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Jan 24, 1996 Minutes


Present: Bible, Caverly, Deduck-Evans, Ford, Glassman, Horne, Hunter,
Lyman, Middlebrook, Pascoe, Sawey, Stedman, Swinney, and Winek. Absent:
Weller.

Guests: Dean Rumaldo Juarez (Health Professions); Profs. Don Hazelwood
(Math) and Lou Caruana (Medical Tech); Margaret Vaverek (Library); Mike
Moore, and Sandra Akridge.

CONTENTS:

33 SENIOR FACULTY SYSTEM (Prof. Hazelwood)
34 CURRICULUM COMMITTEE REPORT (Prof. Caruana)
13 DEVELOPMENTAL LEAVES (Policy and Forms)
70 AD HOC COMMITTEE ON FINAL EXAMS
26 SALARY EQUITY
02 SENATE MINUTES OF 1/17/96
NEW ITEMS

The meeting was called to order at 4:05, Chair Swinney presiding.

33 SENIOR FACULTY SYSTEM (Prof. Hazelwood)

The Faculty Governance Committee was asked to examine current practices
regarding who was allowed to vote on departmental decisions across the campus
and to make recommendations for changes in The Faculty Handbook section on
faculty governance. A survey of most departments found that apparently most
faculty are participating in most faculty decisions, except for personnel
questions which are in the hands of senior faculty.

Therefore, the Committee recommends wording changes in the handbook
to reflect: (1) "Voting faculty" (those who teach more than half time and
have been in the department for one year) will participate in all
departmental decisions except on personnel decisions (e.g. hiring,
retention, promotion), and (2) Senior faculty (tenured faculty who get at
least half their salary from the department) will now be designated as the
department "personnel committee." This is a move to put into written
policy the more egalitarian practice already generally in place.

The Senate passed a resolution to have chairs share the proposed
changes with their departmental faculties with a 30-day response time. The
proposal will then be returned to the Senate agenda for action.


34 CURRICULUM COMMITTEE REPORT (Prof. Caruana)

The Committee recommends the following: (1) HPER will coordinate
PE 3321 & H ED 3321 (Physical activities and health promotion); Art 4376
added; (2) EAPS requests a number change for five existing courses and
approval for seven new courses to meet state certification board
requirements; (3) Health Adm. will add three hours and change its number
to LTCA 4681 to reflect increased intern requirements by accrediting
bodies.

The Senate voted to approve the Committee recommendations.

As a footnote, in the near future Biology will be seeking an MS in
Aquatic Biology, which will give a name to a degree whose courses are
already in place but is currently called an MS in Biology with a specialty
in Aquatic Biology. Currently 42 students are enrolled in this specialty.
No new courses or faculty are required for this change.


13 DEVELOPMENTAL LEAVES (Policy and Forms)

The form used for developmental leave applications simply calls for a
"brief description" of the proposed project. This sometimes leads to
applications which lack the specificity with the Senate needs to understand
fully what the candidate proposes to do. The following suggestions emerged
for specifying guideline questions which applicants could answer in about two
pages: (1) Description of the proposal, (2) Methodology to be pursued, (3) How
the information enhances teaching, etc., and (4) Value of all this for the
University. This general concept was agreed to and Senators Deduck-Evans,
Glassman, and Hunter were asked to come up with a draft form for Senate
consideration.


70 AD HOC COMMITTEE ON FINAL EXAMS

Academic Affairs is organizing an Ad Hoc Committee to examine the
final exam schedule and make recommendations for removing snags. The
Senate moved to nominate Profs. Grady Early (Computer Science), who has
done much research on the subject, and Eric Weller (Art), who has also
expressed much knowledge on the subject, for membership.


26 SALARY EQUITY

There will be a meeting of the salary equity study group of the
President's Council for Women in Higher Education on February 5, 1996, at
3:05 p.m. in Alkek 105-106. The topic will be "Methodology to be used in
the salary equity study." Panel members are: Profs. Janet Bezner
(Physical Therapy), Sherry Blakey (Health Adm.), David Huffman (Biology),
Kevin Jones (Math), Ruby Kishan (Fin. and Econ.) and Paul Raffeld (U.
Testing Center). Everyone is invited. Prof. Lydia Blanchard (Chair,
English and Council director) indicates that the sooner we can agree on
methodology, the sooner we can "move ahead on a regular and systematic
monitoring of salary equity at SWT."

Although not a topic for consideration on Feb. 5, in addition to
questions on methodology, the Senate had also asked last year that the salary
equity survey go beyond regular faculty to include professional staff and
"temps", e.g. librarians and lecturers, and other staff as well. Gender equity
issues in these positions may be a more serious problem than among tenured and
tenure-track faculty, according to the literature and informal local
observation.


02 SENATE MINUTES OF 1/17/96

The minutes were approved with the correction of the Faculty Senate
home-page address for minutes, Faculty Handbook, etc. The correct address
is: http://www.txstate.edu/swt_campus/facsen/facsen.html.

NEW ITEMS

(1) Senator Lyman must resign from the Senate three months
before her term is up to take a quarter time position in the Office of
Affirmative Affairs to organize a leadership development internship program
(for 6-8 faculty each year). The Senate thanked her for her service and
voted to appoint Prof. Bill Kurtz (EAPS) to replace the remainder of her
term.

(2) Parking will return to the agenda soon.

(3) The FREG committee has decided to combine both the leftover
monies for Summer 1996 ($85,000) and the monies for Summer 1997 into one
application date--March 1, 1996. Applicants should make clear which summer
they are applying for. Also, applicants can apply for both summers with
separate proposals on different projects. The deadline for both Summer '96
and Summer '97 grants is March 1, 1996.



Meeting adjourned at 5:33 p.m.

Ramona Ford
Secretary