February 25, 2015

FACULTY SENATE MINUTES
February 25, 2015

Present: John Allen, Steve Barkan, Dick Brucher, Stephen Coghlan, George Criner, Mauricio da Cunha, Paula Drewniany, Thane Fremouw, Gordon Hamilton, Jason Harkins, Marie Hayes, Zhihe Jin, Scott Johnson, Leonard Kass, Dorothy Klimis-Zacas, Irving Kornfield, Robert Lilieholm, Robert Milardo, Grant Miles, Patti Miles, Martha Novy-Broderick, Harlan Onsrud, Michael Peterson, Andrew Reeve, Brian Robinson, Jonathan Rubin, Thomas Sandford, Michael Scott, Howard Segal, Mary Shea, Kathryn Slott, Allan Smith, Owen Smith, David Townsend, Shihfen Tu, Gail Werrbach, Clayton Wheeler, David Yarborough, Bob Rice, President Susan Hunter, Jeff Hecker, Carol Kim, Ryan Low, Bonita Grindle (PEAC), Peter C. Altmann (CEAC), Lindsay Nutter (Stud. Gov),

Absent: Bob Bayer, Jason Bolton, Ian Bricknell, Sudarshan Chawathe, Charlsye Diaz, Scott Dunning, Gordon Robert Gundersen, Jordan LaBouff, Mary Ellin Logue, David Marcinkowski, Sidney Mitchell, Jennifer Moore, Deborah Rogers, Robert Strong, Charles Rote, Meghan Sills (Grad Stud Gov), Deans Council Rep

The meeting was called to order at 3:18 pm

I. Welcome, Announcements and Comments:

Irv Kornfield commented on an Op Ed recently published and his thoughts on the matter. He stated that work is being done to craft a thoughtful response.

Mick commented that pieces of the Op Ed contained sections that had been published elsewhere. He said the process may seen a little slow but senate is working on it.

II. Approval of Minutes

January 28, 2015

Vote: Approved

III. Committee Reports
BOT Rep – Robert Rice –
APRIP, tenure and enrollment were topics at the BOT meeting. APRIP’s new leader is Ellen Chaffee, there were 100 faculty leaders named. She wants mission differentiation of the strategic missions the System put out.

Enrollment numbers are out. The System has 27,231 students, 10,332 at UMaine. UMaine has a gender balance of 50/50; most other campuses are a majority female. FTE is down except at UMaine, which is up 1.7% for spring, and Fort Kent is up. Credit hours for the System are 293,577 with 40% at UMaine. Of the 27,231 students in the System, approximately 60% are between the ages of 18-24.

System-wide, approximately 103 faculty intend to retire or are retrenched. Ninety-one of those are tenured. The BOT is recommending tenure in March. There are 16 being considered for tenure, 3 from UMaine. The average age of faculty at UMaine is 57.9 for male faculty and 55.7 for female.

Q. Where is the money coming from for the constant ad USM has on television?
A. The Chancellor has stated that it is from internal money at USM.

Academic Affairs – Marie Hayes
The committee met last week, as a joint meeting with the Executive Committee. Outcomes Assessment was discussed, and that those assessments should be determined by faculty, not an outside group. Templates for faculty and departments to use would be useful. Patti Miles was at an Outcomes Assessment Conference last week. She said, in short, that the Multi-State Collaborative is at the national level. The goal of the meeting was to learn how to use the Rubrics that academics across the country developed. By May, she needs to evaluate 80 students from across the country using what she learned. Ultimately, we should be able to see how UMaine stacks up and stacks up against the other six campuses.
Q. Were the other six campuses involved in this?
A. No, Purdue, Texas A&M, Michigan, etc.
Grant Miles said that one way to compare is a test given to seniors. It shows where UMaine stands and most do quite well compared to other universities.

Constitution & Bylaws – Martha Novy-Broderick
No report.

Research & Scholarship – Scott Johnson & Mauricio de Cunha
The committee sent a draft document to Research and Creative Achievement for the purpose of providing a document to the System and BOT. The document will be evaluated at the next elected members meeting and ask the Provost and President to review it. The committee hopes to have it included in the 150^th celebration.

The VP for Research updated the committee on National Council and a large number of recommendations, Institutional risk, infrastructure, IT, etc. There is a subcommittee set up with research faculty.

The current survey will continue until the end of the month. Any researcher should participate in the survey.

Carol Kim said there would be a celebration on April 21, 2015 for faculty that have published books, plays, music, etc.

Finance & Institutional Planning – Tom Sandford
The committee met last week and continues to work with the IPED data that is located on the Dept. of Education website, looking at how UMaine compares. Some categories may be very broad so more material would be considered. Department faculty appear to go under instruction without research being included.

University Environment – Mike Scott
The committee will be bringing the issue of divestiture of fossil fuels back to the April meeting.

Library Advisory – Robert Rice & Howard Segal
No report.

