18 September 2003
Loyola Marymount University
Faculty Senate Minutes
September 18, 2003
McIntosh
2:45 p.m-5 p.m.
Present: Marta Baltodano, Matt Dillon,
Omar Es-Said, Victoria Graf, Lily Khadjavi, Chun Lee, Edmundo
Litton, Marc Lony, Suzanne O’Brien, Patricia Oliver, Edward
Park, K.J. Peters, Damon Rago, James Roe, Susan Scheibler, Leland
Swenson, Walter Walker, Patricia Walsh, Thomas Zachariah
Excused: Jok Madut Jok
President Roe called the meeting to order at
2:53 p.m. A moment of silence was observed in honor of September
11.
Announcements by the Senate President:
-KJ Peters will be
the Faculty Senate Parliamentarian
-Committee
Appointments
Committee on
Committees- Mary McCullough (Chair), Matt Dillon, Pat Douglas,
Patricia Oliver
Elections-
Thomas Zachariah (Chair), Suzanne O’Brien, Walter Walker
-A motion was
moved and seconded to hold elections for the four remaining Senate
seats. The motion was approved unanimously.
- Edward Park will
be the liaison between the Faculty Senate and the Economic Status
of the Faculty (ESOF) Committee.
-The Jesuit
Community has invited the Faculty Senate to join them for Mass and
dinner on October 16th after the meeting. Mass
will be held at the Jesuit Community chapel at 5:30 p.m., cocktails
from 6-6:45 p.m., and dinner in the sky room at 6:45 p.m.
RSVP to James Roe as soon as possible.
-The Faculty
Senate Office is located in University Hall Room 3301.
-The Faculty
Senate has a budget of $2400 for the year.
I. Conversation with Dr. Jabbra: Three major
issues
1) Enrollment Issue: Where LMU is
now
-Total FTE students minus those
studying abroad and on tuition remission is 5180. Total FTE
students including those studying abroad and on tuition remission
is 5362. The budgeted number was 5120.
-Features of the
student body:
Ethnicity: Last
Year (Actual #) This Year
African
Americans
7% (368)
6%
Asian/Pacific
Islander
12%
(628)
10%
Latino
18%
(1,007)
18%
European
American
54%
(2,923)
51%
Declined
to State
400-500
Geography:
From
California
76%
77%
Outside
of
California
23%
22%
Gender:
Female
60%
(3289)
(not given)
Male
40%
(2171)
(not given)
Religious
Composition:
Catholic
57% (3099)
Protestant/Jewish/Muslim
32% (1732)
Did not
specify
629 students
Freshman
Characteristics:
SAT
Scores
1146
1145
GPA
3.37
3.40
There are 1318
new students but it is anticipated that there will be some
attrition by Christmas.
-The issue at hand
is the spring transfer enrollment. The University normally
accepts 250 to 300 transfers in the spring, but with the extra
students the University may not be able to accept as many transfer
students. The Office of the Registrar has been asked to check
on how many students will be graduating this fall in order to
determine a final estimate.
2) Budget Process
-The composition
of the Budget Committee has changed. The Budget Committee will
include the President, Vice Presidents, Deans, and the Presidents
of the Faculty and Staff Senates and ASLMU.
-The University
budget will continue to be approved during the first week of March
at the Board of Trustee meeting. The decision to approve the
budget in the spring was made so that the University would have a
better understanding of its finances and needs.
3) Staff and Faculty Compensation Study
- An outside
consulting firm has been hired to conduct a staff compensation
study.
The President and
President’s Cabinet would like to have this firm also conduct
a faculty compensation study. The hope is to have faculty
focus groups that will assist the consulting firm in its study.
Q. What is the reason for the increase in the
price of food at LMU?
A. Dr. Jabbra did not have much information
about the price increase, but suggested that the Faculty Senate
contact the Vice President for Business and Finance, Tom Fleming,
to come to a Senate meeting.
Q. Is the Faculty gym going to close in
University Hall?
A. No decision has been made about this, but
the problem is that the University is running out of space.
Lynne Scarboro, V.P. for Administration, will need to look at room
availability and then assess how much more space is
needed.
James Roe asked on
behalf of the faculty and staff that the gym continue to be located
in University Hall.
Q. Where does ESOF fit into the compensation
study? The ESOF Committee is concerned that the University has
gathered information in the past from the Committee and has not
used it.
