EAST CAROLINA UNIVERSITY

FACULTY SENATE

FULL MINUTES OF MARCH 20, 2007

 

The seventh regular meeting of the 2006-2007 Faculty Senate was held on Tuesday, March 20, 2007, in the Mendenhall Student Center Great Room.

 

Agenda Item I.  Call to Order

Mark Taggart (Music), Chair of the Faculty, called the meeting to order at 2:10 p.m. 

 

Agenda Item II.  Approval of Minutes

Reisch (Business) requested and received two revisions to the distributed minutes of February 20, 2007. 

 

In Section II.A. Roll Call, “Bradley for Reisch” should read “Bradley for Christian” and

 

In Section I. I.Question period, “Bradley (Business) noted that after 5 p.m. available A spots close to the Bate Building were hard to find” should read: “Reisch (Business) noted that after 5 p.m. available ‘A’ spots in the central East Campus area were hard to find, and stated that he would like the Parking and Traffic Policy Committee to consider reserving several spaces for ‘A’ stickers 24 hours per day in several ‘A’ lots.”

 

The minutes of February 20, 2007, were approved as revised.

 

Agenda Item III.  Special Order of the Day

 

A.        Roll Call

Senators absent were: Professors Rastatter (Allied Health Sciences), Kim (Art and Design), Brown (Education), Tovey and Deena (English), Hall (Music), Smith and Coddington (Technology and Computer Science), Parker (Theatre and Dance), Chancellor Ballard, Rigsby (Geology/Past Chair of the Faculty), and Cope (Psychology/ Faculty Assembly Delegate).

 

Alternates present were: Professors Boklage for Fletcher (Medicine) and Kirkpatrick for Eason (Nursing).

 

B.        Announcements

1.         The annual Teaching Awards Ceremony is scheduled for Tuesday, April 24, 2007, at 11:00 a.m. in the Mendenhall Student Center Great Room.  A reception will follow immediately afterwards.  Faculty awarded for their teaching achievements will be recognized at this event and all faculty are welcome to attend.

 

2.         There will be a Faculty Officers’ Candidate Forum on Thursday, April 19, 2006, from 2:10 – 4:00 p.m.  in 105 Rawl.  All faculty are invited to attend and discuss issues of importance with the various faculty officer candidates. 

 

3.         The Chancellor has approved the following resolution from the January 30, 2007, Faculty Senate meeting:

            07-01  Revised Part XII. Personnel Action Dossier of the ECU Faculty Manual

 

            The Chancellor has approved the following resolutions from the February 20, 2007, Faculty Senate meeting:

 

07-02 Commendation for Catherine Rigsby, Past Chair of the Faculty

07-05  Revised College of Health and Human Performance Unit Code of Operation and Department of Geology Unit Code of Operation.

07-06  Curriculum matters contained in the minutes of the December 14, 2006, January 11, 2007, January 25, 2007, and February 8, 2007, University Curriculum Committee meetings.

07-07 Revisions to the ECU Faculty Manual, Part XIII. Promotion and Tenure Timeline.

 

Chancellor Ballard noted that he has not addressed the status of Resolutions 07-03 and 07-04 because both need further review by other offices before he can respond. He expects the reviews to be completed in the near term, and will respond to the Chair of the Faculty as soon as the reviews are received and time permits.

 

07-03  Revisions to the ECU Undergraduate Catalog, Section 5. Academic Regulations, relating to Grade Points and Grade Point Average, Grade Replacement Policy, Warning and Probation, and Special Readmission (Forgiveness) Policy.

07-04    Revisions to the ECU Faculty Manual, Part VI.I.J. Salary Policies.

 

4.         Academic Committee Chairs are reminded that Committee Annual Reports are due in the Faculty Senate office by Tuesday, May 1, 2007. 

