Minutes, NSU Faculty Council, November 5, 2004

1. The meeting was called to order at 3:00 p.m. by President Wickham in the NET Tower Room.

Council Members in attendance: Terri Baker (Liberal Arts), Renee Cambiano (Education), John Diamantopoulos (Science & Health Professions), Dan Glasgow (Education), Harriett Hobbs (Library), Peggy Kaney (Library), Andre Marquis (Liberal Arts & Education), Jeff Miller (Optometry), Latricia Pack (Optometry), David Scott (Liberal Arts), Lallie Scott (Liberal Arts), Jon Shapiro (Business & Technology), Wendall Wyatt (Science & Health Professions)--substituting for Rick Matzen, and John Yeutter (Business & Technology).

Council Officers in attendance: Gary Wickham (President), Andrew Vassar (Vice President), and Chuck Ziehr (Secretary-Treasurer).

2. Treasurer's Report
Since last month's report $20 have been spent (monthly phone charges). This leaves a current balance of $4,514.

4. NSU Undergraduate Research Day
This item of new business was inserted into the agenda at this point to accommodate our guests, Julie Sawyer and Paul Westbrook. Dr. Sawyer presented a report to the Council about last year's Undergraduate Research Day (URD) and plans for next year's event. She expressed her thanks for the continuing support of the Council to promote undergraduate research. The Council has committed $1,500 to URD. Her report follows:

NSU Undergraduate Research Day:
A Celebration of Scholarly & Creative Activity

REPORT TO FACULTY COUNCIL
November 5, 2004

1.    Total applications for past two years: 51
    Total student participants for past two years: 140
    Total faculty mentors for past two years: 64
    (See attached spreadsheet for other counts)

2.    Changes 2003 to 2004
    ✓    Number of posters accepted for presentation for SBS increased to seven due to number of papers submitted
    ✓    $100 cash awards given to Outstanding Scholar in each college

3.    Changes 2004 to 2005
    ✓    Steering Committee membership
        ★    Vanessa Hardbarger, Education
        ★    Julie Sawyer, Science & Health Professions
        ★    Paul Westbrook, Liberal Arts
        ★    Joan Williams, Business & Technology
    ✓    No limit on number of posters accepted for presentation
    ✓    $100 cash award for best poster - Sponsor’s Award
    ✓    $50 cash award for best use of statistics in a poster - sponsored by
        Oklahoma Chapter of the American Statistical Association (OCASA)

4.    What we’re working on right now...
    ✓    Plagiarism policy and reference list
    ✓    Criteria for poster judging
    ✓    Sponsorship renewals - Request for continued support

5.    Other information attached
    ✓    Event announcement (note date change from April 21 to April 19)
    ✓    Application for participation
    ✓    College Selection Committees List

NSU Undergraduate Research Day:
A Celebration of Scholarly and Creative Activity
April 21, 2005

Northeastern State University’s Undergraduate Research Day Steering Committee and the Office of Academic Affairs is pleased to host the third annual Undergraduate Research Day: A Celebration of Scholarly and Creative Activity. This event honors excellence in research, scholarship and creativity by showcasing the endeavors of undergraduate students and their faculty mentors.

Benefits
Undergraduate scholarship allows students to participate in active learning to pursue intellectual interests under the guidance of a faculty mentor. Benefits to the undergraduate student engaged in such a project include stimulation of creative thinking, a better understanding of their discipline, development of research skills, enhancement of communication skills, an opportunity to participate in new discoveries, and preparation for graduate school. Students who participate in scholarly activities gain confidence and are able to function more independently through taking responsibility for a portion of their own learning process.

Eligibility of Participants
Undergraduate students eligible to submit a project for consideration must meet the following criteria:
1.    The student must be a current NSU undergraduate or have graduated no earlier than December 2004.
2.    Current undergraduate students must be in good academic standing.
3.    The student must have engaged in their research/scholarship/creative activity under the supervision of a faculty mentor.

