Minutes - March 22, 2021 - 3:05pm - Online through WebEx
CCSU FACULTY SENATE MEETING
Present: Adair, S.; Al-Masoud, N.; Atkinson, S.; Austad, C.; Barr, B.; Basim, S.; Benoit, D.; Bigelow, L.; Bishop, J.; Blitz, D.; Boscarino, N.; Bray, A.; Broulik, W.; Chakraborty, S.; Chen, S.; Donahue, P.; Dumpson, N.; Duquette, J.; Elfant, A.; Foster, P.; French, J.; Gamache, J.; Garceau, T.; Garcia-Bowen, M.; Ghiloni-Wage, B.; Ghodsi, R.; Gichiru, W.; Given, E.; Gu, S.; Hernandez, J.; Holt, J.; Hou, X.; Hughes, H.; Jarmoszko, T.; Jenkins, A.; Jones S.; Karas, R.; Knox, C.; Langevin, K.; Lewis, M.; Liu, Y.; Mahony, M.A.; Martin, V.; Matzke, B.; Mendez-Mendez, S.; Misbach, K.; Nicholson, B.; Orange, M.; Pancsofar, E.; Paolino, J.; Rein, T.; Roark, E.; Ruhs, T.; Salama, T.; Salgado, E.; Schenck, S.; Scoggins, M.; Singhal, R.; Skinner, L.; Smith, J.; Smith, R.; Spear, E.; Spillman, D,; Strickland, A.; Styrczula, S.; Sylvester, C.; Wang, W.; Whittemore, L.; Williams, L.; Zadi, S.
Ex-Officio: Dauwalder, D.; Farhat, J.; Kim, J.; Robinson, C.; Wolff, R.; Toro, Z.
Parliamentarian: Dimmick, C.
President of the Senate: Latour, F.
Guests:
Goode, G.; Jackson, M.; Kirby, Y.; Kuo, B.; Lee, B.; Palmer, J.; Resetarits, P.; Tucker, P.; Tully, J.
1. Minutes
- Not available at this point
2. Announcements:
a. AAUP (L. Williams)
- Contract negotiations continue. Table Talk will continue to come out every Monday. The good news is that the Board has withdrawn the proposal requiring a 5/5 teaching load. The bad news is that other terrible proposals remain on the table.
- The next Chapter meeting will be at 12:15 p.m. on April 5, right before Senate.
b. SUOAF-AFSCME (J. Gamache)
c. SGA (B. Kuo)
- The Finance committee is trying to get more authority over the SGA scholarship in the CCSU Foundation and looking to add more funding to it.
- The Finance committee is also working on allocating base budgets to clubs.
- The Academic Affairs Committee is working to fill one of the seats open on a Faculty Senate Committee.
- The SGA is also promoting the Pioneer Award.
- The 2021 E-Board and General Elections are upcoming, and the SGA is getting the word out.
- House Bill 6374 is a bipartisan bill in its second session in the CGA. It was not passed last year because of COVID. This is an important bill which seeks to address pervasive campus sexual violence in CT through campus surveys and a statewide amnesty policy that says students who are under the influence at the time of violence cannot be penalized or barred from reporting. Other SGAs in the state and many other organizations have endorsed this bill.
- The E-Board Debate will be this Wednesday at 7:30 p.m. It will be moderated by Prof. R. Smith of the Political Science Department.
d. FAC to the Board of Regents (D. Blitz)
- Sen. Blitz asked the Vice President to show an exhibit to accompany his remarks. The document “Completing and Closing Students First†was shown and Sen. Blitz reviewed it in detail. He will be presenting this at the next BOR meeting.
- The Search Advisory Committee to the Search Committee for the CSCU President will be meeting with the four finalists for the position in all day sessions this week. It is anticipated that the successful candidate will be announced in early April.
e. President of the Senate (F. Latour)
- Reminder: in Connecticut right now, COVID vaccinations are available to anyone 45 or above. If you are in that age group, you should sign up to get your vaccination. People under 45 will be eligible on April 5 [note: changed to April 1 as of publication of these minutes]
- In Spring, we have election of members of faculty committees. The Elections Committee should expect to hear from the Senate President soon. Please considered running for a committee or recommending that a colleague do so.
