Auburn
University Senate Minutes
November
14, 2000
Broun
Hall Auditorium
Absent: D. Norris, D.
Bransby, J. Saye, M. El-Halwagi, S. Krishnamurti, R. Crocker, G. M. Watkins, G.
Weaver, R. Paxton, S. Fuller, R. Britnell, CPT C. Hageman, LTC C. Buchanan.
Absent
(Substitute): S. Bilgili (R. A. Voitie), S. Bannon (F. Kochan), J. Bannon
(J. Owens).
The
meeting was called to order at 3:00 p.m.
The minutes for the previous meeting were approved as posted. They can be found on the Senate web page at https://auburn.edu/administration/governance/senate/schedule.html
Announcements:
A. President’s Office: Provost William Walker
Auburn
has been invited to join Phi Beta Kappa. Many months and years have gone into
this effort; those who have worked to bring this about, particularly Linda
Glaze, Joyce Rothschild, Dean Schneller, Dean Heilman, and the faculty of their
colleges are to be commended. This is a major event in the history of this
institution; thus, the Board of Trustees in their meeting last Friday passed a
resolution commending the institution on their approved Phi Beta Kappa chapter.
Our
consultants, Jim and Karen Nichols, whom we have obtained to help us in the
area of assessment, particularly outcomes assessment, were on campus Thursday
and Friday last week. Their report was
that we’ve done thus far a commendable job in getting things in order. They
will be returning on February 15th. What we were to have had in
place last week were the outcomes to be assessed, and on the 15th
the means of assessment are due. They
were very impressed with our efforts so far; I urge you to pass this along to
your colleagues and encourage them to continue their good work.
The
Tenure and Promotion committee meetings are underway. We’ve already met 5 or 6
hours; hopefully our deliberations will be complete by the end of Fall
semester. This will be ahead of schedule considering our usual progress in the
past years. Our goal is to get this work done by the first of the year so we
can make our recommendations to the President and he can get the results out as
soon as possible.
We
have appointed a Vice President for Student Affairs. Dr. Wes Williams, who is
currently at the University of West Virginia, will come on staff around the
first of the year. John Fletcher and
the entire staff at Student Affairs have done a super job handling this search
process for the past several months. I hope you will take the time to
congratulate those individuals from Student Affairs on a job well done.
Dr. Carl
Hudson, Finance: The means of
assessment were due in February but we need to know about the budget because
the different ways that you can assess learning outcomes requires money and
some units need to know if money will be provided or if it will come out of
unit budgets.
Dr. Walker: I have given Dr. Large a budget for
assessment as well as for the SACS accreditation. I do not know whether the
money has been moved or not, but there will be money there. I think we put in
for the Director of Assessment about
$100,000.
Dr. Hudson: When will the individual units know what
money is available?
Dr. Walker: I don’t know. We will appoint the Assessment
Director at the beginning of the year; it will be up to them to disperse those
funds.
Andy Redman,
SGA-Senate Liaison: At Friday’s Board
of Trustees meeting they passed a resolution regarding Summer graduation. What exactly was the resolution?
Dr. Walker: The board said that we would have Summer
graduation.
Dr. Carl
Hudson, Finance: Can you tell us
the status of the search for the Dean of the College of Business?
Dr. Walker: I’ve decided to postpone that search for a
while. I apologize for not alerting the search committee of that. With some of the things going on with the
College of Business, it seems to me that it would be better to postpone that
search. I should have a decision on
that by the middle of January.
Dr. Renee
Middleton, Counseling/Counseling Pyschology: So we will have Summer graduations from here on out or just this
Summer?
Dr. Walker: My impression is that we will have Summer
graduations every Summer.
Dr. Bruce
Gladden, Senate Chair: Mr. Spina did say
we were in a transition.
Dr. Walker: I presume that if we came to a Summer where
only 25 students wanted to graduate, the board would reconsider that. Right now I have no idea how many students
will be enrolled, will want to graduate, etc.
Right now we are trying to estimate the budgets for Summer school; we
have no background so it is a guessing game.