 

5.         Faculty members are reminded that April 1 Chancellor Ballard will call for candidates for the prestigious 2007/2008 Oliver Max Gardner award.  A copy of the University’s nomination procedures is available at: http://www.ecu.edu/cs-acad/fsonline/customcf/committee/aa/maxgardneraward.htm

 

6.         On March 5th, the Chancellor's Executive Council approved the Smoking Task Force’s recommendation to move smoking 25 feet away from all ECU facilities.  This meets the criteria set forth by Faculty Senate resolution #04-36 dated December 7, 2004.  The Health Education and Promotion grant will provide banners in April to help promote this change before students leave for the summer.  Implementation will begin over the summer with full implementation by August 1.  Smoking urns will be moved away from the buildings and signage installed.  Smoking shelters will not be installed since this would be encouraging an unhealthy behavior and not a good use of limited state funds.

 

The Health Science Campus will continue with their current smoking policy utilizing designated smoking areas.  Bill Koch, Chair of the Smoking Task Force and Director of Environmental Health & Safety, will work with building administrators to identify designated areas or better locations for the urns as requested.  For example, Bill worked with the Student Recreation Center to move their urns 50 feet from the building due to wind currents and building pressurization that push/pull smoke into the building.

 

Although the task force is still working on changing the law in North Carolina through our work with UNC General Administration, the group wanted to move forward with the part of the initiative that is not affected by this law and has been approved by all key groups - Faculty Senate, SGA, Staff Senate and now Chancellor's Executive Council.  The task force will work with the Chancellor's staff and others to inform and educate the campus community about this change.  The NC House has passed a bill to prohibit smoking in all state buildings.

 

7.         There is no longer a curriculum submission deadline for inclusion in the official ECU catalog. Faculty are reminded that the official ECU catalog is now the online catalog. The University Curriculum Committee will continue to meet through April 2007 to address curriculum matters.  Please direct any questions to Professor Janice Neil, Chair of the University Curriculum Committee at cuc@ecu.edu.

 

C.        Chancellor's Report 

Chancellor Steve Ballard was unfortunately ill on the day of this meeting, so Provost Smith provided information on his behalf to the body. 

 

Provost Smith provided a brief overview of the draft University’s Strategic Plan. Smith stated that, during their Founders Day visit to ECU, state legislators, former Gov. Jim Hunt, and other distinguished guests were very impressed by former students’ testimonials. He strongly urged faculty to attend spring graduation ceremonies, challenging them to meet the 25% attendance goal. He informed the Senate that candidates for the position of Vice Chancellor of Economic Development are making their campus visits, that the Nominating Committee for the Government Affairs search is close to bringing finalists for campus visits, that the 4th of 5 candidates for the Dean of the College of Education position is now on campus. He announced that Karla Hughes has accepted the position of Provost at the Morehead State University in Kentucky, and that negotiations are underway with Margie Gallagher for her to fill in as Interim Dean of the College of Human Ecology. He congratulated the Lady Pirates basketball team for their successful season. Provost Smith noted that the SGA had passed a resolution against +/- grading. He informed the Senate that the tentative date for sending ECU’s 5 Strategic Directions to the Board of Trustees is April 4, and invited faculty to send any further ideas to Robin Johnson in the Chancellor’s office. He also noted that the Committee on Child Care is ready request bids, and announced that the search committee was being formed for the position of Associate Vice Chancellor for Academic Program Development, and that work should get under way soon. Members of the Search Committee include: Ron Newton (Associate Dean, Graduate School, Chair), Mark Taggart  (Music and Chair of the Faculty), Jim Decker (Health and Human Performance and Faculty Senator), Dale Knickerbocker (Foreign Languages and Literatures and Chair, Educational Policies and Planning Committee), Janice Neil (Nursing and Chair of the University Curriculum Committee), Wendy Sharer (English and Chair of the Admission and Retention Policies Committee), Linda Wolfe

(Anthropology and Chair of the Academic Standards Committee), Peter Kragel (Associate Vice Chancellor for Health Sciences), Virginia Hardy (Interim Assistant to the Chancellor for Diversity) and

Margie Gallagher (Associate Dean for the College of Human Ecology).

