Minutes of the Faculty Senate
DWR 205
November 15, 2018
3:40 p.m.
Present: Senators Warrick, Bond, Zia, Huang, Louden, Testa, Boumtje, Lowther, DiPier, Lyubartseva, White, Schroeder, Wise, Stanford, Parnell, Wilson, Shirey
Call to Order at 3:41 p.m.
Approval of Minutes
Minutes from September 15th, 2018 were approved (motion – Testa, second – DiPier).
Special Orders of the Day
Dr. Berry gave an update about the presidential home. Current construction costs are 1.429 million. The home is 4,500 square feet. The home is considered to be a University Facility, and as such, 70 percent of the home is public space designed to host community and special guests. The home is currently expected to be finished around the 10th of December. Funding for the home came from 1 time money: bond, money from the India bubble, and a loan. The Board of Trustees determined that the home should be on campus which is why the construction costs are higher because the home must adhere to state standards. There will be additional costs for furnishing, but those costs will be minimized because many personal items will be used to furnish the home. Dr. Berry suggested that the senate hold a spring meeting at the presidential home.
Dr. Lanoue addressed the question of tenured faculty review process and the Faculty Handbook reference to “New Faculty Evaluation. The Faculty Handbook has continuity errors in that the section about new faculty evaluation sites state law which requires that all faculty be evaluated yearly. Dr. Lanoue has met with the Annual Faculty Performance Review Monitoring Committee, and they are in the process of working on aligning our faculty review process to the state law. The committee is discussing the following:
1). Omitting the word “new” from New Faculty Evaluation
2). A system where all full time faculty are reviewed yearly. Tenured faculty would complete peer review and annual summary. Untenured faculty would complete peer review, annual summary, and development plan.
3). Evaluation of online courses that will be comparable to face-to-face course evaluations.
4). If tenured faculty going up for promotion should be required to have peer course reviews.
At this time, it is recommended that department chairs stay in compliance with the law. It is recommended that chairs have meetings with tenured faculty to explain the review process. Until the process is codified, there will be some leeway to chairs and deans in completing tenured faculty evaluations. The senate raised the question of evaluating summer courses in the same way that fall and spring courses are evaluated. Dr. Lanoue will bring that question before the committee. When changes in promotion and tenure requirements occur after a faculty member is hired but before they are tenured, then it is recommended that the faculty member, chair, and dean discuss the expectations and which requirements it is reasonable for the faculty member to follow.
Dr. Lanoue gave an update on the proposed fall break. The fall break is intended to begin in the fall of 2019. There is an additional instructional day in the schedule, which will bring the total number of instructional days in the fall to 45. This will reconcile the fall semester with the spring semester, which already contains 45 instructional days. This will also keep us at 15 weeks of instruction, which is the state requirement. The recommendation for final grades is that they will be due by the end of the day on the Sunday following final exams. The senate raised the question about whether we could begin the fall semester on Monday and then have a week off at Thanksgiving break. A concern was raised in response to the question about issues that arise during that time pertaining to advising, housing, and financial aid.
III. Reports of the Committees
Handbook Committee: Handbook Committee met to discuss integrating online learning information into the handbook. They are continuing with discussions and Kathy Cole will be meeting with the committee. Recommendations will be brought to the senate.
Budget Committee: Budget Committee met to address the topic of adjunct and overload pay (see attached report). Currently there are 582 adjunct and overload courses. In order to fund a 300 dollar pay increase across the board, 234,000 dollars would need to be generated
Motion that we as a university – administration and faculty alike – recognize the need to pay our adjunct and overload faculty fairly on an annual basis and adopt for FY 2019-2020 an additional $2-3 increase in tuition per credit hour across the board to fund this adjustment in pay for our faculty. With the increase in adjunct and overload pay included in tuition, the ability to finance this raise is ensured on an annual basis. Motion carries.