- There are a couple faculty workshops coming up soon. On April 6th there will be a workshop on Promotion & Tenure and on April 27, a Sabbatical Leave workshop will be held. Please plan on attending if you are planning to apply for promotion, tenure, or sabbatical leave.
- It is also report season in the Faculty Senate. We have three annual reports on today’s agenda. Two are informational and one will be presented in person. If you are a chair of a committee, you should expect to hear from a member of the Senate Steering Community soon about when your report should be ready.
- The Campus Climate Survey, sent to us by HERI on March 16, is ongoing. It asks that we participate in a survey on campus climate. It is important we respond to provide our input. The email did look somewhat like a phishing attempt, but it is a legitimate email. The faculty participation rate is still not high enough.
- An issue on our minds lately, after the horrific events in Atlanta, is the attack on members of the Asian community. There is a resolution coming up later in the agenda and there is also an event taking place tomorrow. Sen. Liu spoke to provide information on efforts underway to discuss issues and concerns raised by students and faculty related to this national issue and to discuss what could be done on campus to show support for the Asian community.
- Question: A senator asked about the current status of the Asian Center on campus.
- Dr. Toro responded and said she wanted to go over the details which have led to the current status. On October 5, 2018, Provost Dauwalder presented a proposal to renew the Center at the BOR Academic and Student Affairs Committee, per the BOR’s policy on centers and institutes. At that meeting, there was no support to continue the center. We were given a year to explore and make alterations to the center. We were given one year to review and revised the proposal and given some questions/issues to consider. Two of the issues raised was to whether this center could be made into an international center or combined with another center. They also inquired about the revenue stream and encouraged a student survey. A faculty committee was convened, and a new proposal was developed. It was sent to Provost Gates November 22, 2019. That request did not make the committee agenda later that month, or any of the committee meetings because the proposal did not meet the expectations of the Provost (Gates.)
- On January 17, after going back and forth with the Provost of the System, President Toro sent another letter to J. Gates, making a case to receive a waiver of that policy because the definition of center used in the policy (created in 2017) and applied to us did not conform with the type of center we were proposing. Dr. Toro explained that the redesigned center should be exempted from the policy because it did not meet the center definition contained in the policy. In response, the System Office reviewed the policy and revisions to it were considered by the Academic and Student Affairs Committee on January 24, 2020 and on February 6, 2020, a new policy was approved. The consideration of our Center was on the agenda for the Jan. 24, 2020 committee meeting. The proposal was removed from the agenda because it did not meet the definition in the revised policy. To this date, our center does not meet the requirements of the policy. Provost Dauwalder has been asked to continue to work with the faculty group to see what can be done. This center will not be a combined center, it will not be a revenue-generation center, it will not be a self-sustaining center. So, unless the Board changes its police, the center will not ever meet the policy and be approved, nor will our other centers when they come up for renewal. She noted she has been arguing this policy for years. Dr. Toro is hopeful that “Regent Blitz†can advise on how to move this center proposal forward. D. Blitz shared his amusement about being addressed as a regent, and noted he would bring this to the attention of the FAC. He shared a personal anecdote about another time when the mention of a center created alarm at the BOR.
- Sen. Mendez-Mendez spoke to voice his concern over the BOR policy and in support of the centers at CCSU. He spoke favorably about how our centers have served our students over the past thirty years. He proposed that the Senate create an ad hoc committee on the role of the centers on campus.
- Sen. Mahoney stated that the Latin American, Latino and Caribbean Center fulfills all the requirements of the policy except that it is not self-sustaining. It is a research and student support entity and, very importantly, provides an excellent service to the State of Committee by raising the profile of Latinos in our communities and in the United States. The notion it should be self-sustaining, or that we should be combined with another center is short-sighted. UConn and Yale centers were, at one point in time, grant-funded under Title XI, but that funding has significantly diminished.