 

Zoller (Art and Design) asked why the Performing Arts were included with Athletics in the Strategic Directions. Provost Smith stated he did not know, except that perhaps they both had to do with entertainment. Zoller pointed out that the programs have different goals, needs, and funding sources. Zoller then asked why the new Performing Arts Center was not to be called the Visual & Performing Arts Center. Smith responded that it was simply an oversight, that there has been no discussion on the Academic Council regarding what the final name should be, but said she should send those comments to Robin Johnson in the Chancellor’s office.

 

D.        Provost’s Report

Provost Jim Smith provided the following information prior to the meeting. 

(1)  Last month Senator Tovey (English) questioned me about the organization of Academic Affairs (http://www.ecu.edu/cs-acad/fsonline/customcf/fsminute/307aaorganizationalchart.pdf) and whether the PACE study would affect it.  My answer was a somewhat uninformative, so today I want you to know that best practices reviews will occur in the ten academic affairs offices on a staggered timeframe over the next three years of the integrated planning process.  Financial aid and the Center for Faculty Excellence reviews are to some extent already underway.  Most of these reviews will involve external professional as well as internal faculty participation and the goal is to verify our “index of best practices,” confirm appropriate level of staffing and support, and determine the next steps to ensure that we are in the best shape possible going forward.  The involved offices are: financial aid; center for faculty excellence; the honors program; the writing program; international affairs; admissions; service learning; professional advising; the office of the registrar; and continuing studies.  This calendar is consistent with medium and long range PACE evaluations, so there may indeed be efficiency changes as a result of these national best practices reviews.  

 

(2)  The integrated planning process in the colleges and major schools is moving along in tandem with the final development of the ECU strategic framework
(http://www.ecu.edu/cs-acad/fsonline/customcf/fsminute/307integratedplan.htm).  The recently approved format for the integrated plans of the colleges and major schools will be used to express the drafts of these plans. These drafts will be due April 15 and will be shared with the Trustees at the April 19-20 Trustee meeting.  Further work on these plans will culminate next October 15 when a three-year plan (2007-08; 2008-09; 2009-2010) quite probably will be set in place at all unit levels.  These plans will form the basis for each unit annual report and will be forwarded (with applicable revisions) an extra year each year so as to preserve an on-going, three-year integrated plan.  I believe this will continue effectively a planning tradition at ECU that started in 1987 and will raise it to an integrated level allowing even better linkage to budget allocations, facilities master planning, and overall University development.

 

(3)  Now that the 2007-08 budget year is drawing close, the prospects for a Child Care Center at ECU should be re-focused.  The Faculty Senate endorsed the October 9, 2006 report from a small task force chaired by Bruce Flye and whose work was dedicated to this question. I am now re-charging that group with a new chair and a few new members to follow-up on that report, pursue the request for information (RFI) mentioned in that report, give consideration to local opportunities regarding child care, and render further recommendations on options and related costs to the Senate and to me by November 20, 2007.  While this topic was #8 on the faculty survey conducted by Ken Wilson last year, it is an important topic, especially for our younger faculty and staff and valuable as a recruiting tool.  We should make every effort to evaluate the feasibility of this project as a serious candidate in our list of institutional priorities.

 

(4)  I understand there are questions about the process for arriving at deans’ salary increments in Academic Affairs. I am pleased to summarize that process.  The concepts and principles are the same as for faculty: merit, equity, and market.  Each of these concepts produces the following principles, respectively: reward good work; seek fairness of allocation both internally and externally; and, compete nationally to retain excellent people.  Last year, we had a merit pool of 6% of the base, the faculty had an additional pool drawn from the campus-based tuition increase, and GA continued the quest to raise our salary levels to the 80%ile of our peers.   Each continuing dean in Academic Affairs qualified under the 6% merit criterion.  Since I believe deans should be performing at a level comparable to the top third of faculty performance (or we have the wrong officer!), I set aside a pool comparable to the CBTI portion for faculty in order to address the GA goal regarding external equity (80%-ile of peers).  I qualified this goal slightly because we had just acquired a new group of peers and the 80%-ile was higher than in previous years.  Therefore, I set that bar at the 70%-ile level.  To implement this criterion, we calculated each dean’s previous salary and compared it to the CUPA-data median for public doctoral institutions and also to the 70%-ile level for our current peers.  We then calculated the difference between each of those and the current salary, selected the higher difference and fractionalized “the equity pool” as a function of each dean’s difference.  Thirdly, two deans were recruited as potential candidates at prestigious institutions and market increments were added to facilitate retaining them at ECU.  We were successful in those two endeavors.  I believe this method sets an objective (because nationally-referenced) basis within which to make judgments about the performance of these important officers.  I am always open to suggestions that would make this process better, i. e., accurate and fair.  This process produced increments last summer ranging from 7.67% to 13.25%.

