Executive Committee Report given at the Oct 29, 2007 University Senate Meeting

Steering Committee of the University Senate and Faculty Advisory Committee to the University President

Members:  President Leland, Vice President Gormly, Doug Goings (SoB),  Bill Richards (Library)

Officers:  Secretary: Chris Greer (SoE), Vice-Chair: Kendra Russell (SoHS), Chair: Craig Turner (SoLAS)

 

SUMMARY (an approximation to what was shared orally at the October 29 University Senate meeting)

 

DETAILS  (providing more comprehensive information for each of the individual committee meetings)

  1. Since the September 24, 2007 meeting of the 2007-08 University Senate, ECUS held two elected faculty workshops (Sep 27, Oct 4), one full committee meeting (Oct 18), and one joint meeting with the Standing Committee Chairs (Oct 25). 
  2. Throughout this report, the following acronyms may be used.
  3. On September 27, 2007, the elected faculty members of the Executive Committee (ECUS) met and
  4. On October 4, 2007, the elected faculty of the Executive Committee met and

                                                         i.      Doug Goings is the point person for this matter and is also the Chair of the SubCommittee on Nominations (SCoN) for the 2007-2008 academic year

                                                       ii.      the drafts of supporting documents including a cover letter for the dean of each school and the library were reviewed and agreed to be in final form.  Doug will send the drafts to Craig for posting to the Elections Spring 2008 webpage on the University Senate website.

                                                      iii.      each of the elected faculty will meet with his/her respective dean to share this information at his/her earliest convenience and ideally prior to November 1.

SoHS (Kendra), SoE (Chris), SoLAS (Craig), SoB(Doug), Library (Bill)

                                                     iv.      deadlines are: filing election procedures by Dec 1 and election implementation by Feb 1

                                                       v.      the plan to make the transition from two to three year terms of service for elected faculty senators.  At present, eighteen elected faculty senators are elected each academic year.  The transition would be as follows

·        for the eighteen elected faculty positions with term of service ending April 2008, assign three year terms (Apr 2008 to Apr 2011) to six positions, and two year terms (Apr 2008 to Apr 2010) to the remaining twelve positions

·        for the eighteen elected faculty positions with term of service ending April 2009, assign three year terms (Apr 2009 to Apr 2012) to twelve positions and two year terms (Apr 2009 to Apr 2011) to the remaining six positions

·        This would result in twelve of the thirty-six elected faculty positions requiring replacement each year effective April 2010, the successors of whom would be elected for three year terms of service during the preceding academic year (the 2009-2010 academic year for those with terms ending April 2010, the 2010-2011 academic year for those with terms ending April 2011, etc.)

  1. On October 18, 2007, the Executive Committee met and

                                                         i.       09 budget (University System guidance released on Oct 17),

                                                       ii.      faculty compensation survey (President Leland will prepare a draft of the implementation plan which she will take to FAPC for review),

                                                      iii.      institutional growth (intent to focus enrollment growth at the graduate level with limited growth at the undergraduate level), and

                                                     iv.      the franchise model of the University System for certain initiatives (the institution that gets the franchise for University System initiatives gets to the control and get proceeds from other system schools that are also engaging in the initiative)

                                                         i.      University Faculty Meetings are required to occur once per academic term by Board of Regents Policy

                                                       ii.      the most recent three faculty meetings have been focused on exchanging information on the development, clarification, and implementation plan of the faculty compensation study

                                                      iii.      there was general consensus that future meetings should be town meetings supporting the exchange of information between the faculty and the University President regarding the “big issues”.  Recommended was that the President extend an invitation to the faculty for agenda items prior to each meeting.  Possible items for the tentative agenda for the Spring 2008 University Faculty Meeting are University System Initiatives including the General Education Framework, Advising, and Retention.

                                                         i.      this work was begun during the 2006-2007 academic year and recently picked up again

                                                       ii.      this issue was not raised with the 2006-2007 Academic Governance Committee due to its full agenda during the 2006-2007 with items that took priority over this one

                                                      iii.      the recommendations from the Council of Deans will be communicated to the Academic Policy Committee (APC) at one of its upcoming meetings via Dr. Roy Moore who serves as the designee of the Vice President of Academic Affairs on the APC.

                                                         i.      this committee will be realized as an ad hoc committee of the Executive Committee rather than an administrative committee reporting to the University President as in recent years

                                                       ii.      the charge of this committee is two-fold (1) to review the data from last year (May 10, 2007) and (2) plan the retreat for this year (May 8, 2008)

                                                      iii.      the budget for the retreat is $1500

                                                     iv.      the committee membership is Bill Richards (chair and outgoing senator), Craig Turner (former retreat planner), Todd Shiver and Carol Ormond (both incoming University Senators) and Karen Higgs (staff member).  Bill Richards will extend an invitation to current University Senators to serve on this committee at the upcoming University Senate meeting scheduled for Oct 29, 2007.

  1. On October 25, 2007, the Executive Committee met jointly with Standing Committee Chairs and

                                                         i.      09 Budget: USG guidance is now available and the timeline is short (about three weeks), budget hearings will be held early next week (last week of October), strong ties between funding and the six part strategic plan of the University System of Georgia, our shadow budget (budget developed in the USG office) is very encouraging

                                                       ii.      Drought in Georgia: call for a 10-15 percent cut in water usage

                                                         i.      University Senate tab in myCATS: still in development, draft tab is accessible to the faculty as those continuing to do testing are faculty and tabs within myCATS have a user type, once the tab is developed for the student and staff user types and the ongoing developmental testing is complete, there will be an announcement to the university community unveiling the tab.

                                                       ii.      online motion database: this environment is undergoing some programming changes to support the transition to the new committee structure (APC, CAPC, FAPC, SAPC, RPIPC), this development has been in progress for the last few months and completion is anticipated by November 2.

                                                      iii.      faculty governance coordination within the University System: two coordination meetings for faculty governance are

·        North Georgia College and State University faculty governance leaders are hosting a meeting on Friday November 9 from 10 am to 3 pm  This meeting is intended for the twelve senior colleges in the University System of Georgia that have about the same size and will focus on the exchange of information on best practices

·        Faculty governance leaders at Clayton State University are proposing to host a coordination meeting of faculty governance organizations at all institutions in the University System of Georgia during the Spring 2008 semester

                                                    iv.      Georgia Conference Meeting of the AAUP October 20, 2007

·        Optional Retirement Plan (ORP):  Two bills are under consideration

a.       HB 815:

                                                                                                                                       i.      expands eligibility to ORP to include exempt employees (as defined with the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938) in addition to faculty and principal administrators

                                                                                                                                     ii.      decouples the employer contributions of the ORP and TRS and names the Board of Regents in consultation with appropriate government officials to set the employer contribution rate

                                                                                                                                    iii.      eliminates the 4% legislative minimum on the employer contribution

b.      HB 865 which proposes an opportunity for ORP participants to buy-in to the Teacher’s Retirement System of Georgia

·        Criminal Background Checks

a.       All new employees and those individuals in positions of trust (routine responsibilities within keys, kids, and cash) will undergo criminal background checks

b.      The University System of Georgia has a policy and has also supplied guidelines to individual institutions within the University System allowing the development of institutional policy.  This information has come in two versions, first in July 2007 and most recently in late September 2007

·        A task force led by a University President in the University System of Georgia is developing a new general education framework for the University System of Georgia.  This work is scheduled to be completed by the end of the 2007-2008 academic year and implemented across the system by 2010.

  1. The next meeting of the Executive Committee is an elected faculty workshop scheduled for Thursday, November 1, 2007 from 9:30-10:45 in Arts & Sciences 1-16.