The University Committee met on Tuesday, February 17, 2009 in Molinaro Hall room D135.

Call to Order

The meeting was called to order at 3:35 p.m. by the Chair, Dennis Rome.  Also attending were committee members Herb Colston, Peggy James, and Farida Khan.  Committee members Chris Evans and Greg Mayer did not attend.  Gary Wood was present as Secretary of the Faculty.

Approval of Minutes

The minutes from the meeting of January 27 were approved as distributed.

Announcements

The February faculty representatives meeting is this Friday.  The budget and the UW-System Growth Agenda will be on the agenda.  There is some concern that the Growth Agenda may be subject to budget cuts.  Domestic partner benefits will also be on the agenda.

Dennis reported he met with the Chancellor after the last faculty meeting to discuss merit and merit pay.  The process by which merit scores are translated into dollars is very unclear and apparently very subjective. Specific questions were raised about normalization across departments and how faculty are informed when they do receive a merit raise. The consensus of the committee was that it should continue to press for information.  At the very least, someone in the administration should be able to explain what the current practice is, after that, perhaps some regularity could be introduced.

The University Committee election is concluded.  New committee members for 2009-2010 are Lisa Kornetsky and Rob Barber.  Michele Gee is the first runner up and will replace Herb during his spring 2010 sabbatical.

Nine nominations for the Faculty Distinguished Service Award have been received.  Nominees have until March 13 to submit additional supporting material.  Farida agreed to replace Dennis on the selection committee.

Nominations will open soon for the research, advising and teaching awards.

Peggy reported that she met with the Academic Achievement Assessment Committee and they now have a more clear idea of their role in the reaccreditation process.  They are planning to survey departments to find out what assessment is being done.  Gary will talk to Luellen Breed, Chair of the Academic Staff committee to recommend a math lecturer to fill the math vacancy on the committee.

Old Business

Results of the Chancellor’s survey.  Still no news about releasing the raw data and comments. 

Sabbaticals.  After much discussion and review of comments made at the February 12 faculty meeting, the committee agreed to revise the policies and procedures for reviewing and awarding sabbaticals.  Three specific items will be addressed; the composition of the review committee, the reporting of names of sabbatical recipients and the mechanism for providing feedback to applicants.  These revisions should be made in time for the March 10 meeting of the Faculty Senate.  Input and feedback from interested parties prior to the senate meeting could facilitate the process.  The workshop for faculty intending to submit sabbatical proposals will be held in April.

It was noted that under the current policy, the University Committee appoints faculty to the sabbatical review committee.  Herb pointed out that to avoid any appearance of conflict, UC members who have submitted sabbatical proposals should not be involved in selecting members of the review committee.  He and Peggy both recused themselves from this process last year.

The discussion of a faculty ombudsman was continued.  Peggy told the committee that this appears to be a very common thing on campuses all around the country.  She found a listing of least 600 members in a national organization.   She provided examples of resolutions to create ombudsman positions, guidelines for running an ombudsman office, lists of duties, etc.  Evidence shows that when such offices are created the number of formal complaints decreases.  Also, most issues ombudsmen deal with are not legal issues.  Interestingly, there are no faculty ombudsman offices in the UW-system.  Before drafting a proposal to create an office the committee should determine what compensation would be required for the person filling this position and then get support from the administration.  The Chancellor will be invited to discuss this at an upcoming UC meeting.

New Business

Kara Recker was appointed to the First Year Experience Committee as a one semester replacement for Vera Kolb who is unable to attend the meetings.

Jonathan Shailor was appointed to the Teacher Preparation Steering Committee as a one semester replacement for Wendy Leeds-Hurwitz who is on leave.

The committee discussed faculty hiring policies and procedures.  It was pointed out that the administration is following administrative policy 80 even though the Faculty Senate resolution PSF #20/07-08 approved on November 27 shows that administrative policy 80 is inconsistent with Wis. Stat. 36 and UWS 3 and states that faculty hiring policies and procedures are to be developed by the faculty.  Based on the senate resolution, policy 80 should be rescinded.  This is another matter to be discussed with the Chancellor.

The ad hoc committee on department chairs has not met.  Peggy asked that the committee include the roles and responsibilities of program directors in their discussions.

The spring faculty meeting scheduled for March 12 will need to be changed because of a conflict with a Chancellor Search and Screen Committee meeting.

Adjournment

The meeting was adjourned at 5:20 p.m.

Submitted by,

Gary M. Wood,

Secretary of the Faculty