September 15, 2005
Loyola Marymount University
Faculty Senate Minutes,
September 15, 2005
Hilton 302
3:00 p.m.-5:00 p.m.
Present: Marta Baltondano, Cynthia Becht, William F. Cain, S.J., Jeffrey Davis, Victoria Graf, Jok M. Jok, Chun I. Lee, Blake Mellor, Ed Mosteig, Elizabeth Murray, Suzanne O’Brien, K.J. Peters, Ralph Quiñones, Nina Reich, James A. Roe, Rhonda Rosen, Susan Scheibler, Robert Singleton
Excused: Charles E. Erven, Omar Es-Said, Paul Harris, Patrick Damon Rago
President Graf called the meeting to order at 3:00 p.m.
I. Announcements of the President of the Faculty Senate
-President Graf welcomed the Faculty Senate to the first meeting of the year with a thank you to former president James A. Roe for his outstanding work throughout the previous year. Mary E. Stroud, a graduate student in the English Department, was introduced and welcomed as the new recording secretary. This was followed by a prayer on compassion and a moment of silence to reflect on current events, especially Hurricane Katrina.
-It was moved and seconded to approve the minutes of the April 2005 meeting. The
minutes were approved unanimously.
II. Dr. Ernest Rose, Academic Vice President
- President Graf welcomed Vice President Rose to the Senate.
- Dr. Rose addressed the following topics:
- Vision for LMU. As the new Academic Vice President, Dr. Rose feels that his vision is a “shared vision” to create among ourselves. There will be a push to move LMU to the next level with the goal of answering the following questions: What makes an LMU education unique? What is it that defines LMU for the students? Dr. Rose expressed a strong interest in moving graduate education into the mainstream of thought, expanding existing or creating new programs so that LMU is known more as a comprehensive university.
- External and internal grant monies. Dr. Rose discussed his plans to develop support and infrastructure to help faculty be more active in the grants and research areas. He elaborated on ideas regarding how to track grant funding. Grant monies would be distributed according to the following formula:
70% will be retained by the AVP’s office to build support for the grants office
10% will go to the dean of the awarded school
20% will go to the principal investigator as funding for travel, academic memberships, research assistance, etc.
The plan would include the hiring of a fiscal administrator, who would work with faculty regarding the use of the grant money, as well as facilitate the distribution of the funding. Additional grants office staff would include pre-grant advisors or assistants who would work with and for faculty to find grant opportunities based upon their interests.
- Academic Affairs. The organization within Academic Affairs is being reviewed. Searches are in process for the following open positions: Associate Vice President for Academic Affairs and Dean of Enrollment Management, Director of Institutional Research, and Dean of University Libraries.
- Library. A design team has been assembled to plan the interior space of the future Hannon library building as the previous design plans are several years old. The team is comprised of faculty, administrators, and the interim University Librarian. The team will look to design a library that will serve as an information center as well as a repository. Dr. Rose anticipates the team will have a completed design prepared by the Spring.
-Discussion:
Q: Will the reorganization of grant monies affect how internal grants are awarded?
A: Probably. Internal grants possibly would support faculty conducting pilot studies or help put them in a position to receive greater external funding for their research or creative endeavors. Also, we would continue to have summer grants made available to new faculty to get their research up and running. Some internal funds would go directly to the schools and colleges to decide how to award them, within defined parameters. There are a variety of possibilities. Dr Rose is open to ideas and suggestions. He invited faculty to submit their thoughts and ideas to their deans.
Q: Regarding the focus on graduate programs, what about considering having a graduate dean?
A: The idea is to create two positions from the position vacated by Sr. Mary Beth Ingham: an Associate Academic Vice President for Undergraduate Education and an Associate Academic Vice President for Research and Graduate Education. Dr. Rose would like to move internal organization to a three Associates model in order to bring more leadership, direction, clearer reporting lines, and a single source for information.
Q: How does the level of LMU grants compare with that of other universities?
