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July 16, 1997 Minutes


Present: Bechtol, Bible, Deduck-Evans, Hunter, Irvin, McGee, Oliver,
Pascoe, Sawey, and Stimmel.

Absent: Bourgeois, Conroy, Hays, Simpson, and Winek

Guests: Bill Nance,(VPFSS), Lou Caruana (Clin Lab),Chris Frost (Psy),
Jeff Gordon (Phil), Lydia Blanchard (Eng), Nancy Grayson (Eng), Mike
Hennessy (Eng) Rebecca Bell-Metereau (Eng) Mike Moore, and Lance Moore
(AGS).

CONTENTS:

- PARKING UPDATE
- CURRICULUM COMMITTEE REPORT
- LEARNING EXCELLENCE TEAM (LET)
- EVALUATION OF CHAIRS AND DEANS
- NEW BUSINESS
- FACULTY AWARDS PROGRAM
- ADDITIONAL SUMMER MEETING
- MINUTES 5-12-97

The meeting was called to order by Chair Bible at 3:05 pm.

PARKING UPDATE

Bill Nance, VPFSS, outlined the history of the pit parking garage and
the new intracampus bus routes which will deliver students to and from
the new Student Center. Originally, a bus turn-around loop was planned
for the end of No. LBJ where the handicapped parking now is, but the
architect and the building committee felt the loop would take away too
many spaces from the pit parking garage. The alternative was to build
Matthews Street to allow the buses access to the new Student Center.

Mr. Nance then addressed the rumors about Matthews Street being too
narrow for the buses and that the new CNG buses could not make it up
Sessoms when fully loaded. In fact, Matthews Street can accommodate the
buses but there is a serious concern about the safety of pedestrian
traffic because there are no sidewalks. The ability of the new buses
powered by CNG to get up Sessoms, while fully loaded, is a problem. Mr.
Nance assured the Senate that the Durham Transportation Company is work-
ing to correct the situation by repowering the buses at no cost to SWT.
Durham has posted a million dollar performance bond which means they are
obligated to compliance.

Senator Hunter expressed concerns about the additional staff which would
need parking at the Student Center, closing the temporary lot when the
construction begins on the Art/Technology Building, the fact that the
new garage is strictly "pay to park" (no "red" reserved) and the limited
handicapped spaces for Health Profession clinics in the new garage. She
also asked for clarification of the timeline for completing the Live Oak
parking lots and rebuilding Pecan Street. Mr. Nance said the Live Oak
lots and Pecan Street should be completed by January. He explained that
building the new garage was only possible by selling bonds to cover the
construction cost so those bonds will be repaid through fees collected
for use of the facility. He said SWT would certainly comply with the
law regarding ADA and the number of handicapped spaces available in the
new garage. Senator Hunter noted that the temporary lot (R-26) was in
bad disrepair and presented a potential safety hazard to many of their
clinic patients.

Senator Sawey inquired about the fees to be charged to those interested
in buying a parking space in the new garage on a yearly basis. Mr.
Nance reported that Lillian Dees and Kathy Voges are drafting a parking
policy for the new garage and that the yearly fee would probably be
between $200-300.

CURRICULUM COMMITTEE REPORT

Prof. Caruana, Chair of the Senate's University Curriculum Committee,
reported on requests for additions, changes and deletions of courses for
Fall 1998. The English Department proposes to restructure the B.A. with
a Major in English by dropping the two general studies courses (ENG 1310
& 1320) from the major requirement and replacing them with six upper
division hours of English. The Curriculum Committee and an ad hoc
committee which it appointed to study the proposal recommended approval
of the request, and the Senate agreed.

Dr. Gratz had asked the committee to consider (1) the precedential value
of this proposal if other departments want to substitute other courses
for general studies courses in their major requirements, and (2) under
what circumstances a department should be permitted to expand the number
of hours required in its academic major beyond that typically required
for similar degree programs. The committee responded that the first
question should be resolved case-by-case, and that the second should be
addressed by the entire academic community since the legislature may
eventually cap the number of hours required for undergraduate degrees,
and in light of the effort already being made by the Coordinating Board
to do this.

Prof. Caruana related that requirements for the submission of new course
requests for the next annual review cycle of the Curriculum Committee
would be forwarded to all department chairs early in the Fall semester.