A. The ESOF report will now go directly to the
Budget Committee so that the report can be included before the
budget is finalized. The information that ESOF gathered in
the past was considered since their data was used to adjust the
salary of the three ranks of the faculty that resulted in a
$550,000 difference/adjustment.
Q. Why does LMU report the unweighted GPA of
the freshman class when few universities still do this?
A. Dr. Jabbra will check with the Admissions
Office and will report back to the Faculty Senate.
Q. Will there be communication between ESOF
and the consulting firm regarding the compensation study?
A. Yes, ESOF will be one of the faculty focus
groups.
Q. Is the gender ratio at LMU comparable to
other Universities nationally?
A. The ratio is not unique to LMU. It is
close to the 60/40 ratios, but not exact.
Q. Is the enrollment goal of the University
related to the size of the incoming freshman class or to the size
of the entire LMU undergraduate enrollment?
A. The immediate focus is on the incoming
freshman class, but there will also be consideration given to the
size of the entire LMU undergraduate student population.
II. A Report by the Core Curriculum
Committee
1) Mary Beth Ingham, C.S.J., Associate
Academic Vice President - Last year’s activities.
-The WASC
reaccredidation evaluation is being conducted in two parts.
The educational effectiveness infrastructure was reviewed in
March. WASC will evaluate the effectiveness of LMU’s
mission related activities during its visit from October
15th to October 17th.
-Last year the
senior class was given a survey in their capstone courses regarding
the effectiveness of the curriculum, but given a 25% return rate,
the survey was not very informative. The point of the senior
class survey was to determine the students’ understanding of
and satisfaction with the core curriculum.
-Faculty and
student focus groups were held in the spring. This
information along with survey results was shared with the Deans and
Directors at their retreat in May. Two important findings
came out of the retreat. First, the data that was reported
needed to be more sophisticated and there needed to be a more
efficient way to collect it. Second, the data showed that
students experienced the values of the University through the
activities of Student Affairs as well as in their academic courses.
As a result, the Core Curriculum Committee will organize its work
for the coming year with these results in mind.
2) Kelly Wahl, Director of Assessment
–Activities for this year
-The Learning
Outcomes Assessment Plan is still in its infancy, but there will be
an Informational Open House Forum on October 8th
which will be held in the McIntosh room. It will be an
opportunity to see the plans and projects measuring learning
outcomes.
-In order to
assess the University’s effectiveness in promoting academic
excellence, the Core Curriculum Committee is working with K.J.
Peters of the English Department and the College Writing Program to
collect samples of student work in order to track changes in
students’ skills, knowledge, and values. This will be a
yearlong process that will be expanded to other departments in
order to collect other aspects of students work.
3) Judy Scalin, Professor and Director of
Dance – Future plans
-Judy Scalin
became Chair of the Committee this past summer. The focus of
the Committee’s work before October will be to have an
orientation regarding the work of last year’s committee and
to the status of the current assessment activities. They will also
develop a working plan regarding the Core Curriculum. Once
the plan is developed the Committee will provide a summary report
to the Faculty Senate.
Q. How is membership of the Committee
determined and how does one get on the Committee?
A. There is a letter is sent out at the end of
the year requesting committee preferences and then the Committee on
Committees makes the selection.
Q. Do we look at Graduate students in the WASC
review?
A. No, that has never been done because the
Core Curriculum Committee deals with Undergraduate
curriculum. The hope is to eventually include work from
Graduate students in the Learning Outcome Assessments Program.
Q. Is attention currently being paid to having
an integrated core curriculum?
A. WASC is going to look at how our services
are integrated with the curriculum. LMU chose to have WASC
evaluate the University on its mission. The Core Curriculum
will look at the first year and the senior capstone courses to see
if they are integrated with the core curriculum.
Q. How does the Core Curriculum Committee plan
to change the core for the math and science component since there
are major problems with it?
A. Currently, there are three representatives
from the Math Department on the Committee and it is a concern that
there is no representation from the science departments. The
Committee is planning to survey the faculty to see what concerns
need to be raised, especially concerns of junior faculty.
III. Review of the Faculty Handbook by
Matt Dillon
-The review of the
Handbook will be conducted in two phases.
-First Phase:
Mechanical Updates.