A: LMU seems to be a bit more generous with the awarding of internal grants than other schools. The size of the grants is comparable. There is much potential for more external funding.
Q: What is happening with the summer Raines research Assistantships? Are the work study hours being cut?
A: Work study allocations were reconfigured when Fr. Koppes switched from the pool of hours model to awarding monies. All colleges and schools have been given close to what they actually spent last year and in virtually all cases received more than their previously stated allocations. There is no longer a reserve in the AVP’s office. The monies have been handed out to the deans and decisions on expenditures will be made internally from now on. It is also important to remember that for the Raines summer grants, somebody has to be responsible for signing off on work study. The AVP will no longer sign off on work done by students when faculty supervisors are on sabbatical.
Q: Can you discuss the background of recent decisions made regarding the Children’s Center, the search for an officer for the Office of Health and Safety, and the Collins Center? It seems that these issues were undertaken with little or no committee involvement.
A: This is a conversation for another time. Vice President Tom Fleming could come and speak with the Senate regarding these issues.
III. Rebecca Chandler, Assistant Vice President of Human Resources
- President Graf welcomed Rebecca Chandler to the Senate.
-Update on faculty benefits. Ms. Chandler prefaced her discussion by noting that no one in Administration who had assisted in the development of the compensation plan is still here. She currently is focusing on the following issues:
1. Market analysis is being done to compare the compensation of LMU faculty to that of other universities. The data should be ready to present to Vice President Rose in about a month.
- Merit pay. Ms. Chandler is currently doing research to see what the past merit
based pay programs reflect. There will be opportunity for dialogue before any changes are made.
- The maternity leave policy is in its first draft phase. After the draft is approved by the President, Ms. Chandler will start soliciting feedback from the faculty.
4. Sexual and discriminatory harassment training for all supervisory faculty. Anyone
in a supervisory position is required to attend this 2 hour training seminar every twenty-four months. All faculty are encouraged to participate but any faculty member who supervises staff must complete this training between now and the end of the year in order for LMU to remain in compliance.
5. Cultural Climate survey. Ms. Chandler is beginning to conduct a community wide
cultural climate survey via a web-based instrument to assess the LMU
environment, perceptions of leadership, and support. Initially, students will
receive the version of the survey that Ms. Chandler passed out during the meeting.
The forthcoming faculty survey will contain questions regarding job satisfaction.
Collation and analysis of surveys will be done by an outside expert.
-Discussion
Q: What do we say to female candidates regarding our maternity leave policy?
A: I would just be honest and say that one is currently being drafted.
Q: How do we compare with other similar institutions regarding the maternity leave policy?
A: One semester is usually the amount of time granted for a leave; however when it occurs in the middle of the semester it presents some major problems. Larger universities often give a full year’s leave that does not count on the clock.
Q: Merit calculations were in violation of the contract last year in that they did not follow the formula. What is being done about this?
A: This will be rectified this year.
IV. President’s Report
- Faculty Senate President Victoria Graf spoke on the following topics:
1. The Hilton building was chosen for the Senate meetings for its middle-of-campus convenience.
2. Summer activities. The Senate Executive Board met and discussed establishing a more collegial relationship with Administration. President Graf went out to lunch with several administrators one-on-one over the summer in order to establish a dialogue. Of paramount importance in these conversations was making sure that contracts would be corrected for this year.
3. Information Technology Services. ITS is a source of continuing challenge. The Help Desk and IT responsiveness are currently huge priorities. Erin Griffin will be coming to the November meeting to update the Senate on the State of IT at LMU. She will also talk about security concerns. Faculty Senators are encouraged to collect issues, concerns and comments from faculty for the November meeting. Emphasis should be on current issues, not on past problems.
4. The Executive Board has begun an initiative to co-host ten luncheons with Fr. Lawton throughout the academic year. Six faculty members representing each college and school will be invited to each luncheon. This will be not only a social opportunity, but also an opportunity to discuss important issues.