 

(5)  Administrative searches currently underway: 

(a) The candidates for the deanship of the College of Education are currently visiting campus, with the 4th of 5 with us at the beginning of this week.  I intend to bring the top candidates, presuming we have those on this round, back for a second visit.  This national search is supported by the work of the Hollander Group. 

(b) the internal search for the associate vice chancellor for academic programs will get underway within a week or so.  The Senate officers and I agreed that such a search could track an “Appendix L” search in terms of the proportion of search committee members with ten committee members in all.  Thus, six search committee members (listed below) have been confirmed.  I will appoint an additional four members and a chair and we will be underway soon.  Faculty members are:

--Mark Taggart, Music & Chair of the Faculty

--Jim Decker, HHP & Faculty Senator

--Dale Knickerbocker, FL&L and Chair of the EPP Committee

--Janice Neil, Nursing and Chair of the University Curriculum Committee

--Wendy Sharer, English and Chair of the Admission and Retention Policies Committee

--Linda Wolfe, Anthropology and Chair of the Academic Standards Committee

 

There were no questions posed to Provost Smith at this time.

 

E.        Chair of the Faculty’s Report

Chair Mark Taggart reminded Senators that last month, Chancellor Ballard raised concern over ECU’s low diversity ratio in Fall, 2006.  Taggart stated that he had appreciated hearing from faculty members regarding the Chancellor’s report, and especially appreciated hearing from those who pointed out the progress ECU has made in diversity hires in the past few years. Taggart also noted that he appreciated hearing Professor Niswander’s report to the Chancellor’s Cabinet, bolstering the arguments that faculty have made that we are improving in this area.  Niswander had pointed out that there was a 33% increase in the proportion of minority faculty hired at ECU from 200-2006.  So ECU has made significant strides in this effort.

 

The question Taggart then asked was:  are we doing enough?  Rather than continuing to take our time informing each other that things are better, could we now turn our efforts to come up with concrete strategies for further improvement?  Taggart stated the ECU has strong faculty with a depth of remarkable diversity of talents, ages, interests, disciplines, fame and fortune.  If we were to individually and collectively turn those talents to coming up with concrete strategies to increase our diversity in such areas of race and ethnic backgrounds we could become even stronger.  Noting that he thinks that our efforts to bolster diversity are consistent with our motto to serve our region.

 

Chair Taggart stated that these past few weeks have provided an ample opportunity to explore the origins of our university, from Governor Thomas Jarvis’ prophetic comment of “we can never begin to calculate the value it will be to North Carolina,” to Mary Schulken’s column in the Charlotte Observer which commended the University’s accomplishments by proclaiming: “You can't swing a baseball bat in eastern North Carolina without hitting someone who attended East Carolina, or something connected to it.”  Schulken points out that we’ve served a region, geographically spread out, “chipping away” at our high rates of poverty, unemployment and illness.  But we should reach out more. As the population of our region and state becomes more diverse, we must be prepared for this by employing best practices to increase faculty diversity.  We should develop recruitment strategies. Taggart stated that he was committed to bringing (and maintaining) more diversity on our campus.  And that he believed that this commitment is in perfect alignment with our motto. 

