• In early August 2006, the senate learned that the Provost’s office planned to reduce benefits for retired faculty.  The most significant of these cuts would have stripped retirees of free parking privileges and complimentary tickets to Fine Arts and sporting events.  Working with a fledgling Retired Faculty Association, the senate gathered data on usage of parking and sports tickets and compared that with information on donations and gifts.  The senate presented this information to the President and Provost at the September PAAG meeting.  President Trauth and Provost Moore agreed to rethink the issue and delay any changes to the pertinent PPS.  In the end, retired faculty retained all of their benefits except for free tickets to the football games.

• A senate subcommittee (Don Hazlewood, Michel Conroy, and Ted Hindson) brought to fruition the latest version of the Faculty Handbook in a web-version (accessible through the Faculty Senate webpage www.txstate.edu/facultysenate) as well as hard copy.

• The senate expressed concerns about the proposed PPS for Background checks for faculty (PPS 7.20) and recommended the PPS be amended so that the checks on newly hired persons in teaching positions would be conducted only for “a felony conviction or a deferred adjudication conviction at the age of 17 or older”.  The Senate’s recommendation was incorporated in the final version of the PPS.

• The senate recommended revisions to PPS 4.01 to include “active military service” as an excused absence from class.  The revisions would render PPS 4.01 congruent with PPS 4.09.

• The senate enjoined the administration to have chairs and directors of programs submit workload reports in a timely fashion and to comply with PPS 7.05 which requires that the chairs or directors provide faculty members with their individual workload reports.

The senate has also expressed concerns that the workload reports are not filled out in a consistent or correct fashion by administrators.  Associate Provost Bourgeois is recommending changes that will more accurately reflect faculty workload, especially the research credit.

• The senate sought clarification from the Provost about proposed revisions to PPS 8.01 (Department evaluation of tenure track faculty) which seemed to remove the category of service entirely from the evaluation of tenure track faculty.  The Provost assured the Faculty Senate that PPS 8.01 would be revised to include reference to the category of service (though the Provost emphasized the far more significant role of research and teaching in the evaluation of tenure track faculty).

• The senate considered and approved 17 applications for Development Leave in the Fall and 16 applications in the Spring.

• At the October 11, 2006, PAAG meeting, the Faculty Senate expressed concerns regarding the unintended consequences of the development of doctoral programs on campus.  Specifically, the Senate was concerned that departments which do not pursue a doctoral program will be considered “service departments” and also, that the existence of doctoral programs on campus limits the potential funding from agencies which provide programs specifically for funding research at primarily undergraduate institutions (PUI).  The National Science Foundation, for example, limits the submission of NSF-PUI proposals to institutions which award less than 10 doctoral degrees in NSF-funded areas per year, regardless of whether the principal investigator is in a doctoral-granting department.  As a result, departments that award only the master’s degree at Texas State will be competing for funds at NSF with Tier 1 research institutions such as the University of Texas at Austin and Texas A&M University.  Although there are no simple answers to the problem, the President and the Provost are aware of the concerns and assure the Faculty Senate that only departments with a strong commitment to doctoral programs should pursue doctoral status.  The President and Provost also indicated that the Office of Sponsored Programs would assist faculty in areas that will be affected by the absence of PUI funding.

• A senate subcommittee formulated revisions to PPS 6.11 (Presidential awards for excellence in service, scholarly/creative activities, and teaching).

• Senators expressed concern over departments not following UPPS 7.02: Faculty Hiring. In particular, the Senate noted that some deans were asking for unranked lists of candidates, while 7.02 (paragraph40) states that the departmental search committee “will forward its recommendation to the department chair/school director...”.   In response Associate Provost Bourgeois met with all Deans to highlight the specific language of the UPPS to help ensure departmental compliance with the policy.

Issues raised by the Senate not yet resolved: 

• The Senate continues to raise questions about the role of Service in the evaluation of tenured faculty (e.g., when applying for promotion to Full Professor). 
• The Senate will continue to urge that there be electronic verification of the 12^th day rosters.