The need is to
revise all of the de facto issues, new school policies, or things
that are obsolete.
-How to make
changes: Go to Blackboard. In Blackboard there are
three sections. Go to the section that needs the revision and
write in the change/comment there.
-The Senate
members are asked to review the first three sections of the Faculty
Handbook by the next meeting. These changes should be
submitted through Blackboard.
-Second Phase:
Substantive Issues
Examples of
substantive issues include policies regarding implementation of
promotion and maternity leave policies.
Q. When was the last time the Handbook was
revised?
A. 1996. At the bottom of each page
there should be a date specifying when the last revision was
made.
IV. Sexual Harassment and the Need for a
Full-time Compliance Officer by Patricia Oliver and Dave Trump
-Patricia and Dave
talked about the sexual and racial harassment policy, the revision
of the policy that is currently being reviewed and the proposal for
a full-time compliance officer.
-The proposal to
hire a full-time sexual and racial advisor was approved by the
President and will go for a second time to the Budget
Committee.
-Dave Trump came
to the Faculty Senate as an administrator who dealt with a case
this summer and found the policy and process very difficult to work
with. Dave proposed that the Senate support funding for a
full-time position.
Patricia Oliver
agreed to develop a resolution for the Senate to support the
funding of this position.
V. Resolutions
1) The following resolutions addressing the
incoming student class size were introduced.
The incoming entering undergraduate students
number 130 greater than the agreed upon target of 1200. This
has an unwanted impact on the facilities and mission of this
university. Adding additional class sections depletes the
availability of classrooms, or if no sections are added, increases
the class size. Because of this class size, some students are
required to sleep in living rooms or in temporary
housing. The increase in the student body is also
affecting graduate programs.
Below are two resolutions regarding how the
Senate should respond to the Administration concerning "class size"
inflation.
1A. Be it resolved that if students in excess of the LMU admissions
targets are admitted, 10% of the extra tuition gained shall be paid
directly to faculty, deans and other directly impacted persons, as
compensation for the increased workload and inconvenience
associated with over-enrollment.
The resolution was amended to read – Be
it resolved that if students in excess of the LMU admissions
targets are admitted minus attrition, 10% of the extra tuition
gained shall be paid as Christmas bonuses to faculty, deans and
other directly impacted persons, as compensation for the increased
workload and inconvenience associated with over-enrollment.
Moved and seconded. Discussion followed which
focused on the implications of implementing the resolution.
Q. What is happening with the extra money?
A. The University has experienced a habitual
over enrollment of students.
Suzanne O’Brien agreed to investigate
where the money is going.
Call for the question – 3 in favor, 13
opposed, 1 abstention
Motion was defeated.
1B. Be it resolved that Loyola Marymount
University must make a greater effort in the admissions process to
limit incoming students to 1200 students, as outlined by the
strategic plan. In addition, in determining the budget for AY
2004-2005, the revenue generated by only 1200 incoming
students will be taken into consideration
The resolution was amended to read - Be it
resolved that Loyola Marymount University must adhere to its
strategic plan to limit incoming students to 1200. In
addition, in determining the budget for AY 2004-2005, the revenue
generated by only 1200 incoming students for the year will
be taken into consideration
Moved and seconded. Call for the question
– 12 in favor, 1 opposed, 4 abstentions. Motion passed.
2) Resolution Addressing the Value of Offering
Free or Subsidized Housing for Students Carrying Out Summer
Research on Campus.
Be it resolved that the University should offer free or, at
least, subsidized on-campus housing to demonstrate institutional
support to external granting agencies, to encourage on-campus
research by LMU faculty and to increase the retention of LMU
students as summer researchers.
-James Roe
explained that this would demonstrate support for faculty research
and for institutional support for obtaining outside grants.
The resolution was amended to read - Be it
resolved that the University should offer free or, at least,
subsidized on-campus housing to LMU students engaged in summer
research to demonstrate institutional support to external granting
agencies, to encourage on-campus research by LMU faculty and to
increase the retention of LMU students as summer researchers.
Moved and seconded. Call for the question -14
in favor, 2 opposed, 0 abstentions. Motion passed.
The meeting adjourned at 4:55 p.m.
Next meeting: October 16, 2003
2:45-5
p.m.
McIntosh
Submitted by: Victoria Graf
Prepared by: Amber Hager
.