 

Taggart stated that we have served our region well in our first one hundred years and that he was confident that we will continue to do so. Our motto tells me that we must and a more diverse faculty body will give us the strength to meet our challenges and to serve our changing region in the next one hundred years. 

 

There were no questions posed to Chair Taggart at this time.

 

F.         Spring 2005 Graduation Roster

Glascoff (Health and Human Performance) moved the approval of the Spring 2007 Graduation Roster, including honors program graduates, subject to the completion of degree requirements.  The graduation roster was approved as presented.  RESOLUTION #07-08

 

G.        President, Student Government Association

SGA President Cole Jones was unable to attend the meeting, so the SGA Speaker of the Congress, Jon Massachi discussed various issues of importance to students. Mr. Massachi first noted that SGA elections were coming up soon, and that any faculty enrolled in courses are eligible to vote. He thanked Professor Taggart for working with SGA to improve communications between the two bodies, and the Senate for passing the smoking resolution. He invited any Senators with questions or concerns about SGA to e-mail him at SGAspeaker@ecu.edu.

 

Mr. Massachi noted that SGA had endorsed on 2-26-07 a resolution against implementing a plus/minus grading scale.  The resolution read as follows:

 


WHEREAS, it is difficult enough to make distinctions in grades with the current system. With even finer distinctions and grade points available through the plus/minus grading system, the problem associated with assigning grades and perhaps misclassifying students is likely to be further exacerbated and,

WHEREAS, The plus/minus grading system divides the A grade into two parts, A and A-, effectively reducing the number of students obtaining a GPA of 4.0 since there is not a corresponding A+ with a 4.3 to balance out the A- with a 3.7 and,

WHEREAS, there could be an increased number of students on academic probation. At ECU good academic standing requires an overall C or 2.0 for undergraduate students. With the adoption of the plus/minus grading system, some undergraduate who are at the C and B borderline respectively could be earning a C- and B- respectively and,

WHEREAS, there have been many studies by different universities showing that the plus/minus grading scale would affect mostly student with above a 3.5 GPA and students that were close to or on academic probation and,

WHEREAS, employers understand the current standard grading scale when choosing applicants for jobs and ECU is preparing students for tomorrow’s highly competitive job market and,

WHEREAS, current students should be grandfathered in under the old system,

BE IT RESOLVED, the SGA Congress of ECU does not support the implementation of a plus/minus grading scale as written out by the Faculty Senate.

 

 

Jones (Criminal Justice) remarked that the Senate had acted in haste, and that he himself still had questions about the policy. Long (History) pointed out that the Recruitment and Retention Committee had been working on it since 2003 and thoroughly researched its implementation, use, and effects at other institutions; that the issue has been under discussion for 20 years, that the Senate had actually recommended such a policy once before but the Chancellor turned it down, that a copy of the committee’s recommendation had been available online, and that SGA had a representative on the committee. He stated that he did not understand how this could be considered acting in haste, or how SGA could consider itself not to have been involved, and asked Mr. Massacchi what he thought the Senate should have done to involve them adequately. Massacchi replied that they he realized that the student representatives should have participated in the creation of such a policy.

 

H.        Question Period

Faculty are encouraged to participate in the Question Period of the Faculty Senate meeting. This period allows faculty an opportunity to ask questions of administrators and others present relating to activities of the administration or Faculty Senate committees. 

 

Sprague (Physics) asked Vice Chancellor Mageean about the status of graduate student applications, stating that in his department they have yet to see any, and other programs are already sending out acceptance letters, putting us at a disadvantage and endangering an entire recruiting year. Vice Chancellor Mageean responded that they are basically “stuck in Banner”.

 

Dean of Graduate Studies Pellicane explained that Banner has several problems, including that whereas previously two screens were necessary to input application information, twelve are now needed; there is no mechanism for printing; it is not possible to securely take credit card number, making portfolios incomplete due to non-payment. Furthermore, while applications are up 25%, fee income is down $15,000. Data must now be entered by hand into the old and new systems, and they have hired all the staff for which they physically have space to deal with the backlog in both systems, and he doesn’t see any short term solutions. Rose (Nursing) asked if it was possible to get applications physically?  Dean Pellicane replied yes, and invited faculty within programs to do so.