I’d
like to add my personal congratulations to everyone involved in the achievement
of the chapter of Phi Beta Kappa at Auburn University, particularly to those
mentioned by Dr. Walker: Linda Glaze,
Joyce Rothschild, and Deans Heilman and Schneller. Certainly this is something that everyone at Auburn University can
be proud of.
We
are presently establishing a nominating committee for Senate officers for next
year. That committee will be chaired by past-chair Jo Heath. Send nominations for the new chair-elect and
secretary elect to:
heathjw@auburn.edu
or Jo Heath, Parker Hall. Feel free to
nominate yourself. We would like to
have lots of people to step forward and have lots of participation. The
committee will be put together in early December, so it is not too early to
begin that process.
I
would like to thank all of you for forwarding the requests of the Administrator
Evaluation committee to your Department Heads and Chairs. We have received some valuable feedback from
some of them. We appreciate you getting the word out to them.
Finally,
I was pleased to know from a newspaper article in the Birmingham news that a group
of about 20 trustees from Boards of Education representing every state
university met with Governor Seigelman yesterday in Montgomery. They were lobbying for more money for
faculty raises, technology, and maintenance. This is in response to the State
Education trust fund. Board of Trustee
members from Auburn included Mr. Jimmy Samford and Rep. Jack Venable. They were
present trying to get a good cut of that trust fund for higher education.
Committee
Reports:
A. Calendar and Schedules committee – Dr. Christine Curtis
The
calendar committee has been working diligently trying to adjust these calendars
to meet all of our needs. As of Friday,
we will have a graduation for Summer 2001; the date being recommended is August
6. Finals end on the 4th of
August; the 6th would be an appropriate date for the
graduation. The calendar committee
recommends that we establish that date for graduation. Fall Semester will start on August 16, so we
will have approximately 10 days between Summer graduation and the beginning of
Fall semester. This date is not the beginning of classes, since we have many
meetings and orientations scheduled before classes start.
On
behalf of the calendar committee, I bring to you August 6th as the
graduation date for Summer term and I make a motion that we adopt that date.
The
motion was seconded and passed without dissent with a voice vote.
Secretary’s note: In the following section, Dr. Curtis is referring to an email survey sent out to the Senators 2 weeks prior to this meeting. The survey asked the Senators to rank 6 items in order of importance in determining the days for the Fall Semester calendar. This information was used as a guide by the Calendar and Schedules committee during their deliberations. The items the Senators ranked included: 75 day minimum; having the same number of types of days, ie, the same number of Mondays, Tuesdays, Wednesdays, Thursdays, and Fridays; Fall break; one full day off before Thanksgiving; 2 dead days; and ending as early in December as possible.
The
second item is the calendar for Fall semester 2001. One consideration none of
us thought of the last time we discussed the calendar was that classes were
actually scheduled to start on the 16th of August. With the
transition to the semester we are changing our payroll date so that we start on
the 16th of August rather than the 16th of
September. This would mean that if we
started on this date we would be starting on the first day of the payroll,
which would mean that we would not have any time for orientation of new faculty
or students, or for coordinating classes and activities for the Fall
semester. Therefore, the calendar
committee proposed that we take the calendar to the Senate and ask a number of
different things. I believe all of you
received a request from us to give your opinion of what was important for the
Fall semester. Remember we have
constraints in the Fall that we don’t necessarily have during the Spring, so in
the Fall we’re trying to start a couple of days after the 16th so we
can give those departments a chance to plan for the fall. Secondly, we have our Thanksgiving break;
thirdly, we have our traditional Christmas break. So we asked that the Senate look at six different things. Several years ago the Senate stated that it
would like to have 75 days of class in each semester. The students have since
requested that they have a fall break.
They did a study and a number of schools do have a fall break. Another
issue that has come up over the years is that we used to have a half-day of
class the Wednesday before Thanksgiving. This usually skewed things because of
low attendance unless we scheduled a test or something, because students who
lived four hours away or further did not have much of a chance to get home
unless they skipped class on Wednesday morning. We are ending later in December
with the semester system than we traditionally did with the quarter system; the
question is how late are we willing to end in December. Another issue that has
come up is trying to keep the number of types of days (Mondays, Tuesdays, etc.)
equivalent with holidays, the Fall break, etc. The last thing we asked you to
look at is having two study days before Final exams at the end of the
semester.