Eligibility of Projects
Projects eligible for consideration must meet the following criteria:
1.    The project may be from any field of study.
2.    The project does not have to be the result of work in a formal course but work done in a formal course is eligible.
3.    The project must involve the significant creation, synthesis and/or application of knowledge.
4.    The project must demonstrate intellectual rigor, innovation, and acceptability in the field of study.
5.    If the student researcher graduated in December, the student must have made substantial progress toward completing their project prior to graduation.Judging of Projects
Each student work will be evaluated by a committee of faculty from the student’s college. These faculty have been chosen to represent the academic disciplines and scholarly methodologies of the college. While specific judging standards may vary from college to college, all committees adhere to two general criteria:
1.    Research and creative work will conform to the generally accepted standards of scholarship of the area of study.
2.    The research and creative work will adhere to the accepted ethical standards of the academic disciplines and will receive the approval of the NSU Human Experimentation Advisory Committee and/or the University Animal Welfare Committee as required.
        NOTE: PLAGIARISM WILL NOT BE TOLERATED. The author of any paper plagiarized in part or in whole will be disqualified from Undergraduate Research Day and reported to the faculty mentor.

Students will submit an initial application describing their project. After screening the applications, the college committee will invite selected students to submit a draft presentation of their project. These presentations will be judged by the college committee, and honored scholars will be selected.

Awards
Honored scholars will present their projects at Undergraduate Research Day. One student from each college will be selected as the Outstanding Scholar from their college and will give an oral presentation of their research at a special symposium. In addition, other students from each college will be selected to display their work in poster format. Outstanding Scholars’ papers, as well as abstracts of the poster presentations will be printed in the Undergraduate Research Day Program.

All students who present projects at Undergraduate Research Day will receive a certificate of participation from the Vice-President for Academic Affairs. Outstanding Scholars and their mentors will receive a trophy, and the student will be awarded a $100 cash prize. Poster presenters will receive a medal. New this year is a $100 cash prize for the best poster presentation. Details on this award will be announced at a later date.

    NSU Undergraduate Research Day:
A Celebration of Scholarly and Creative Activity
    April 19, 2005

    Application Form

    The third annual Undergraduate Research Day: A Celebration of Scholarly and Creative Activities, will be held in the University Center from 10:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m., Tuesday, April 19, 2005. Festivities are highlighted by an awards ceremony to honor outstanding student projects. All students who would like to be considered for participation in Undergraduate Research Day must complete this application form. A panel of judges representing the four undergraduate colleges will screen applications. This application and an unofficial transcript must be submitted to Dr. Julie Sawyer, College Science and Health Professions, by Friday, January 28, 2005.

1.     Project title     ____________________________________________________

                ____________________________________________________

2.     Primary Presenter/Researcher:

    Name _________________________    ID ___________________________

    Major _________________________    Classification ________________

    Email _________________________    Telephone ___________________

3.    Other Presenters/Researchers:

    Name _________________________    ID ___________________________

    Name _________________________    ID ___________________________

    Name _________________________    ID ___________________________


4.     Academic discipline represented in your project    ______________________

5.    Faculty mentor supervising your project    ____________________________

6.    Describe your project in a paragraph.

7.    Describe the expectations and/or outcomes of your project.

1. Circle of Excellence
a. The permanent plaque will displayed in the library; thanks were extended to Dr. Allen McKiel, Director of the Library.

6. Faculty Association Constitution
A committee has been formed to study the current Faculty Association Constitution and to propose revisions. The committee is: Jon Shapiro, Mike Sharp, and Gary Wickham.

7. Establishing Format, Date, and Time to Meet with President Williams and Vice President Pate
The meeting will be at 3:00 p.m. on Friday, December 3, 2004 in the NET Tower Room. Questions that have been submitted by the faculty to Council President Wickham will be synthesized and edited by Dr. Wickham and the Council and given to President Williams and Vice President Pate in advance.

On October 26, 2004 Vice President Pate sent a set of proposed changes to the BOROC policy manual to Council President Wickham and Dr. Wickham circulated that document via e-mail to all Council delegates. The Council expressed its deep appreciation to Dr. Pate for reaching out and sharing the document with the Council. A lengthy and multifaceted discussion was conducted regarding sides of the issue. During the discussion, a good deal of time was spent talking about retaining faculty. This is a crucial matter given the time in service of our faculty. It was decided that preemptive job seeking (i.e. working at NSU but quietly seeking employment elsewhere and leaving with minimal notification) already is a stiff annoyance. The Council feels that the implementation of the notification change identified would change the annoyance to a serious problem. The sense of the Council was that recruitment already is a bit of a problem, and the lack of a reasonable notification factor would make it quite difficult. The Council's discussion concluded with agreement with the following statement.

