March 1, 2017

DRAFT FACULTY SENATE MINUTES
March 1, 2017

Present: Bob Bayer, Erik Blomberg, Jason Bolton, Emmanuel Boss, Tony Brinkley, Laura Cowan, Mauricio da Cunha, Farahad Dastoor, Paula Drewniany, Per Garder, Michael Grillo, Chris Grindrod for Nancy Hall, Zhihe Jin, Leonard Kass, Peter Koons, David Kress, David Marcinkowski, George Markowsky, Grant Miles, Patti Miles, Sidney Mitchell, William Nichols, Clint Relyea, Bob Rice, Deborah Rogers, Deborah Saber, Michael Scott, Kathryn Slott, Mona Therrien, David Townsend, Shihfen Tu, Mark Wells, Gail Werrbach, Clayton Wheeler, Jen Bonnet (PEAC), Brian Preziosi (Grad Stud Gov)

Absent: John Allen, Dean Astumian, Sudarshan Chawathe, Scott Dunning, Thane Fremouw, Amy Fried (resigned), Sam Hanes, Jason Harkins, Jordan LaBouff, Brian McGill, Brian Olsen (sabbatical), Howard Segal, John Singer, Owen Smith, Andrew Thomas, President Susan Hunter, Provost Jeff Hecker, Carol Kim, Peter C. Altmann (CEAC), Hashim Allah (Stud. Gov.)

The meeting was called to order at 3:20 pm

I.  Welcome, Announcements and Comments:

II.  Approval of Minutes
February minutes will be available at the next Full Senate meeting.

III. Committee Reports
BOT Rep – Patti Miles
Tomorrow the BOT Reps travel to Augusta to the Maine Legislature Committee meeting on Higher Education. There will be an opportunity to speak with people after that meeting. If you have any items you’d like discussed send them to Patti Miles.

BOT Reps met with the Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs with an emphasis on; One University being difficult to implement without an ease of transfer credits, transfer of grades, support material, and MaineStreet being different campus to campus. There are several issues prior to One University moving forward; Hanover Research was hired to help find peers important for benchmarking; also discussed was how increasing enrollment can’t solve problems.

Q.  Did the Vice Chancellor mention the cost to find peers?
A.  No

Q.  Is this for him or to find peers in other areas, i.e. budgets etc.
A.  Other areas also, he mentioned several areas to compare at UMaine.

Q.  Is this geared to finding peers for NEASC?
A.  No, but helps.

Academic Affairs – Michael Grillo
The committee will try to coordinate a meeting over break. Monday/Wednesday and Tuesday/Thursday class options will be revisited.

Comment: Regarding courses scheduled at alternate times, cancellation of classes at 12:20 and after is confusing when a class starts at 12:00. It appears some receive an email stating noon classes are cancelled but not everyone. Patti stated that with Infosilm the goal is to have consistent start times but long classes do pose an issue.

Constitution & Bylaws – David Townsend
There is a motion under New Business

Research & Scholarship – Emmanuel Boss & Mauricio de Cunha
The search committee for Vice President of Research and Graduate School Dean received several comments regarding the candidates. The committee will examine how a motion to the BOT, what it will contain and if it will move forward. There will be a meeting with the Interim VP for Research on March 15.

Finance & Institutional Planning – Grant Miles

No report other than setting up a meeting with Claire Strickland regarding shared services.

Service & Outreach – Jason Bolton
Trying to get the committee involved with Pathway 1. The Strategic Plan will be assessed over the next several months.

Committee on Committees – Michael Grillo
The call for volunteers for committees on Pathways went to all faculty as well as senators. There is a due date of March 3. Senate has asked for two members to be placed on each committee.

Election of Faculty Senate Officers will take place at the April Full Senate meeting. This is the first call for anyone interested.

Program Creation & Reorganization Review – Sid Mitchell
New Media will have a new administrative structure, from a department to a program. This isn’t a Faculty Senate issue, only an informational statement. Mike Scott stated New Media would now be under Computing and Information Science, they previously were a stand-alone department.

