to refer the first new proposal to the Constitution and Bylaws committee over the summer and brought back to the Senate for the Fall.
  • Approved (29-8)
  • Motion to refer the second new proposal to the Constitution and Bylaws committee over the summer and brought back to the Senate for the Fall.
  • Approved (30-7)
  • Motion: To send the proposed constitutional amendments to the faculty for a vote, as separate items (39-2)

  b. Approval of Candidates for Graduation

  • Approved unanimously

  6. Adjournment

  • The meeting adjourned at 5:36pm.