- Senator Mendez-Mendez made a motion for the Senate to look at a funding mechanism for the centers, which are vital to the well-being of our students and university. He encouraged support of President Toro’s attempt to have these centers be approved. He restated the motion: the Senate will research how the centers have historically benefitted the university and provide data to the Board to ensure that the centers continue to exist.
- Sen. Mahony stated that the center directs already have this information and a motion was not needed. Sen. Mahony suggested that we offer President Toro the support of the Senate and ask how we can be of assistance in generating materials to be submitted to the Board of Regents.
- Sen. Latour refocused the discussion, proposing that the Steering Committee discuss what support could be provided and return to the Senate with a plan in two weeks.
- On a separate issue, referring to the State’s vaccination schedule, Sen. Blitz asked Dr. Toro whether the University had a plan to encourage students to get vaccinated when their age group becomes available. Dr Toro noted there will be a plan that promotes students getting vaccinated, but we cannot require that they get vaccinated.
3. Committee Reports (reports marked with an asterisk are informational reports intended for consent agenda only; if you would like a report to be discussed, please inform the President and Secretary by Monday, noon)
a. Sabbatical Leave Committee (P. Resetarits & B. Flinn)
- Prof. Paul Resetarits reviewed a slide presentation that showed:
- the membership of the 9-member committee, noting members’ terms and the chair and co-chair of the committee;
- the mission of the Sabbatical leave committee;
- the AAUP contract language pertaining to Sabbatic Leave;
- the process used by the committee’s work to select 24 awardees on our campus;
- the criteria used by the committee to rank the proposals received;
- suggestions for getting feedback on a proposal before submitting it to the committee;
- statistics about application pool and awards made;
- a list of the names of the recipients.
- Sen. Chakraborty asked whether unsuccessful candidates would receive feedback. Paul noted it was a confidential process, but he would be willing to speak with unsuccessful candidates and share as much information as could be shared.
- Sen. Ghodsi made some suggestions about additional information that should be considered. He cited a colleague within his department who has been rejected three times but has not received any feedback concerning why his prior proposals were not approved. He spoke to highlight what he feels it a problem with the process: that some people get multiple sabbaticals during the same period that others get denied repeatedly.
- Sen. Basim noted he had been denied multiple times, making him wonder how many people on the committee read his proposals. He stated he believes the process has no integrity. He called for the abolishment of the committee. F. Latour indicated he is not in favor of abolishing the committee. P. Resetarits explained that each committee member reads and scores every proposal, the lowest and highest scores are eliminated, the remaining scores are aggregated and those receiving the highest scores are recommended.
- Sen. Mahony reviewed the competitive nature of the process and applauded the current committee for asking that CCSU be allocated more sabbatical leaves. She stated she firmly believes it is the competitive nature of the process that leads to good proposals not being awarded. She also thanked current committee members and reiterated that resource allocations continue to plague us and that she hopes that the contract negotiation team is successful in making this case at the negotiations table.
- Sen. Blitz agreed with P. Resetarits that it is difficult for committees to give qualitative and quantitative feedback, however, it may be possible to revise the pdf form that was circulated prior to this round of proposals. The previous Word document seemed to work better. There should be a note that lets people know that they can submit more than what will fit in the space provided on the pdf. He suggested the University should also send to the BOR the abstracts of our members’ winning proposals so that the BOR can get a better understanding of the quality and purpose of the sabbaticals.
- Sen. Al-Masoud thanked the Sabbatical Leave committee for their work. He indicated he has not served on this committee yet, but he wanted to state that he does have faith in the committee and in the process. He asked whether it might be possible for the committee to give anonymous feedback to the unsuccessful applicants. For example, indicate which part(s) of the proposal could be improved.