General Education – Farahad Dastoor & David Townsend
The committee is making progress, has working groups from colleges, and will meet after break. It was asked if the committee would assess all courses, they said no. There are 700+ courses listed as Gen Ed, not sure at this time if all courses will remain Gen Ed.

Ad Hoc IT – Michael Scott & Patti Miles
No report.

Ad Hoc Shared Governance – Jason Harkins
The committee met Monday to draft a survey regarding Shared Governance. Hoping to have the draft ready in two weeks.

University Environment – Kathryn Slott & Clint Relyea
The committee met February 8, discussed the classroom study from last year and is in the process of drafting a motion. Clint has been working on Hiring Retention and Spousal Accommodations. Looking to have a motion for the April meeting.

Reports of Faculty Members on Committees of the Administration
Grant Miles gave an update on the Portland MBA proposal and said that the MBS would not attend a planned meeting until further information was received. The committee would like to see the MOU with the Alfond Foundation. The first benchmark for money from the Alfond Foundation is March 31. USM has concerns that may, or may not, be shared with MBS.

Q.  Is the process a good idea?
A.  The idea of offering a new MBA in Portland with UMaine’s name appears to have merit. As it’s worked through real problems arise. The Maine Business School is doing it’s best to stay involved.

IV.  Announcements and Updates from the Administration
No report – Most administrators were in Augusta for UMaine System presentation to Legislators.

V.  Questions of the Administration

Q.  Why does USM have more IT support staff when UMaine is larger and has more students?
A.  Robin stated USM and UMaine have the same number of staff but they are looking at it because it’s felt UMaine needs more on campus IT staff.

Q.  There was a power outage Friday night that went undetected or reported, some buildings lost internet connection. Is there a move for public sites when there are power issues with IT?
A.  There is a site but it doesn’t show IT issues. The department is working on doing a better job with this issue.

Q.  During a recent holiday IT had the day off even though classes were is session. Shouldn’t they be here when classes are in session?
A.  Someone stated next year President’s Day and Patriots Day would be a day off, no classes.

VI.  Old Business
None

VII. New Business
Motion to begin the process of amending the University of Maine Faculty Senate Constitution to clarify Article IV: Membership
Constitution and Bylaws Committee, March 1, 2017

Introduction:
This motion addresses two issues:

First, the University Teaching Council has informally asked the Faculty Senate to consider membership on the Senate for Adjunct Faculty; and

Second, it has been pointed out that there is no formal recognition of the Honors College in the Faculty Senate Constitution with respect Senate representation.

During, and following, a meeting of the Constitution and Bylaws Committee on October 26, 2016, it was noted that current wording in the Constitution, Article IV: Membership, is vague but nonetheless implies that Faculty Senate membership is limited to full-time UM faculty, thus precluding membership of Adjuncts who are not full time. At a subsequent discussion of this issue at a members only meeting of Senators, it was agreed that the intent of language in the Constitution was to limit membership on the Senate to full time faculty. The Constitution and Bylaws Committee felt that part-time Adjuncts, while not eligible for election to the Senate, may be assumed to be affiliated with departments and/or colleges, and are therefore already represented in the Senate.

The Constitution and Bylaws Committee also found that wording in the Constitution is similarly vague with respect to apportionment of Senate representation among the colleges.

The proposed changes in the following motion are an attempt to clarify these two issues, and can be summarized as:

  • The Constitution is re-worded to state more clearly that only full time faculty members are eligible to serve as Senators, thereby clarifying what is only alluded to in the present wording in Article IV. Section 1.A.2. as “…one Senator will be elected for each ten full time faculty members.”
  • Because there currently are, and may be in the future, colleges with fewer than 10 faculty, we have changed Article IV. Section 1.A.1. that states: “Each college shall have at least four Senators.” To “Each college shall have at least four Senators, except colleges with fewer than 10 faculty, which shall have two Senators.”
  • We have clarified membership for The Maine Business School, which by its title is not explicitly a “college”, by recognizing it as a college.
  • We formally recognize the Honors College, which will be represented the same as the other colleges, with one Senator for every ten full time faculty members, or a minimum of two Senators, whichever is greater.

