September 19, 2012

FACULTY SENATE MINUTES
September 19, 2012

Present: John Allen, Emmanuel Boss, Douglas Bousfield, Dick Brucher, Stephen Coghlan, Mauricio da Cunha, Thane Fremouw, Michael Grillo, Robert Gundersen, Dennis King, Judy Kuhns-Hastings, Paul Myer, Harlan Onsrud, Ray Pelletier, Michael Peterson, Jay Rasaiah, Andrew Reeve, Brian Robinson, Thomas Sandford, Michael Scott, Howard Segal, Philip Trostel, Roy Turner, David Yarborough, Bob Rice, Kathryn Slott, Paul W Ferguson, Susan Hunter, Stuart Marrs, Melvin Johnson, Jennifer Hooper (GSG), Robert Jackson Pineau (USG)

Absent: Steven Barkan, Jason Bolton, Richard Borgman, Ian Bricknell, William Congleton, Benildo de los Reyes, Charlsye Diaz, Marcia Douglas, Dylan Dryer, Janet Fairman, Ramesh Gupta, Gordon Hamilton, Clarissa Henry, Steven Kimball, Dorothy Klimis-Zacas, Bill Livingston, Mary Ellin Logue, David Marcincowski, James McClymer, Robert Milardo, Martha Novy-Broderick, Claire Sullivan, Chuck Wallace, Mark Wells, Gail Werrbach, Robert Strong, The meeting was called to order at 3:15 pm

I. Welcome and Announcements:

Charlie Slavin Commemoration: Presentation by James Galagher See Appendix A for the text of the commemoration.

Following the meeting today there is an informal tea to celebrate the life of Professor Carol Gilmore. The reception is at the Buchanan House beginning at 4:30.

Moment of silence

Other announcements:

Committee sign up is being passed around. Serving on committees is very important to the senate.

Blue Sky Project – representatives from the senate are very involved in the project. President Ferguson has appointed Faculty Senate representatives to each team. They are as follows:

Mick Peterson – Maine’s Renewal
Jim McClymer – Money and Management
Rick Borgman – Morale and Marketing
Judy Kuhns-Hastings – Mentoring and Modeling
Doug Bousfield – Master Plan and Maintenance

Senate documents will now be on the webpage, only the agenda and motions will be printed for handouts. Parliamentary issues, voting will now be a voice vote instead of counting individual votes. If a vote is close, a count will be taken.

All FirstClass material has been moved to the webpage. If you are a committee chair and would like to have a web page for your committee, we can make you an author for that page. Some committees may wish to continue with FirstClass for private conversations with their committees. Let Kim know if you want to set up a FirstClass folder for your committee communications.

II. Approval of April 2012

Vote: Motion Approved

III. Committee Reports

BOT Rep – Robert Rice
There was a BOT meeting on July 9, 2012. At that meeting President Ferguson gave an overview and received approval from the BOT for the Blue Sky Project and compliments from the room. Increase funding for the New Media Center. Goals and Actions of the BOT can be seen at: umaine.edu/facultysenate/documents/

Three items by the Chancellor today; 1) performance funding, 2) Administrative review process that’s ongoing, 3) credit transfer project. We’ll be hearing a lot more about that project.

Next Monday there’s a Board meeting at USM, Goals and Actions will be on the agenda. Requested appropriation from the state, basically flat funding, 2014 $194,197,748 with $14.7 million will be meek funding, debt service $3.2 million, Casco Bay Estuary is about $35,000. The 2015, request for the same amount.

Gifts to UMaine were up about $2 million, 2011 it was $14.3 million and in 2012 it’s $16.4 millions. On Monday the BOT will go forward with naming of the new planetarium.

License plate revenue with System plate and Black Bear plate

Black Bear $97,902

UMS $71,000

Academic Affairs –Richard Borgman & Judy Kuhns-Hastings
The first meeting with be Monday, Sept. 24, 11:00 am in the Alumni Hall conference room (first floor)

Constitution &Bylaws – Mick Peterson
No report.

Research &Scholarship – Robert Gundersen
First meeting will be Sept. 28, 11:00 – 12:00, room to be determined. Taking active assessment of strategic implementation plan for research and scholarship.

Finance &Institutional Planning – James McClymer & Tom Sandford
We have representatives from each college with the exception of Education, if someone would like to volunteer.

University Environment – Andrew Reeve & Mike Scott
We’ll have an organizational meeting to determine the committee focus. Will be looking at the classroom environment. Looking for committee members.