The
Senate then responded and we had a number of comments. Many gave some very interesting perspectives
and good ideas to the calendar committee.
Of the rankings, 43% of the Senators rated 75 class days as the number
one priority. Number 2 priority was 38% of the Senators responding that they
would like to have the same number of days of each day of the week. The third priority was Wednesday off before
Thanksgiving. The fourth priority was even between having a fall break and
ending as early as possible in December.
The last item, two study/reading days, did not really rank. The calendar
committee discussed all these issues. John Fletcher made an interesting
comment, saying we couldn’t go too deep into December if we expect grades to be
mailed before Christmas break. If you remember, in the last several years we’ve
had a fairly long Christmas break; I don’t know how much you’ve enjoyed it, but
I’ve enjoyed it thoroughly. This year
our last day here is the 18th of December, while graduation is the
16th; thus, we really only have a couple of days after grades are in
to get those grades out.
The
calendar committee looked at all the issues and priorities and made the
following suggestions, resulting in this proposed calendar:
2001 Fall Semester (74 Days)
August 17 Orientation for new students
August 20 Classes begin
September 3 Labor Day Holiday
October 10 Mid semester (37th day)
October 15-16 Fall Break
November 21-25 Thanksgiving Holidays
December 7 Classes end
December 8-9 Study/Reading Days (formerly
"dead days")
December 10-14 Final Exams
December 15 Graduation
The
17th is a Friday and is suggested as an orientation for new
students. Starting classes on Monday rather than Tuesday prevents us chopping
up another week. This particular calendar chopped up the weeks the least; this
is one reason the committee chose to present it.
The
students who came to the Calendar and Schedules committee last Spring felt very
strongly about the Fall break. The
student serving on the committee voiced, after the poll, that it was something
very important for the students, so the calendar committee felt that it was
something we should give a try.
In
accordance to the wishes expressed, the Calendar committee suggested that we
not try the half-day on Wednesday.
Classes
end on December 7; the Study/Reading days, December 8 and 9, are on Saturday
and Sunday.
Finals
week being December 10-14 and graduation following immediately on the 15th
does put the Registrar’s office in a bit of a bind. The cooperation of the faculty to get the grades in early would
certainly be appreciated on their part, particularly in regards to graduating
seniors. They were willing to give up the traditional day they have between
finals and graduation, however.
The
compromise that we have in this calendar is that it is 74 days. From the
various comments, the committee felt that the Senators gave the committee
enough latitude to move from 75 days to 74 days. In the comments it was also indicated that 75 would be optimum,
but 74 would be acceptable. The committee felt that looking at the various
parameters, this is the best we could come up with.
On
behalf of the committee I move that the Senate suspend its rule to require 75
class days in each semester and allow for Fall 2001 to have 74 days, based on
the analysis that has been done.
Dr. Gladden: This doesn’t
require a second since it comes from a Senate committee. Is there any discussion of this motion?
Adam Clayton,
SGA rep. to Schedules and Calendar committee:
We feel that the Fall break is very important because we have entered
into a period this semester where students are dragging their feet. People are growing tired of taking classes,
there have been a large number of course drops, and a growing number of people
not attending classes. We feel that the fall break would alleviate these types
of problems. I’d like to thank the Calendar and Schedules committee because I
think they’ve done a great job addressing the needs of students and faculty
with this calendar. On behalf of the SGA, I’d like to say that we are in full
support of this calendar.
Dr. Curtis: Bruce said
that I needed to clarify the motion.
The motion is to suspend the 75 days and allow the 74 days for Fall
semester 2001 and approve the calendar that is displayed on the overhead.
Dr. Jo Heath,
Immediate Past Chair: Do you have a count on the number of Mondays, Tuesdays,
and Wednesdays this calendar has?
Dr. Curtis: There are
three weeks that were broken.
Dr. Heath: How distorted
is it?
Dr. Curtis: Labor Day is a
Monday, the Fall break is a Monday and Tuesday, and Thanksgiving Holidays are
Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday.