Motion that pay for adjunct and overload faculty be tied to any and all annual COLA raises received by the regular SAU faculty with the adjunct and overload amounts raised by the same proportion as faculty base salaries, rounded up to the nearest $5, for the fiscal year in which that COLA takes effect. Such a link to the COLA raises ensures that we continue to maintain the salary standards set forth in the original motion. Motion carries.
Other Business
Deans approved a common template for face-to-face blackboard courses.
Motion to approve Blackboard common template to look like online course template. Motion carries.
Dr. Giles discussed University Hiring Practices Training. The purpose of the training is to ensure observance of proper practice and consistency across campus
Gerald Plumlee addressed the topic of Axiom Mentor. The College of Business and the College of Education piloted Mentor in 2015-2016 and have since adopted Mentor as their faculty reporting tool. Currently, approximately 70 faculty member are using Mentor. It can be customized to meet different department needs. Asked the senate to consider a motion to adopt Mentor across campus.
Motion to refer to the Handbook Committee to replace the current word document with Mentor as the official tool for reporting Annual Summary and Professional Development Activity. Motion Carries
Adjourn
Senator White motioned to adjourn at 4:53 pm (Schroeder second). Motion passed.
Report from the Faculty Senate Budget Committee regarding increasing adjunct and overload pay as referred to the committee during the October 2018 Faculty Senate meeting.
The Faculty Senate Budget Committee (Senators Schroeder, Testa, DiPier, and Zia) met on 11/12/18 to discuss the item referred to the committee. It appears that such an increase in pay to adjuncts has not happened since some time prior to the 2010-2011 academic year. Committee chair Schroeder brought along some research acquired from information supplied to the committee by VPF Reed as well as information from the interactive fact book from the SAU Institutional Research website.
From VPF Reed’s information:
Over the past year (Fall 2017, Spring 2018, Summer 2018) there have been an estimated total of 582 courses taught by adjuncts/overloads: 211 overload + 371 adjunct.
Figures do not count independent study types of courses.
From the IR website interactive fact book:
2017-2018 fiscal year total SSCH for SAU: 113,971
2016-2017 fiscal year total SSCH for SAU: 120,474
2015-2016 fiscal year total SSCH for SAU: 112,234
As calculated by the Budget Committee:
It will cost $174,600 to increase the pay for all overload and adjunct pay by $300 across the board, resulting in pay levels of $2100/$2400/$2700 for bachelors/masters/doctorate level instructors respectively.
For the 211 overload instructors in the report, the budget committee estimates that the accompanying increase in fringes (no healthcare included in this increase) to be approximately 20% of the raise in salary, resulting in an additional $12,660.
This results in a rough estimate of the total cost of the proposed raise in adjunct/overload salary to be $187,260.
If it is estimated that approximately 20% of our tuition revenue is waived as scholarships, this needs to be accounted for in our totals if the cost of the increase is to come from tuition. This results in the university needing to effectively raise $187,260/0.80 = $234,075 to fully fund this proposed increase if the fund is to come tuition revenue rather than fees.
Therefore:
It is the recommendation of the Senate Budget Committee that we as a university – administration and faculty alike – recognize the need to pay our adjunct and overload faculty fairly on an annual basis and adopt for FY 2019-2020 an additional $2-3 increase in tuition per credit hour across the board to fund this adjustment in pay for our faculty. With the increase in adjunct and overload pay included in tuition, the ability to finance this raise is ensured on an annual basis.
It is further the recommendation of the committee that the pay for adjunct and overload faculty be tied to any and all annual COLA raises received by the regular SAU faculty with the adjunct and overload amounts raised by the same proportion as faculty base salaries, rounded up to the nearest $5, for the fiscal year in which that COLA takes effect. Such a link to the COLA raises ensures that we continue to maintain the salary standards set forth in the original recommendation.