Library Advisory – Robert Rice & Howard Segal
The committee met yesterday. The library is becoming an academic commons where students come to study and do research. Provost Hunter supported funding for the Digital Commons. UMaine is the only campus, out of seven, to have a Digital Commons. There are 2,299 items in the Digital Commons which have generated 53,000 downloads.

Ebooks – last year Fogler added 20,000 scholarly titles to ebooks. One of the benefits is that ebooks are not actually purchased until significant use is made of the book.

Service &Outreach – Emmanuel Boss & Claire Sullivan
Met two weeks ago. Rather than duplicate a committee that  Kristin Sobolik has we’re going to meet with that committee next week.

Committee on Committees – Roy Turner
Committee still needs three members; Natural Sciences, Business, and Cooperative Ext. Sent email to all faculty the other day. Thank you to those that replied. Still need people for Campus Planning, Cultural Affairs, and Honorary Degree. The next meeting will be next Friday at 10.

Program Creation & Reorganization Review – Michael Grillo
Committee met electronically. First meeting will be Fri., Sept. 21 with an open hearing in the Bumps room at the Union. Reviewing PhD in Communication at 2pm and MS in Spatial Informatics at 4pm. There will also be two other degrees that appear on the docket, MA in Bio Informatics, if committee gives a go ahead on that there will be a public meeting on October 19, also reviewing Human Dimensions of Climate Change. PCRRC is in need of a new chair because the chair has other commitments that will remove him from that position.

General Education — Vacancy
There are a couple members but still in need of a chair.

Ad Hoc IT – Martha Novy-Broderick & Mike Scott
Committee hasn’t met, sometime in the next two weeks.

Committee of the Administration
In the future the following committees of the administration will be asked for reports, if not reported on within one of the other committees. Our reps on Blue Sky Path teams will typically be asked to comment on progress.

IV. Invited Report from the Administration

President Paul Ferguson, Blue Sky Status, Plans & Faculty Engagement

President Ferguson expressed his appreciation for faculty involvement with the Blue Sky Project. The plan was designed to be inclusive and communicative. A strong commitment to engage the campus and the senate was helpful in that process. The BOT approved the project, it can be viewed on the Office of the President website. The Project is now at the implementation phase with items this year, in three years, and five years. The oversight team includes Presidents of the Foundation, Faculty Senate, Alumni Assoc., etc. Each Pathway is chaired by a cabinet member with broad representation i.e., Board of Visitors, Faculty, Students, Staff. We want to ensure accountability on what needs to get done this year, in three years, and in five years. Over the next several weeks there will be a role out to the campus about how the implementation plan is coming together. About 60 people are actively involved with the implementation.

President Ferguson introduced Dr. Jimmy Jung, VP of Enrollment Management. Dr. Jung commented on areas that Enrollment Management will concentrate on; communication to influence, increase contact with high school and middle school students, collaboration with department and colleges. The Admissions webpage was upgraded and it will also be made to accommodate access from smart phones, since most prospective students access information from their phone.

Questions

Q: What about the retention rates of students recruited from “new” areas for UMaine; are we looking at that?
A: Yes.

Q: What is the academic profile of the students recruited?
A: Susan Hunter: Not only will the number of students increase but also their quality.

Q: Why has the position of Vice President for Reserach been changed to Vice President for Research & Graduate Studies?
A: Susan Hunter: to broaden the integration of research and graduate studies.

Q: What is being done to eliminate the confusion in using p-cards?
A: Janet Waldron: UM is working with UMS to eliminate the confusion.

Q: What are the expected budget challenges and will they affect our academic programs?
A: Janet Waldron: for the incoming class, UM has met its budgeted student credit hours.

Q: What is UM’s relationship with INTO?
A: Pres. Ferguson & Janet Waldron: it is a group designed to bring in more international students.

V. Old Business
None

VI. New Business
None

Adjourned at 4:56 pm

Respectfully submitted
Kathryn Slott

Appendix A

Charlie Slavin Commemoration: Presentation by James Galagher

I want to thank the Senate for giving me the opportunity to continue last Friday’s celebration of Charlie and for me to say good-bye to an old and dear friend. Charlie and I go back nearly 25 years. I don’t have the time or, frankly, the emotional strength to talk about all of what connected us. I do want to talk about what for me was the strongest part of our connection and what I think are the most powerful connections and contributions of Charlie to the University of Maine and what it stands for. To state it very clearly: CHARLIE SLAVIN IS THE FINEST TEACHER I HAVE KNOWN. As I say that you need to know I have been teaching a very long time and have known many fine teachers – and some not so fine. I came to Maine and the Sociology Department in 1971 after two years at The University of Waterloo in Ontario and three years teaching my own courses as a graduate student at Indiana University.