Dr. Heath: This calendar
has five days for the Thanksgiving holidays.
Dr. Curtis: That includes
the weekend.
Dr. Herb
Rotfeld, Steering committee: When I heard some advance information
that this calendar would include a fall break due to the students’ desires, I
asked about other schools that had it and was quickly given a list. I asked about what happened to the
attendance during this week. Since we are going to have a half-week at
Thanksgiving, I don’t think any teacher doubts what’s going to happen to their
Monday and Tuesday attendance during that week. I was concerned that while the
SGA says they want a fall break, I don’t know what they think will happen in
the days around it. I was fortunate
enough to randomly be in touch with various faculty at different institutions
whom I asked about this fall break. I always received the same answer: forget it. In the days surrounding it the attendance
plummets. You lose a lot of work the week of Thanksgiving and the week of the
Fall break. I talked to a number of graduate students here who were familiar
with the fall break at other institutions and they said the same thing. Don’t
you think we are losing two weeks here?
Dr. Curtis: I have no
answer. I haven’t done that analysis. Are there any members of the committee
from last year here who may have done that analysis? Anyone with experience
from other schools? We are losing a week of days, but what you are saying is
that we will lose another week consisting of the days surrounding those breaks.
I understand but do not have an answer.
Dr. Bob Locy,
Biological Sciences: I think there are
actually two issues involved here. One is the issue of having the same number
of days, but the other issue is the number of times you break. For example, in
Biological Sciences where we have large laboratory class loads that meet
virtually every day of the week from 8 in the morning until 6 or after at
night. We set the labs up for the week and tear them down the weekend. When we lose a Monday and Tuesday,
basically, we can’t have labs Wednesday, Thursday, or Friday. So essentially, two breaks costs us two or
three weeks of labs. So I do not see such a problem with the number of days we
have class as with the number of times we must break class. Combining the fall
break with the Thanksgiving break serves Herb’s need and my need since I have
students coming to me already wondering if they’re going to miss anything important
in class if they are not there this Tuesday.
I’d like to propose to amend your motion and move the Fall break to the
beginning of the week of the Thanksgiving break.
The
motion was seconded.
Dr. Locy: I would also like to add that I would be prepared
to look at any information that the SGA or any other body could give me to help
me be better informed when I vote on this motion. I would like to see information supporting the benefits of a fall
break for students and faculty alike.
Dr. Gladden: Just to
clarify, you are proposing to eliminate the Fall break and have a full week at
Thanksgiving?
Dr. Locy: Yes.
Adam Clayton,
SGA rep. to Schedules and Calendar committee: I do not have any information
regarding the attendance. I do have this list from other schools regarding
their breaks. As you can see from this overhead, LSU is the only school that
does not have any type of break. All of
these SEC schools have some type of break.
To argue the case against students missing class, we see it two ways: one, it is to their own detriment. They can
miss class but it is their problem.
Second has to do with the number of class days. With 74 or 75 class days per semester we
have an average of 148 or 148 days. On the quarter system we have averaged 142
class days. If we did approve this calendar, this would be 6 to 7 more class
days per academic year than in previous years.
Andy Redman,
SGA-Senate Liaison: I would like to speak against this amendment. I do not
have any statistics or evidence to back myself up, just my own perspective.
Obviously the SGA supports a Fall break. The discussion was whether or not a
fall break would lead to more class days missed. Perhaps this is my own
personal opinion because I am used to the quarter system, but right now I am
ready for a break. I am ready to go home and see my mom. I know this is not
statistical data, but a lot of the people I’ve talked to feel the same way. I
think that because there has not been a break many students have been more
likely to skip classes. Of course there has not been a study on that, but I think a Fall break would actually help
class attendance. I think the Fall break is obviously supported by the students
and urge you to vote against this amendment.
Dr. Curtis: Herb, there
was one thought that came to my mind. When we met with the University of
Tennessee during the semester transition, they were the ones who introduced the
concept of Fall break to us. They indicated that when they started they did not
have it, but that faculty were the ones to indicate that they needed it and
that they felt it was beneficial.