Motion:
The Faculty Senate of the University of Maine recommends that the Constitution and Bylaws Committee formally submit the following revision of Article IV: Membership to the Secretary of the Senate in order that procedures detailed in Article IX: Amendment commence to amend the Constitution accordingly. Proposed changes to Article IV follow. Omitted text is indicated by strikethrough and added text indicated by underlining.

Article IV: Membership

Section 1. Faculty members. The faculty members of the University of Maine shall elect faculty Senators as follows:

A.  Eligibility

  1. Only full-time faculty of the University of Maine are eligible to serve on the Faculty Senate.

A. B. Apportionment.

  1. Each college shall have at least four Senators except colleges with fewer than 10 faculty, which shall have two Senators. Faculty senators will be distributed across the colleges so that one Senator will be elected for each ten full time faculty members, rounded upward. The Maine Business School and the Honors College are hereby formally recognized as colleges.
  1. Faculty senators will be distributed across the colleges so that one Senator will be elected for each ten full time faculty members. For purposes of apportionment, full-time members of each college shall be designated by the dean of that college. The criteria used will be subject to approval of the Senate. Each February, the deans of various colleges shall send the Senate Secretary a list of full-time faculty. Using the above rules, the Secretary, subject to the approval of the Executive Committee of the Senate, shall determine the number of faculty representatives to the Senate to which each college is entitled and shall so inform the deans. Departmental chairpersons shall be eligible for election as faculty Senators.
  1. The Cooperative Extension faculty, who are not represented as part of a college, shall be represented by two Senators. These representatives shall be elected in the manner described in Article IV, Section 1.8. [note that there is no Article IV, Section 1.8]
  1. In the event of changes in the composition of colleges or distribution of faculty across colleges, the Executive Committee of the Senate shall formulate a plan to phase in the adjustments to apportionment of Senators resulting from such changes. Such a plan must include the provision that elected Senators shall have the option to complete their term even if the resulting number of total Senators is temporarily greater than forty.

[With subsequent sections numbered accordingly]

The revised text would now read as follows:

Article IV: Membership
Section 1. Faculty members. The faculty members of the University of Maine shall elect faculty Senators as follows:

A. Eligibility

  1. Only full-time faculty of the University of Maine are eligible to serve on the Faculty Senate.

B. Apportionment.

  1. Each college shall have at least four Senators except colleges with fewer than 10 faculty, which shall have two Senators. Faculty senators will be distributed across the colleges so that one Senator will be elected for each ten full time faculty members, rounded upward. The Maine Business School and the Honors College are hereby formally recognized as colleges.
  1. For purposes of apportionment, full-time members of each college shall be designated by the dean of that college. The criteria used will be subject to approval of the Senate. Each February, the deans of various colleges shall send the Senate Secretary a list of full-time faculty. Using the above rules, the Secretary, subject to the approval of the Executive Committee of the Senate, shall determine the number of faculty representatives to the Senate to which each college is entitled and shall so inform the deans. Departmental chairpersons shall be eligible for election as faculty Senators.
  1. The Cooperative Extension faculty, who are not represented as part of a college, shall be represented by two Senators.
  1. In the event of changes in the composition of colleges or distribution of faculty across colleges, the Executive Committee of the Senate shall formulate a plan to phase in the adjustments to apportionment of Senators resulting from such changes. Such a plan must include the provision that elected Senators shall have the option to complete their term even if the resulting number of total Senators is temporarily greater than forty.

Vote:     Passed

Opposed 1

Adjourned 4:00 pm

Respectfully submitted,
Grant Miles

Prepared by Kim Junkins