| SSCH Report by Academic Year by College | ||||||||
| Presented to the Faculty Senate Budget Committee by T. Schroeder | ||||||||
| Source: Interactive Fact Book on the SAU Institutional Research Website | ||||||||
| 2nd Summer 2018 | Fall 2018 | Spring 2019 | Summer I 2019 | |||||
| Enrollment | SSCH | Enrollment | SSCH | Enrollment | SSCH | Enrollment | SSCH | |
| 156 | 466 | 1,989 | 5,967 | |||||
| 562 | 1,586 | 3,393 | 9,138 | |||||
| 283 | 836 | 7,727 | 20,453 | |||||
| 343 | 940 | 7,904 | 18,835 | |||||
| 1,344 | 3,828 | 21,013 | 54,393 | 0 | 0 | |||
| 12 Month Total Enrollment: | 22,357 | |||||||
| 12 Month Total SSCH: | 58,221 | |||||||
| Term | ||||||||
| 2nd Summer 2017 | Fall 2017 | Spring 2018 | 1st Summer 2018 | |||||
| COLLEGE | Enrollment | SSCH | Enrollment | SSCH | Enrollment | SSCH | Enrollment | SSCH |
| Business | 133 | 399 | 2,071 | 6,065 | 1,925 | 5,761 | 212 | 636 |
| Education | 455 | 1,298 | 3,126 | 8,257 | 2,970 | 8,248 | 670 | 1,960 |
| Liberal & Performing Arts | 217 | 646 | 7,835 | 20,900 | 6,806 | 18,362 | 441 | 1,300 |
| Science & Engineering | 876 | 2,466 | 7,731 | 19,554 | 6,689 | 16,643 | 557 | 1,476 |
| REPORT TOTAL | 1,681 | 4,809 | 20,763 | 54,776 | 18,390 | 49,014 | 1,880 | 5,372 |
| 12 Month Total Enrollment: | 42,714 | |||||||
| 12 Month Total SSCH: | 113,971 | |||||||
| SSCH Report for 2017 by College | ||||||||
| Term | ||||||||
| 2nd Summer 2016 | Fall 2016 | Spring 2017 | 1st Summer 2017 | |||||
| COLLEGE | Enrollment | SSCH | Enrollment | SSCH | Enrollment | SSCH | Enrollment | SSCH |
| Business | 166 | 496 | 1,987 | 5,961 | 1,868 | 5,604 | 187 | 561 |
| Education | 404 | 1,174 | 2,912 | 7,818 | 2,940 | 8,258 | 506 | 1,479 |
| Liberal & Performing Arts | 269 | 806 | 7,346 | 19,772 | 6,526 | 17,674 | 484 | 1,442 |
| Science & Engineering | 1,445 | 4,175 | 8,621 | 22,700 | 7,736 | 19,942 | 911 | 2,612 |
| REPORT TOTAL | 2,284 | 6,651 | 20,866 | 56,251 | 19,070 | 51,478 | 2,088 | 6,094 |
| 12 Month Total Enrollment: | 44,308 | |||||||
| 12 Month Total SSCH: | 120,474 | |||||||
| SSCH Report for 2016 by College | ||||||||
| Term | ||||||||
| 2nd Summer 2015 | Fall 2015 | Spring 2016 | 1st Summer 2016 | |||||
| COLLEGE | Enrollment | SSCH | Enrollment | SSCH | Enrollment | SSCH | Enrollment | SSCH |
| Business | 202 | 606 | 2,005 | 6,015 | 1,885 | 5,655 | 200 | 600 |
| Education | 397 | 1,165 | 2,585 | 6,912 | 2,531 | 7,122 | 391 | 1,167 |
| Liberal & Performing Arts | 284 | 853 | 6,778 | 18,661 | 6,182 | 17,200 | 464 | 1,372 |
| Science & Engineering | 588 | 1,593 | 6,970 | 18,350 | 7,673 | 20,289 | 1,597 | 4,674 |
| REPORT TOTAL | 1,471 | 4,217 | 18,338 | 49,938 | 18,271 | 50,266 | 2,652 | 7,813 |
| 12 Month Total Enrollment: | 40,732 | |||||||
| 12 Month Total SSCH: | 112,234 | |||||||