“We have read the proposed changes to policies regarding notification of non-reappointment and tenure review, and we have deep concerns. It appears that these changes will undermine job security for all regular faculty members who fall under these policies. The faculty of Northeastern State University is very proud of the job that we do. We believe that we are an excellent faculty, and we back that up with the dedication and hard work to make it true.

We choose to be educators because we are dedicated to public education. This is so even though the monetary compensation is significantly below want many of us could make in comparable work in the private sector. One thing that we do have, and value, is Sections 3.1.2 b) and c) of the Board of Regents of Oklahoma Colleges Handbook; the right to be notified in advance of non-reappointment. By March 1, many academic appointments for the Fall Semester already have been filled. After that, it becomes increasingly more difficult to find a suitable position for the coming year. We strongly prefer that the notification requirement be kept intact.

We have read the proposed changes for Sections 3.3.5 b) and 3.3.6. Although Section 3.3.6 is not extensively modified, it is not clear to us how these combined proposed changes affect faculty rights under tenure. When read by itself, the proposed Section 3.3.5 b) appears to allow for the dismissal of a faculty member based only on two consecutive unsatisfactory performance (academic and professional) reviews. However, no criteria are stated for what constitutes an unsatisfactory review, nor who will perform the review.

If our interpretation of one or both of these proposed changes is correct, and if they are implemented, this would be detrimental to individual faculty members as well as to Oklahoma’s regional university system. These changes would permanently affect faculty morale, and they also would compromise our ability to hire, and to keep, quality faculty.

Respectfully, we ask you to clarify our interpretation of these proposed changes, and if our sense of their effect is accurate, then we ask that you ask that they be reconsidered.”

3. Question List for President Williams and Vice President Pate
The current list of questions that had been submitted to Gary Wickham were reviewed and synthesized. Further editing and revising will be done by President Wickham and the Council via e-mail. The following set of questions were eventually sent to President Williams and Vice President Pate:

1. PERSONNEL:

Exactly how is the audit of faculty preparation (degrees) being conducted? Have there been any untoward findings? Are we (both faculty and academic administrators) expected to look more closely at the curriculum vita of prospective faculty members?

In the event of a President or Vice President of Academic Affairs leaving, what role would the Faculty Council Delegates have in selecting a new President and/or Vice President? This is important to the faculty since the people filling both offices greatly impact faculty success and productivity.

In the past year, some employee actions (dismissals, suspensions, warnings) were conducted in a manner that immediately cut off network access of employees dismissed or suspended, gave them relatively little time to separate their personal items and intellectual property, and provided an escort off campus by NSU’s Campus Security personnel. Such actions seem to be the talk of the non-University community in Tahlequah. Is this a local policy or does the BOROC Policy Manual address this? The Employee Appreciation Week this Fall focused on our being “just like family.” Most of us do not have a family in which the police are needed to escort brothers and sisters out of the house. Could we not make dismissals a little less threatening and humiliating?

Throughout American Higher Education, numerically quantified student evaluations of faculty have a life of their own. The average teacher has a hard time understanding how an average student, who has yet to test his/her skills out in the real world, can assess what the education in a single class will do for them. How important are student evaluations in the review of non-tenured and tenured faculty members at NSU?

2. SHARED GOVERNANCE:

How can the officers of the Faculty Association and the Delegates to the Faculty Council enter into a constructive relationship of shared governance with NSU’s Administration? As is the case at OU and OSU, and to a lesser extent with UCO, might it be possible for the Faculty Council to be a Senate functioning with actual powers to contribute to NSU in a way analogous to the American system of government?

3. HEALTH CARE/FISCAL:

The price of spouse and family coverage under Health Choice seems to have finally reached the point of either breaking the budgets of faculty families or else causing them to leave their families uncovered. What can we do about this serious problem?

What strategies or plans are in place to bring new money to the Tahlequah campus?