I use the idea “teacher” in the broadest sense of the term. The teacher I envision is not simply a person who stands before a class and gives a lecture transmitting truth, beauty and required knowledge and then testing the passive listeners for how much of that absolute knowledge they have internalized. I am envisioning something far wider and far more basic and important to understanding what it means to teach. I can explain this best by talking about how I first came to know Charlie.

Sometime in the mid-1980’s two of my students came to me to tell me about this weird calculus teacher they had. Note they chose “weird” quite consciously. They were well aware of my “negative attitude” (I am trying to be very diplomatic here) toward a good deal of traditional education and toward grades. They also defined me as weird. They loved what Charlie did because he shared that weirdness. So they thought I should know about this guy. They loved and learned so much from Charlie because he did not stand and lecture at them. He did not measure their knowledge of the truth with the traditional test. They worked as a group that Charlie was a part of and acquired an understanding of calculus together as a community of learning. And the wonderful thing was that this community led them to connect to and comprehend the very nature and meaning of The Calculus.

After coming to know Charlie from his teaching calculus I began a long interaction with my friend. We co-taught in The Ages of Discovery Course for example. We had many conversations about teaching, grading and all that constitutes teaching and all that we thought should constitute teaching. I should point out that while these discussions were often aided by liberal doses of liquid lubrication, I could never convince Charlie of the inherent superiority of a pint of Guinness and a dram of Tulamore Dew over a martini.

Out of these interactions came our articulation of what teaching and education should be. This thing we call education is, or should be, a process seeking understanding of who we are as humans, as individuals and as active members of this thing, whatever it is, that we call reality. This must be a life-long process- it must be a life-long endeavor. It must be a journey. What we do as teachers is to recognize and validate the journey that we all are on. Our role as teacher is to facilitate and help guide the journey – on all of its dimensions. That needs to be based on the recognition of the inherent worth, dignity and potential of all of us on that journey. The essence of the journey is one of growing understanding and empowerment. All of us, all members of this community of learning, are both teacher and student. On that path of empowerment we must recognize the inherent potential of our humanity and work diligently to fulfill that potential.

What we also need to do is recognize the ability of the educational institution to control and disempower. What we are challenged to do is not participate in allowing the system to use that ability to objectify and disempower – whether it be of student or teacher

Charlie lived that vision. He lived it teaching Mathematics, he lived it teaching The Ages of Discovery. He lived it in all his teaching. Charlie became director of the Honors Program in 1997. I was on the committee that selected him for that position. In talking to the committee he outlined his vision for the program. Honors must be focused and directed toward facilitating that journey. That vision became The Honors Journey.

I have been a part of honors for a very long time – longer in fact than I have known Charlie. His impact on Honors has been profound. It has grown exponentially. It is now a College. It is now a community of learning with a residential component; it has a structure to facilitate faculty/student research and so much more. Building Honors was not an exercise in empire building. Every program, every aspect is generated by Charlie’s vision of the Honors journey. All has grown out of Charlie Slavin the teacher and his commitment to students and teachers alike having an environment in which they can continue their journey. I need to add one more element, a very personal element, to understanding Charlie Slavin the teacher. In 2000 I had quintuple by-pass surgery. At this point my partner, Kathie, tells me I have to be very careful in what I say. While I have no memory of this, as I was emerging from the anesthesia the first thing I apparently said was to cite an old Johnny Paycheck song (I was always a very careful scholar in my references and citations). Said song refers to what the singer’s boss could do with the singer’s job and implied in what part of the Boss’ anatomy it should be deposited. For me it had been a very long and often bruising 33 years on the road of academe and I was done. The battle was over. Shortly after I had come home, Charlie came to visit. As I sat in my chair, fervently praying for the pint and dram that I couldn’t have, I was feeling very sorry for myself. Charlie changed that fairly quickly. In that warm and gentle and sometimes acerbic style, he reminded me of who I was and how central all that I have talked about above was to both of us. He reminded me to connect back to the very core of myself, a core that we both shared. I am a teacher. He also reminded me that the teacher could locate self in the Honors journey. I took early retirement from the Sociology Department as soon as I could and began teaching, part time in the Honors College. I’m still here.

Charlie Slavin is the finest teacher I have ever known. His physical passing leaves a tremendous hole. But his legacy and spirit live on in a multitude of places and a multitude of hearts, including mine. Our challenge is that Charlie’s legacy be continued by all of us.

Safe Home My Friend, Safe Home