Dr. Dennis
DeVries, Fisheries and Allied Aquaculture: It seems to me there are two
issues, one the issue of laboratories and the other the issue of students skipping
class. It seems to me that if a break is made available to them, then whether
they come to class or not is up to them. I would like to hear more from other
institutions that have that same problem of missing an entire week because of a
partial break.
Dr. Bill
Hames, Geology and Geography: He was sympathetic to those units that had labs and understood how broken
weeks were disruptive to teaching those labs.
Dr. Andreas
Illies, Chemistry: I think that my Department Head, Howard Hargis, would second
that. I support the idea of a Fall break, but I think it really means that
there would be one less lab. If the faculty could live with that, then it would
be okay.
Dr. Renee
Middleton, Counseling and Counseling Psychology: I just
wanted to get a better sense of the word “difficult.” Does difficult mean
impossible? Is it possible? I don’t understand what “difficult” means, because
a lot of things are difficult but we still do them.
Dr. Bill
Hames, Geology and Geography: There are certain labs that we feel
compelled to teach our students.
However, under the semester system we will drop some labs that are
designed to go along with certain lectures or topics.
Dr. Steve
Knowlton, Physics: To answer your question, I think it is difficult, but it is
one of the prices you pay for having a Fall break.
Dr. Bob Locy,
Biological Sciences: Kind of like Steve was saying, we could accommodate one
break, maybe stretch and accommodate two breaks by designing something that is
a little more flexible. When you start breaking the semester three or four
times, it is impossible to take back much of what you normally do in labs. In
our case, since we have so many lab sessions we must teach, we start first
thing Monday morning and go until last thing on Friday night. We can’t set
something up for part of the week.
Adam Clayton,
SGA rep. to Schedules and Calendar committee: Students
started coming to me in the middle of October letting me know how tired and
frustrated they were with school and no break. I feel as though if we wait to
give a full week at Thanksgiving, students will still be like they are now.
They will be dragging their feet and class attendance will be down. I do not
have any evidence or data to show that class attendance will increase if we
have a Fall break, but I personally feel that it will. The four-day weekend in
October will give students a chance to go to the beach, go see their family, or
stay here in Auburn and catch up on school work if they need to. I feel that if
we wait longer, until Thanksgiving, it will prolong this period of tiredness
where no one is attending class and academic work is being sacrificed.
Dr. Bob Locy,
Biological Sciences: From my point of
view as an instructor, if you give me two days off in the middle of the week it
is just dragging the semester out even further. Second, are your sources mostly
freshman, sophomores, or others, because those familiar with the quarter system
are most likely not used to semesters and might find it more difficult than the
freshman who only knows semesters. I teach mostly freshman so I do not get a
sense of what you are talking about.
Mr. Clayton: I feel that
giving a four-day weekend would allow time for students to recuperate. The
standard Fall now is week after week after week of the same routine. This break
would give them a chance to relax and come back; it is almost like a
mini-spring break. About the types of people coming to talk to me, I’ve had all
types including freshman, sophomores, juniors, seniors, grad students, and
faculty especially.
Dr. Curtis: One of the
comments that came through was that it is very difficult for some faculty,
particularly single parents for the school system to have a day off when we
don’t. Their point was that a number of classes would be cancelled those days
as well since there’s nothing to do with the children.
Dr. Paul
Schmidt, Mathematics: Personally I have
no strong opinion about a Fall break but I would like to tell you what the
faculty in mathematics told me when I asked for their input. I got very diverse, contradictory statements
about a lot of these scheduling issues but there was unanimousity about one
issue and that was the absurdity of a 2 day Fall break. So although it has been said that not only
the students but also the faculty suffer from the length of the Semester, that
is certainly not the opinion of the faculty in mathematics.
Dr. Gladden: Is there any
further discussion? Are we prepared to vote on this amendment?
A
vote on the amendment was taken by a show of hands. There were 34 in favor of
the amendment and 17 opposed, so the amendment passed.
Dr. Curtis: We will proceed with the calendar as amended
with the Fall break no longer there; instead those two days have been added to the
Thanksgiving break, giving a full week of holidays at Thanksgiving.