5. Future plans for the Faculty Senate. This year the Senate will be looking at its role in regards to governance. William G. Tierney, USC, an expert on Higher Education, will be invited in January to speak on models of faculty governance. Committee structure will be reviewed. The Senate will look into a student-voiced concern expressed by Vice President for Student Affairs Lane Bove regarding LMU’s intellectual life.
6. Emergency Plan for LMU. The Senate will meet with Public Safety in order to hear about emergency planning.
V. Report on the Faculty Handbook -- Matt Dillon
- President Graf welcomed Dr. Matthew Dillon to the Senate.
-Matt Dillon discussed the following faculty handbook topics:
1. The handbook is seriously out of date. The last systematic revisions were made six to eight years ago. In order to remedy this, there should be a standing committee in place to make annual changes. Matt estimates that it will take two years to get the handbook up to date.
2. The general plan of revising the handbook is to implement the non-controversial changes first. Ideally an amended draft of these revisions would be approved by the AVP by early November. The Senate would then vote on it and the package would be submitted to the entire faculty for comment.
-Discussion
Q: The faculty handbook is critical to the relationship between the faculty and the
institution. This is our contract. How can the university continue doing business with the handbook so out of date?
A: It takes a considerable amount of effort to enact these changes. As of now it is the Senate’s responsibility to make sure it gets done. The Senate meets only for two hours each month. Matt suggests a standing committee might be established to manage the updating of the handbook.
Q: Who signs off those portions of the faculty handbook: the AVP or the Senate?
A: There needs to be approval from both sides, requiring a lot of consensus building and collaboration on this matter.
Q: How is the handbook distributed?
A: It is available on-line.
VI. Update on Manegate -- John Kiralla, Director of Web Services
- President Graf welcomed John Kiralla to the Senate.
- The following information was reported:
1. Manegate, the new LMU intranet service, went live today for faculty and staff. It is the first system on campus combining the entire LMU population. Because it is newly in place, there are many issues that are expected to arise.
2. One planned-for feature that did not make the deadline is called “targeted
announcements.” This feature will not be available until the end of the semester.
-Discussion
Q: My Students tab takes me to Blackboard instead of to Prowl. How do I get to Prowl?
A: The faculty direction to Prowl is not so obvious because the system is mostly geared toward students. Blackboard is a location for sharing notes and communicating with students. However, Manegate should send network credentials to both places.
Q: Is there a way to disable the time out function?
A: Currently this is not available. However, a message box appears to warn you if it is about to log you out. The time out function addresses security needs but I will ask if there is any way for faculty to disable it.
Q: Was information disseminated on Manegate decisions?
A: Advisory groups were represented in the development of Manegate. I feel very comfortable in saying that the information was properly disseminated and communicated. There were focus groups, an open forum, and a two day catered affair.
Q: Who made the decision to purchase Manegate? Was there faculty input?
A: It was an IT purchase in response to a momentum gathering among university campuses to provide these portals. Faculty was involved to some extent since the purchase decision had to go through the Budget Committee.
Q: How can I customize Manegate?
A: Users can move channels around and remove some of them. Institutional messaging cannot be moved or removed.
VII. Final comments discussed before adjourning the meeting
1. The Senate discussed the relationship between Administration and the faculty, stating that it will be important to make improvements this year. Dissemination of information is inadequate. It was noted that there are faculty members serving on a wide range of committees. The Senate needs to find a mechanism of utilizing them to represent us. They will be invited to future meetings in order to report to the Senate.
2. There is a question of the accountability of administrators. The idea of developing the position of an ombudsman between faculty and administrators was suggested. It was pointed out that the power of subpoena is integral to the functioning of the Senate.
3. The representation of part time faculty was also discussed. The development of a committee for the part time faculty was proposed. The Senate will look into the question of part time faculty participation when investigating models of governance.
The meeting was adjourned at 5:00 p.m.
Submitted by: Cynthia Becht
Prepared by: Mary Stroud