Decker (
Health and Human Performance) affirmed that the problem is not the Graduate Studies staff, who are doing all that is possible in the situation.

 

Provost Smith commented that the same problem exists at the Undergraduate level, that Don Joyner is working hard to resolve the situation, but that it is foreseeable that there will be a drop in enrollment of 500 students at that level as well as 500 graduate students, with obvious funding repercussions.

 

Grimes (Music) commented that it seems ECU was asking for such trouble when it contracted a firm with proprietary software, and suggested we remember that when we reconsider Blackboard. Vice Chancellor Mageean stated that there are only two providers of such software, Banner and People Soft (also proprietary), and she knows of cases in which the implementation of People Soft was as problematic as our Banner experience.

 

Agenda Item IV.  Unfinished Business

There was no unfinished business to come before the Faculty Senate at this time.

 

Agenda Item V.  Report of Committees

 

A.        Calendar Committee

Shanan Gibson (Business), Vice Chair of the Committee, first presented the proposed Summer 2008 – Spring 2009 University Calendar.  Wilson (Sociology) asked if it was seen as going against the calendar if he gave a take-home final exam.  Professor Gibson stated no, as long as the class met on the last day to discuss either the exam or course content. Following a brief discussion, the Summer 2008 – Spring 2009 University Calendar was approved as presented.   RESOLUTION #07-09

 

Professor Gibson then explained the rationale for the unofficial informational faculty calendar being presented for information only.  She stated that it is in response to requests by new faculty for a source of information for only the dates most important to them: e.g., promotion/tenure dates, annual evaluation due dates, etc. She welcomed input as to content and distribution venues.

 

Glascoff (Health and Human Performance) asked how the committee wished to receive information. Professor Gibson responded that it could be sent to her or Cal Christian.

 

Niswander (Business) stated that he thought this was a good idea, but that it would be essential to keep it updated. Gibson then noted that it would contain Faculty Manual dates and deadlines, but not those of units.

 

B.  Educational Policies and Planning Committee

Dale Knickerbocker (Foreign Languages and Literatures), Chair of the Committee, presented for information only, a list of actions taken by the committee and forwarded to the Chancellor for his consideration.  Those included: 1) School of Health and Human Performance, Recreation and Leisure Studies (RCLS) proposal for a new concentration for the Management of Recreation Facilities and Services (MRFS), 2) School of Health and Human Performance, Exercise and Sports Science (EXSS) Master of Arts (MA) designation be changed to a Master of Science (MS) degree, 3) School of Allied Health Sciences, Health Services and Information Management (HSIM) proposal to establish a health informatics minor and 4) School of Medicine proposal to change name of Department of Biochemistry to Biochemistry and Molecular Biology.

 

There were no questions posed to Professor Knickerbocker following his report.

 

C.        Unit Code Screening Committee

Garris Conner (Nursing), Chair of the Committee, presented the revised School of Nursing Unit Code of Operation.  Bode (Medicine) asked if there were any significant changes to the unit code.  Conner responded no, that it has been revised to reflect changes in organizational and reporting structures, and to clean up a few procedures that were not functioning smoothly in the revision implemented three years ago.  Following a brief discussion, the revised School of Nursing Unit Code of Operation was approved as presented. RESOLUTION #07-10

 

D.        University Budget Committee

Cal Christian (Business), Chair of the Committee, presented a brief overview of online education. Information distributed included a Distance Education Profile and an Analysis of Change from 2004-05 to 2005-06.

 

Provost Smith referenced a report entitled “Redefining Undergraduate Education for the 21st Century” which is available online at:
http://www.ecu.edu/cs-acad/fsonline/customcf/fsminute/307redefining.pdf.

 

Provost Smith summarized what the changes would mean to ECU. The Provost remarked that last year when representatives from GA visited, Erskine Bowles was so impressed that he invited Elmer Poe to give a presentation on how distance education is done at ECU. He also noted that of the 50% increase in faculty, 75% of that growth came from distance education, yet students frequently reported they felt they had more contact with their instructors, not less.