- Senate President Emeritus Jackson spoke in support of the veracity of the current process. He agreed that it is difficult to provide individual feedback because of the individual nature of the review process. He spoke specifically to how high and low scores are dropped out, reducing each proposal’s score to an aggregate of seven scores, which are then ranked to identify what proposals can be awarded. He also noted that no proposals were deemed non-meritorious; there were simply not enough slots to award every proposal. He also noted that the committee’s membership changes significantly year to year, which adds to the complexity of giving pointers about how proposals could be improved.
- Sen. Mendez-Mendez noted he has had the benefit of two sabbaticals and that this may be getting blown out of proportion. While he understands that some people may feel otherwise, there is a clear process being followed that includes a good rubric.
- Sen. Chakraborty restated his prior comments stating it is not a question of credibility, but could the committee find a way to help people improve their proposals in the future? People have a right to know. P. Resetarits responded, echoing many of the points just made by fellow Sabbatic Leave committee member Jackson.
- Sen. Ghodsi restated his concerns. He stressed the process could be improved by including information about how many prior sabbaticals an applicant has had, how many years they have been at Central, and how many years have passed since the last successful sabbatical proposal. He asked for fair access to be given to everyone.
- MOTION: to call the question. Motion passed 42:2.
- MOTION: to accept the Sabbatic Leave Committee report. Motion passed 40:2.
b. BOR Research Award Committee (I. Gotchev)*
- Hearing no objection, F. Latour accepted the report on behalf of the Senate.
c. BOR Teaching Award Committee (M. Cistulli et al.)*
- Hearing no objection, F. Latour accepted the report on behalf of the Senate.
d. Curriculum Committee (B. Lee for T. Burkholder)
- The report was reviewed by B. Lee, with particular attention paid to courses that have not been scheduled and are subject to being cancelled and removed from the next catalog. If someone wishes to pull a course from the list, they should write to Tom Burkholder expressing such.
- MOTION: to approve the Curriculum Committee report. Motion passed unanimously.
4. Unfinished Business
a. Possible extension of Temporary Changes to Academic Policies to Spring 2021
- President Latour noted that this is essentially the Pass/Fail policy for Fall 2020. He proposed that a possible motion is that this policy would be extended to Spring 2021. There are three things that could be done: (1) approve an extension to Spring 2021 with some amendments; (2) postpone to next meeting to allow for departmental discussions; (3) postpone indefinitely. A possible fourth action could be to refer this to a committee, but that is unlikely.
- Sen. Adair spoke to convey there are many students doing well, but also many who are struggling. He is in favor of extending the proposal. Sen. Bray spoke in favor of reverting to the original policy to encourage students to have conversation with their faculty and advisors. Sen. Foster spoke in favor of extending the policy. Sen. Smith agreed with colleague Bray because she had many students make poor Pass/Fail decisions. Sen. Gamache agreed with Sens. Bray and Smith. Sen. Chakraborty spoke against extending the policy based on personal experiences with students who made poor Pass/Fail decisions. Sen. Langevin spoke against extending the policy.
- MOTION: to approve the Fall 2020 Pass/Fail policy to Spring 2021. Motion failed 16:25.
5. New Business
a. Student Opinion Surveys and other related matters for Fall 2020 and Spring 2021
- Due to the hour, Fred suggested senators take the draft shared with the agenda back to their departments and that this be placed on the agenda for the next meeting.
- Sen. Hughues commented that deferring a vote today may have impact on people going up for P&T because applications are due at the end of this month and the next Senate meeting is April 5. At the same time, a quorum call was made. A quorum was confirmed. F. Latour called for a vote on the proposal as stated.
- MOTION: to approve the policy on Student Opinion Surveys for Fall 2020/Spring 2021. Motion approved 31:1.
b. Resolution of Solidarity with AAPI community
- MOTION: to approved Senate Resolution of Solidarity with AAPI Community. Motion passed unanimously.
6. Adjournment
6. Adjournment
- The meeting adjourned at 5:23 p.m.