LEARNING EXCELLENCE TEAM (LET)

Profs. Frost and Gordon returned to discuss their proposal to establish
a new Senate Committee called the Learning Excellence Team (LET). Its
purpose would be to improve student learning at SWT, to facilitate
campus efforts to enhance teaching, and to promote institutional rewards
for good teaching (tenure, promotion, merit, workload) by integrating
resources in a more efficient, collaborative, sustained manner.

The discussion centered on whether LET should be a Senate committee or
aligned with SLAC or FAC, how its membership would be determined, and
its charge. There was strong sentiment expressed by Profs. Frost and
Gordon and several senators that the faculty can retain control over
this vital initiative only if it is driven solely by faculty leadership,
and that the Senate is therefore the most logical place in which to
house the team.

A motion was passed that the Senate establish a LET Committee for a
trial basis of two years. The Senate appointed Jon McGee is oversee its
organization. He will work with Profs. Frost and Gordon, who will
recommend the membership, define the committee charge, and design a
mechanism for outcome assessment. The issue will RTA in August.

EVALUATION OF CHAIRS & DEANS

Dr. Gratz has agreed to the creation of a joint Senate/Deans/Chairs
subcommittee to consider a Senate subcommittee's recommendations on the
evalution of chairs and deans (PPS 8.03 and 8.05). The subcommittee
will consist of 3 deans, 3 chairs and 3 senators who will begin meeting
soon. The senators are Ron Sawey, Bill Bechtol and Theron Stimmel.

A discussion regarding the Senate drafts of PPS 8.03 and 8.05 concluded
with the Senate passing a motion to approve the draft in principle. The
senators are entrusting the subcommittee to work on the draft and will
revisit the issue.

NEW BUSINESS

FACULTY AWARDS PLAN

Dr. Bible distributed the latest version of the faculty awards (bonus)
plan. The gist of the ensuing discussion was that the Senate remains
concerns about the absence of clear criteria for determining who should
receive an award. Several senators commented that it appeared that the
recent round of merit and performance determinations involved a failure
to abide by existing policy in some instances -- that is, that some
departments used unwritten criteria to make determinations, were incon-
sistent in applying their criteria, played favorites, etc. -- and that
there was no reason to think that these kinds of problems would not be
even more prevalent in faculty award determinations given the fact that
the guidelines are so nebulous.

PPS 7.10 (MERIT AND PERFORMANCE)

At the July 15 CAD meeting, Dr. Bible asked Dr. Gratz to postpone CAD
action on revisions to PPS 7.10 until he could confer with the Senators.
The Senate continues to be concerned about several aspects of the pro-
posed revisions and would like more time to study them. The senators
agreed to have Dr. Bible again seek a postponement of CAD action until
after the next senate meeting which will be August 20.

ADDITIONAL SUMMER MEETING

The Senators decided to schedule an extra summer meeting of the Senate
to discuss several important matters. The extra meeting will be held on
Wednesday, August 20, from 3-5 in the Senate Conference Room of JCK.

MINUTES OF 6-18-97

The Minutes of June 18, 1997 were approved with corrections.

The next meeting of the Faculty Senate will be held on Wednesday, August
20, at 3:00 in the Faculty Senate Conference Room, 880 JCK.

The meeting adjourned at 5:25.

Shirley Pilus
Administrative Assistant

Addemdum to Minutes of July 16, 1997

The following information has been submitted by Bill Nance in response
to questions brought up at the meeting.

Mr. Nance has spoken to Ed Reznicek, Director of Campus Construction.
The parking lot project for the Live Oak/Pecan/Comanche/Sessom area is
on schedule. We expect to complete it before the end of December, 1997
in time for the opening of the new Student Center/Bookstore complex when
we come back from Christmas break in January, 1998.

Also, we are in full compliance with ADA on the disabled parking in and
around the parking garage and Health Science building. Four new
disabled spaces are being created at this time between the garage and
Health Science. There are three or four already in existence between
Health Science and College Inn. There will be 18 in the new garage.
ADA only requires 7 in the garage. If there is a feeling that this is
still not enough, some more disabled spaces could be added in the
parking lots in the Live Oak, etc. project. Tina Schultz will review
this with the "Building Committee" working with the engineer on the
parking lot design.