Faculty Governance Committee
Minutes of
the Meeting
December 3,
2008
Members
Present: Marianna Walker, Jan Tovey, Catherine Rigsby, Phyllis Horns, Marilyn
Sheerer, Edson Justiniano, Mary Gilliland, George Bailey, Mark Jones, Ken
Wilson.
Others
Present: Linda Ingalls, Hope Murphy,
Lori Lee, Chancellor Steve Ballard.
Edson
Justiniano served as Chair of the Faculty Governance Committee due to
Purificacion Martinez’s absence.
I.
The minutes of the 10/27/2008 meeting were approved.
II.
Appendix D – Section V.D.2. - Discussion occurred regarding the
faculty advisor and the representatives for both the complainant and the
respondant(s). See Section D-5 (2), Conduct of the Hearing. Mark Jones recommended that someone should write
up this section and send to the committee. Marianna Walker volunteered to edit
the section “Conduct of the Hearing” and send to committee.
Discussion of Appendix D – Section
V. E, Procedures after Hearing. Hope Murphy advised the committee that this
section was revised
to comply with BOG document re: “burden of
proof” instead of “clear and convincing”, which is not in Code 604 D.
III. Edson Justiniano welcomed Chancellor
Ballard to the Faculty Governance Committee.
Initially,
there was discussion with the Chancellor, regarding faculty senate resolutions.
The committee members requested that if the Chancellor has concerns about a
policy or document, that a dialogue take place regarding the particular issue.
Discussion
between the Chancellor and committee member continued regarding “collegiality”
vs. “professional misconduct”, as referenced in Appendix C. The Chancellor asked the committee to review
“professional misconduct” and how to incorporate this term into the faculty
manual. The committee agreed to undertake this charge.
In
reference to the review of administrators and the draft document from the
Faculty Governance Committee, Chancellor Ballard stated
the
following in his remarks to the Faculty Governance Committee.
In
December 2007, the Board of Trustees approved what they wanted in the review of
administrators. Afterwards, there was confusion
among
the campus community about what
procedures to follow. Since the approval
of the BOT policy, there have
been 4 deans
hired
with the BOT policy.
The
BOT feels strongly about the approved policy and are unhappy that 18 months
later there is still no final development on how input is gathered during the
review process. They see the overall
review of administrators policy a done deal and that they blame him, the
Chancellor, for the responsibility of resolving any issues relating to the
University policy. Chancellor Ballard
stated that he has discussed this in detail with the BOT and stated that we are
in an experimental time period of 30 months on the 5-year evaluation and shall treat
this BOT policy as under development with suggestions for review going back to
the BOT during the 2010-2011 academic year.
He stated that what he wishes from the Faculty Governance Committee is
the best possible mechanism to gather faculty input into the 5-year review of
administrators. He stated that there was
plenty of implementation in the current policy and that he felt the Committee’s
draft document was too prescriptive. He wants the Committee’s proposed guidelines
to be consistent with what is required by the Board of Governors and BOT
policy. These guidelines would not be a part of the BOT policy and the
authority to adhere to them would be given to each Vice Chancellor.
Professor
Rigsby asked about his rejection of the actual direct quotes taken directly
from the Board of Governors’ policies. She stated that the Committee had, in
good faith, used the best practices given to them by Chancellor Ballard. Chancellor Ballard stated that no one,
including the faculty or administration could overwrite or change the BOT
policy. He reiterated that the BOT
policy would be in force, with discussion and review considered during the 2010-2011 academic year. If there are different ways to gather faculty
input then he is open and willing to hear them. Chancellor Ballard then stated
that he would like to see copies of the best practices forwarded to the
committee for their use.
Professor
Tovey stated that she would provide copies for him and stated that she saw the
Committee’s proposed guidelines to be broader than what was originally asked
for. It was binding administrators to
specific review and not how to obtain faculty input for the review.
Chancellor
Ballard stated that he suggested that the closer the person being reviewed was
to faculty (i.e. unit chair) the more the faculty should be involved, but that
there still needed to be some flexibility in the guidelines to allow the Dean
and/or Vice Chancellor to suggest ways to gather more faculty input. Again, he stated that this would not be a
part of the BOT policy.
Professor
Bailey stated that the BOT policy was specific that the names of interview
candidates would go forward, but beyond that the BOT policy was fairly open and
he was surprised that more options were not really closed off. He stated that the BOT policy failed to
address procedural issues and that the Committee saw this as fair ground. He then asked Chancellor Ballard how
formalized can the guidelines be written in regard to how faculty are chosen to
play a role in the review of the administrators? How specific at what level is
faculty participation useful i.e. would the evaluation of the unit chair should
include a majority of the faculty in the unit?
At the VC level, would the participation be more broad? In particular, how would non-unit code deans
be evaluated (i.e. Arts and Sciences Dean)?
In the past, VC Smith thought that the unit-code deans should be
evaluated and started this and now it has become the procedure. Then Muse’s policy took that and stated that
faculty played a role in the evaluation of those administrators, beginning at
the first level and all the way up.
Regarding
administrator hires, Chancellor Ballard stated that the BOT policy ensures that
at least 3 names are presented to the VC from the search committee, which
allows the VC to pick the most appropriate candidate.
The
Chancellor furthered his discussion by stating that he does not want to have
direct involvement in the evaluation of the deans, because he feels that that
should be faculty. But he does want more
than just faculty involvement in evaluating those administrators higher up the
chain of command.
Professor
Bailey stated that in recommending faculty input at the dean level that the
Committee’s guidelines could be less prescriptive by stating that faculty input
will come from N number faculty
appointed in a particular way but not chosen by the administrator.
Provost
Sheerer stated that Deans Niswander and Elwell have asked what process will be
used for their 5-year administrative review.
She stated that she is going to use Muse’s process, which calls for a
lot of faculty input. She feels that
this will not be going against the new BOT approved policy.
Professor
Justiniano stated that the problems of the administrative review related to how
the administrators in charge appointed/selected members for the review
committee and that was what the Committee was trying to address.
Chancellor
Ballard stated that his concern related to where the faculty came from and that
they must come from the same dept/unit of the administrator. If a provost is
being evaluated, then the make-up of the review committee would vary
tremendously and that it should not be made up of a majority of faculty. He
stated that he didn’t remember the particular procedure proposed for selecting
faculty but agreed that, in relation to a department chair, the majority of the
review committee should be faculty from that particular academic unit. He would like to see less descriptive
procedures because that leaves little flexibility for those forming the review
committee. For example, if VC Mageean was being reviewed, he would not want to
have guidelines that were so descriptive that faculty had to come from the
Faculty Governance Committee,
Professor
Justiniano asked if the Chancellor would agree to allow a standing committee to
appoint some faculty members to the review committee. For example, if the Chancellor thought that,
with this example, would he agree to a procedure that allowed some faculty
appointments from the standing Committee on Committees through the
Professor
Rigsby stated that the Committee’s goal was to come up with a procedure that
provided a broader faculty voice, no matter what high level administrative
position was being evaluated and that having the
Chancellor
Ballard responded that he did not think that having a broader point of view was
only attainable through a strict prescribed manner. He thanked the Committee
again for their hard work on this and appreciated their collective efforts on
drafting guidelines that work the best for all involved. He reminded the Committee that there was
still testing left to do with the BOT policy that he feels is currently working
and that he looked forward to working with the committee on this during the
2010-2011 academic year.
Respectfully
submitted,
Marianna
Walker