Are there any plans in place to see that we get annual raises, rather than a nominal raise every 2-3 years? My area is competitive. If NSU can't commit to such a plan, I’m not sure how we will keep many of the faculty who work with me. Several of my colleagues are looking into lateral moves to universities similar to NSU but committed to this goal.

4. COMMUNICATION:

What is your opinion of the level of communication between you and the faculty as a whole?
a. If you would say it is not so good, what might we do to possibly improve on it?
b. If you would say it is pretty good, what could we do to make sure it stays at that level, or even improves further?

5. PHYSICAL PLANT:

What security features will ensure safety in the swimming pool area of Seminary Suites?

What are the cost/benefit numbers for the facility (toilets, fluorescent lights, motion sensors) modifications being installed? Is it true that a percentage of any savings realized will go to the contractor? Motion sensors do not seem to be in hallways and common areas but can be in some rooms that need to be dark or light only as controlled by the users. Who engineered the scheme of installing these fixtures?

Why does NSU not have an organized paper recycling effort for the whole campus?

6. CLASSROOM/ACADEMIC FREEDOM:

Most faculty members assume that their classroom operates by the rules established for the class in the course syllabus. Do you believe each faculty member has the right to define the circumstances of classroom operation? What support mechanisms does a faculty member have when he/she is dealing with inappropriate student behavior in the classroom?

7. ACADEMIC REORGANIZATION:

Is our academic structure where it will stay for the foreseeable future, or is there another wave of change coming up? If more changes are anticipated, will we, as Faculty Council Delegates, know about these before they are implemented?

4. Getting Assessment of Previous Motions Passed by Faculty Council
It was noted that over the years that the Faculty Council has passed motions that contradict motions that were passed by previous council. It was recognized that the current Council had the authority to do that, but it appears that sometimes the past motions were not even known about at the time of the new action. An example may be that of the Faculty Circle of Excellence Award where one Council limited recipients to one award in any category for life and another Council allowed more than one award if received in different categories. The Council will consider how to handle this matter at its first meeting in 2005.

5. FAC Meeting this Saturday
The Faculty Advisory Council to the State Regents will host its annual meeting with all Council/Senate presidents on November 6 in Oklahoma City at the State Regents' Office. Gary Wickham is a member of the FAC.

Gary Wickham wanted it noted that political advertisements during the fall about the practice of optometry in Oklahoma were outrageous and did not represent the way optometry is practiced.

Summary of URD Submissions for 2003-2004

	Arts & Letters		Business & Technology		Education		Math, Science & Nursing		Social & Behavioral Science		TOTAL
	2004	2003	2004	2003	2004	2003	2004	2003	2004	2003	2004	2003	CHANGE
Applications
Projects	3	7	4	3	3	1	3	3	14	10	27	24	3
Students	8	12	9	3	5	2	5	9	15	10	78	70	8
Unduplicated Students	8	12	9	3	3	2	5	9	13	10	74	66	8
Mentors	3	7	4	1	4	2	3	3	15	11	53	50	3
Unduplicated Mentors	2	5	2	1	3	2	3	3	6	6	33	31	2

Papers
Projects	3	6	3	3	1	0	2	3	14	5	40	37	3
Students	8	11	6	3	1	0	4	3	15	5	56	48	8
Unduplicated Students	8	11	6	3	1	0	4	3	13	5	54	46	8
Mentors	3	5	3	1	2	0	2	3	15	6	40	37	3
Unduplicated Mentors	2	3	2	1	2	0	2	3	6	5	26	24	2

Outstanding Scholars
Projects	1	1	1	1	1	0	1	1	1	1	9	8	1
Students	1	3	2	1	1	0	3	1	1	1	14	13	1
Mentors	1	1	1	1	2	0	1	1	1	1	10	9	1

Posters
Projects	2	4	1	2	0	0	1	1	6	4	21	19	2
Students	7	6	1	2	0	0	1	1	7	4	29	22	7
Unduplicated Students	7	6	1	2	0	0	1	1	7	4	29	22	7
Mentors	2	4	1	1	0	0	1	1	6	5	21	19	2
Unduplicated Mentors	1	2	1	1	0	0	1	1	2	3	12	11	1

Note: One SBS student whose project was accepted as a poster did not show up to present in 2004.