 

Elmer Poe reported on the future of Distance Education. With respect to infrastructure implications, he stated that 2700 sections of 6000 total will have a Blackboard(Bb) shell, internally hosted by ITCS, generated for them automatically in Banner beginning in fall. He reported an up time of 99% for Bb. He informed the body that synchronous Centra 1100 events, to complement Bb, will soon be available from within Bb itself, and that ECU had negotiated an unlimited license with Centra hosted on an .asp model until the full ramifications of the Banner platform are known. He noted that a state study is underway comparing Bb with other available systems to determine the best overall educational tool. President Bowles ha launched a statewide initiative provisionally titled “UNC Portal” listing all distance education programs in state, which should be online in May. It is also hoped that it will eventually make transfer of credit easier. There is no feeling it will be statewide distance education university, but will continue to be done through each institutions. It is specially targeted to help military, community college, and continuing education students. Finally, he said that preliminary discussions are being held about the possibility of ECU hosting Bb courses for other UNC institutions—a centralization of hosting—but that at present they are just exploratory in nature.

 

Wilson (Sociology) asked why “racial mix” was not in the report data. Poe responded that they do gather that data, he didn’t know why it wasn’t included, but that it would be provided to the Chair of the Faculty for distribution.

 

Levine (Medicine) asked if anyone thought that future distance education courses would be taught by faculty actually not residing in Greenville. Provost Smith said that, given the entrepreneurial nature of DE at ECU, no policy has been dictated concerning this, since faculty in the units themselves are best qualified to make such decisions.

 

Boklage (Medicine) asked if every distance education is required to have a face-to-face component? Niswander (Business) answered no, that from an instructional standpoint there is no reason. He also pointed out that it depends upon how each college or unit defines its expectations of faculty. Provost Smith added that these questions are being incorporated into strategic planning

 

Wilson (Sociology) asked if there is an equivalent to 750 minute rule for semester contact hours? Professor Gibson, Vice Chair of the Calendar Committee, answered no.

 

E.        University Curriculum Committee

David Long (History), a member of the Committee, presented the curriculum matters contained in the minutes of the February 22, 2007, and March 8, 2007, meetings. There was no discussion and the curriculum matters were approved as presented.  RESOLUTION #07-11

 

Agenda Item VI.  New Business

Long (History) presented a resolution commending the ECU Women’s Basketball Team.  He stated that this resolution was drafted to commend the East Carolina University women’s basketball team on their highly successful 2006-2007 basketball season and their victory in the Conference USA tournament resulting in an appearance by an ECU basketball team for the first time in 25 years

 

He then offered an amendment to his resolution, deleting the sixth whereas that read:

WHEREAS, due to their very difficult early season schedule and the bruising setbacks suffered playing teams from schools that have had long records of success in women’s basketball, and the fact that in such situations it is nearly unavoidable for a team consisting of as many young players as are featured by the Lady Pirates, this team found itself at several points, once during the Christmas holidays and again on the occasion of the February 1st loss to UAB which brought their record to nine wins and thirteen losses, at a low ebb when they might very easily have lost their spirit and confidence in the goals of this team; and

 

and replacing it with:

WHEREAS, due to that very difficult early season schedule, and losses to a number of teams with long records of success in women's basketball, the youthful Lady Pirates faced what could have been a very demoralizing situation; and

 

WHEREAS, at several points during the season, once during the December holidays and again after the February 1st loss to UAB which brought their record to 9 wins and 13 losses, this team experienced moments of frustration and disappointment that would have effectively ended the season for many teams of comparable age and experience; and

 

There was no objection.

 

Long then moved to delete the Be It Further Resolved that read:

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that it is the sense of this Faculty Senate that the administration of East Carolina University should promote this superb showing by this ECU athletic team by encouraging students to support the Lady Pirates and should do whatever is in its power to expedite the travel to tournament sites at which this team may be scheduled to play its tournament games; and

 

There was no objection.

