MEETING DATE:       August 26, 2010

 

PERSON PRESIDING:            Shanan Gibson

 

ATTENDEES:              Terry Jones, Sachiyo Shearman, Shanan Gibson, Reid Parker, Margit Schmidt, John Crammer

 

EX-OFFICIO:              Angela Anderson, Patrick Carr, Kimberly Heidal

 

VISITORS:                  JoLynne Daughtry, Lori Lee

 

The meeting was called to order at 10:00 a.m. in Rawl 142 by Shanan Gibson.  Gibson welcomed everyone and the committee members introduced themselves.  Due to a time conflict, the chair of the faculty was not available for the meeting. 

 

The committee then elected officers for the current academic year.

John Crammer nominated (Reid Parker seconded) Gibson for chair.  She was elected.

Crammer nominated (Parker seconded) Terry Jones for vice chair.  She was elected.

Gibson nominated (Parker seconded) Crammer for secretary.  He was elected.

 

Gibson started business carried over from last year:  creating a visual form of the calendar.  She pointed out that ITCS has done something better.  JoLynne Daughtry from ITCS talked to the committee about what they had done.  They created an ICS calendar that can be downloaded to outlook.  To do this, a calendar for the next semester needs to be created about a month before the semester starts (August 1 for Fall; December 1 for Spring, and April 1 for Summer). They have had about 300 downloads so far; instructions for downloading the calendar are on the academic calendar web page.  They would like assistance from the committee for adding events to the calendar.  Students have access as well as faculty and staff and would like access from hand-held devices.  Gibson pointed out that someone would have to do this every semester (the task should not be dumped on Lori Lee in the Faculty Senate office).  This should be the responsibility of the Calendar Committee (Lee said the person who does this could be her graduate assistant).  Gibson asked for the committee’s thoughts on this (we create calendars two years out); we would need to do the 2011-12 calendar now.  Angela Anderson said she definitely likes this (she currently uses two monitors).  Gibson added that it would be useful to indicate mobile format capability.  Kimberly Heidal said that she would like to have it on iPhone.  Gibson asked whether doing this would be a labor issue; it would not be much more work than we do now.  Parker said that we could do this as a group.  Lee said that she could train members of the committee each year.  Gibson noted that it appears to be unanimous that we do this.  Daughtry pointed out that we need to work on coordinating this; the current download is only for Fall 2010.  We do not want to create the download too early; once the download is done, it cannot be updated.  We might add a statement “Notice: this is accurate as of given date”.  Gibson noted that on August 1 school is not in session; the date for Fall should be May 1.  Daughtry emphasized that the calendar should not be released too early.  Parker suggested releasing Summer and Fall on April 1.  Daughtry asked if November 1 would be better for Spring.  Anderson and Gibson agreed that this is a good idea.  Lee asked Daughtry if she could send something out to all the faculty.  Daughtry showed a demo screen to the committee.  Gibson thanked Daughtry for presenting this to the committee.

 

Gibson said that since the committee has no standard meeting time, she requested that the members send her their schedule times and she would set up a meeting time.  The committee meets once per month and presents the proposed calendar to the Faculty Senate in March.

 

The committee returned to business carried over from last year.  Gibson noted that the committee tries to coordinate with Pitt Community College and Pitt County Schools.  Anderson noted that the county schools’ calendar is not released until spring.  Gibson also noted that we look at calendars from the other UNC schools for information; Crammer volunteered to pull up the calendars for the other schools.  Gibson asked whether the committee should create a faculty information calendar containing dates specific to the faculty.  This will be left as an ongoing task.  She asked for opinions as to what should be on the calendar.

 

New business concerns include establishing a process for making editorial changes and revisions to previously approved calendars and consideration of creating a final examination schedule for Distance Education classes.  Sachiyo Shearman asked about exam for night classes; their dates and times are in the narrative description above the dates and times for common exams and day classes.  Margit Schmidt asked about the conflict in exams for 5:00 classes and common exams; it was noted that this has become more of a problem as more undergraduate classes are being taught at 5:00.

 

The committee established goals for the current year:

  1. Create 2012-2013 calendar
  2. Editorial revisions process and Distance Education exam schedule
  3. Coordinate with ITCS on the visual calendar
  4. Faculty information calendar

 

Gibson pointed out that Crammer has drawn up a draft calendar for 2012-13.  Crammer also distributed a handout of key dates for old calendars and dates for ending Fall and starting Spring semesters.

 

Gibson will set a date for the next meeting and notify the committee.

  

The meeting was adjourned at 10:40 a.m..