Service & Outreach – David Yarborough & Jason Bolton
The committee met with Claire Sullivan regarding the Community Engagement Summit. This summit is for Administrators and Deans, there will be a more inclusive summit at a later date.

Committee on Committees – Executive Committee
No report.

Program Creation & Reorganization Review – Brian Robinson
The committee received an application for a BS in Cyber Security, presented by the Cyber Security Consortium. A degree would come from each campus. It is a new program and there will be a posting soon.
Q. Is it known how many students would be interested in this degree?
A. There have been estimates given and those go up each year.

Q. Harlan – The Chancellor hopes to have a degree in place by fall. This is a short timeframe that normally takes 2 years, is the process being circumvented?
A. The Provost said the Intent to Plan was just seen last week. He stated that it’s a good idea; there is nothing formal to circumvent the process.

Q. Someone asked if the Chancellor had suggested any other degrees. It appears things come out publically and then the campuses need to deal with it and implement.
A.This was faculty driven. There were meetings a year and a half ago with a lot of faculty involvement at that time.

Q. Is it a System degree?
A. No, each campus will offer their own degree.

General Education – Harlan Onsrud
The committee met with the System Office regarding the approved Block Transfer from last fall. They are now asking to do the same process for the Community Colleges. There have been several conversations on how to do that. The Community Colleges may not be current on evaluation of courses so possible a Rubric would see what students are learning. There’s a feeling that the timetable is rather aggressive. There’s a need to have Academic Affairs offices involved. Harlan stated that UMaine will determine the quality.

Q. If monitoring transfers from Community Colleges, what happens after 75 hours and 60 of those were from the Community College? Now they’re given a rubric at UMaine, how are Community College and UMaine courses/learning distinguished?
A. Provost Hecker – it can be determined. The Multi-State gives the tools, it’s up to us how we use them.

Ad Hoc IT – Michael Scott
The committee met with Dick Thompson and John Gregory today. DPC 100 will be getting an upgrade. There were discussions regarding the process of tickets and how to track the progress. A specific proposal for a one-page sheet listing who to call for hardware/software issues, etc. Asked to have an IT budget identified, Dick will present that at the next meeting.

Dick Thompson spoke regarding Red Zone. The old microwave spectrum used for ITV was coming to an end and the FCC gave a date to have a 3^rd party take it over. The first vendor fell through so Red Zone came in and had a good plan. The frequency would have gone back to the FCC if Red Zone hadn’t stepped forward. They will give some service back and pay the System $200,000.

Q. When will it be up and running?
A. Told within the calendar year.
Q. There’s some limited LTE coming back for use?
A. Yes, but it’s limited to approximately 500 devices. Once it’s built there will be an announcement.

Q. Faculty used to be able to purchase software needed at the UMaine bookstore at a reasonable price. Now it takes faculty hours to figure out where to buy and what the standard is. So, is System IT paying for licenses and how do we get them?
A. Not ready at this time but trying to come up with funding.
Q. Is there any help on campus for Gmail accounts? Told the other day, after the person tried to help, to Google it.
A. Dick Thompson said he and John Gregory would need to talk to find out. There are System people that can do it but they need to get that information out.

Committees of the Administration Reports
No report.
IV. Questions of the Administration

Q. Has there been a change in the Bond Rating for the System?
A. Ryan Low said this has political implications but in practicality it’s small. Higher education in general has a bad outlook. However, it’s another negative story.

Q. Who pays for IT upgrades?
A. UMaine System IT is responsible for infrastructure on campus and IT services provide maintenance once it’s installed.

Q. There have been conversations regarding the centralized budget. Does the money stay here in an account?
A. The depreciation money stays here “as it is today.” The policy on reserves, some departments, for instance, have saved funds for several years to purchase equipment. The policy needs to be looked at because it’s not right to take those funds.

Q. Mission differentiation between campus’ and benchmarks with peers rather than comparing to each other, shouldn’t it be recommended to use benchmarks with peers and who our competitors are?
A. Yes. That is frequently brought up as well as student enrollment, quality of students, percentage of tenured faculty, etc. There needs to be a conversation and quickly. The Provost said he hopes that’s what APRIP and the sub-teams will do.

Q. Are the research funds administered by Sponsored Programs stable or part of negotiations to change the formulas?
A. The MEIF budget line may increase. If it stays the same the distribution is 30% to small campuses, 80% UMaine, and 20% to USM. There are legislators from the south that would like to increase the amount to USM, small campuses would like more also. The System gives testimony neither for nor against. UMaine will continue to monitor and participate.

Q. Are the outside dollars managed secure?
A. 95% of the funds are MEIF, very little is E&G.

Q. Asked to Ryan Low, do you lobby for UMaine or for the System?
A. All UMaine, all the time.

Sounds like two places faculty need to be budget wise.

Q. Are we moving closer to a zero balance on E&G funding?
A. Some parts of that are good but how do we implement it. System oversight is all about implementation. There is a meeting with the Vice Chancellor next week.

V. Old Business
None

VI. New Business

Sexual Harassment Policy at the University of Maine