 

Long then offered two editorial changes: 1) change the words “will be advancing” to “advanced” in the 2nd whereas and 2) change the phrase “Pirates have not lost another game” with Pirates did not lose another game”.  These editorial revisions were approved as presented.

 

Following brief discussion, the proposed commendation for the ECU Women’s Basketball Team was approved as revised.  RESOLUTION 07-12

 

The meeting adjourned at 3:50 p.m.

 

 

Respectfully submitted,

 

 

Dale Knickerbocker                                                                          Lori Lee

Secretary of the Faculty                                                                    Administrative Officer          

Department of Foreign Languages and Literatures                     Faculty Senate

 

       FACULTY SENATE RESOLUTIONS APPROVED AT THE MARCH 20, 2007, MEETING

 

07-08  Spring 2007 Graduation Roster, including honors program graduates, subject to the completion of degree requirements.

Disposition:  Chancellor, Board of Trustees

 

07-09  Summer 2008 – Spring 2009 University Calendar.

Disposition:  Chancellor

 

07-10  Revised School of Nursing Unit Code of Operation.

Disposition:  Chancellor

 

07-11  Curriculum matters contained in the minutes of the February 22, 2007, and March 8, 2007, meetings

Disposition:  Chancellor

 

07-12    Resolution commending the ECU Women’s Basketball Team that read as follows:

WHEREAS, the East Carolina University women’s basketball team won the Conference-USA tournament with an impressive 79-70 victory over Rice University after having been behind by as many as twelve points in the second half; and

 

WHEREAS,  the East Carolina University Lady Pirates advanced to compete in the NCAA postseason tournament for the first time in twenty-five years; and

 

WHEREAS,  the tournament championship featured the young women of this basketball team and their dedicated coaches winning three games in three days, including a very hard fought game on Saturday evening against a second-seeded University of Alabama-Birmingham team that had earlier in the season defeated ECU in Greenville and then danced on the Pirate logo; and

 

WHEREAS, since that February 1st loss to UAB the Lady Pirates did not lose another game, compiling a ten game winning streak that included a win over Conference USA regular season champion Tulane University at Minges Coliseum on February 18 by a 76-68 score; and

 

WHEREAS, that February win streak led the Lady Pirates to a third place finish in Conference USA regular season competition, in spite of a very tough early season schedule that saw them lose  four of their first five games; and

 

WHEREAS, due to that very difficult early season schedule, and losses to a number of teams with long records of success in women's basketball, the youthful Lady Pirates faced what could have been a very demoralizing situation; and

 

WHEREAS, at several points during the season, once during the December holidays and again after the February 1st loss to UAB which brought their record to 9 wins and 13 losses, this team experienced moments of frustration and disappointment that would have effectively ended the season for many teams of comparable age and experience; and

 

WHEREAS, even with their impressive seven game winning streak to finish the regular season, the Lady Pirates entered the Conference USA tournament on March 1st, knowing they would have to win the tournament in order to make it into the NCAA tournament; and

 

WHEREAS, fully realizing what those pressures meant, and how long it had been since an ECU team had played in the NCAA tournament, the players and coaches of this sophomore-dominated team trusted in one another and in their common goal, and for seventy–two hours and through three grueling games performed in a manner that made the citizens of Greenville and Pirates everywhere proud of them and of this university.

 

THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED, That Head Coach Sharon Baldwin-Tener, Assistant Coaches Chrissy Roberts, Melissa Kolbe, and Samantha Young, and Director of Basketball Operations Bett Shelby, plus all the players, managers, and trainers of the Lady Pirates basketball team, be extended the heartfelt thanks and congratulations of this Faculty Senate; and

 

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that this Faculty Senate strongly encourages the Chancellor of East Carolina University extend to Sharon Baldwin-Tener and her staff, and to the women’s basketball program, commensurate recognition and rewards as would be given to any other major sports team achieving comparable glory and representing ECU in such a positive manner.

Disposition:  Chancellor