Dr. Alex
Dunlop, English: I have an angry
email from a colleague concerning the problem with pay schedules. This is
someone who is involved with training GTA’s at the beginning of the
semester. They are very concerned that
there will not be enough time at the beginning of the semester to do this. I am
simply passing on this complaint.
Dr. Curtis: This was
discussed at length by the calendar committee. At this point we have four days,
the 16th through the 19th, two of those days on the
weekend. We did not have a good solution. The only way to accommodate a good
solution would be to move the calendar deeper into December.
Dr. Dunlop: Could the
fiscal day be moved up?
Dr. Curtis: The fiscal
date goes from the 16th of August to the end of December, then from
the beginning of January to the 15th of May. Summer term will be the
16th of May to the 15th of August. If you moved it up to
August 1, then you’d have the trouble of overlap because of our graduation date
on the 6th of August. Then
you would have trouble in May because the last pay check would be on April 30th
and you wouldn’t be getting paid for those 15 days.
Dr. Jeff
Facteau, Psychology: Recording not
interpretable
Dr. Curtis: One of the
issues I understand to be a problem are the new GTA’s coming in, who would be
finishing up somewhere else that summer. There is the same issue with new
faculty. There are multiple issues
here.
Dr.
Bruce Gladden: Asked for a vote to
approve the Fall calendar 2001 as amended.
After
a hand count vote, the motion passed and the calendar was approved by a vote of
38 in favor, 13 opposed.
Fall 2001 Calendar
approved by the Senate:
2001 Fall Semester (74 Days)
August 17 Orientation for new students
August 20 Classes begin
September 3 Labor Day Holiday
October 10 Mid semester (37th day)
November 19 - 25 Thanksgiving Holidays
December 7 Classes end
December 8 - 9 Study/Reading Days (formerly "dead
days")
December 10 -14 Final Exams
December 15 Graduation
Dr. Mark
Rolsma, Pathobiology: Seeing that this is the second Fall out of two in a row
where we’ve had 74 days, it looks like we’re going to have a 74-day calendar no
matter what. I move to enable the Calendar and Schedules committee to approve a
74- or 75-day, preferably 75-day, calendar without having to come back to the
Senate for a waiver of this rule to always have a 75-day calendar.
The
motion was seconded.
Dr.
Gladden:
We have a motion to allow the Calendar and Schedules committee to have a
Fall/Spring semester calendar that would be preferably 75 days, but could be 74
days, without seeking Senate approval.
Is there any discussion?
Dr.
Jo Heath, Immediate Past Chair: We do still approve the schedule?
Dr.
Gladden:
Yes. This is a motion not to require specific waiving of the 75 days.
Dr.
Herb Rotfeld, Steering Committee: First of all, since we have to
approve every calendar, they’re not really asking for a waiver every time,
they’re just asking for approval as part of the calendar. Secondly, after
talking with the chair of the Calendar committee, he said we ended up with 74
this time and last because of the way the dates fell on the calendar and
certain issues with working it out. Thirdly, I’ve heard from a number of people
at different times about the 75-day requirement and how it gets in the way of
other things they want to do. I think it would be really nice to accommodate
these people who want fewer days to work throughout the course of the semester.
Lastly, one reason I consider the 75-day calendar an important thing deals with
something that came to us from the Board of Trustees. After having spent three fun-filled years on the Curriculum
committee during transition and going through every curriculum program on this
campus, we dealt with a certain restriction that was imposed by the Board of
Trustees: all of our programs be such that students can complete them in four
years. What this meant in some instances is that we had ceilings on some of the
courses that were going through. We had
a number of programs that came in and said that lowering the number of credits
required would considerably lessen the credibility of their curriculum. When we were on quarters I did a study on
the number of days and the number of days steadily decreased. I don’t won’t to start doing that now on the
semester system.
Dr.
Gladden: Any other
comments? OK, if there is no other
discussion, we will vote.
The
motion was passed by a voice vote.
Dr.
Gladden: I would like to thank all of you for
providing feedback on the calendar.
This is always a difficult task for that committee, so I appreciate you
helping out.
The
meeting was adjourned at 4:15 p.m.