The
Regular session –
office: Jacobson Faculty Hall 206
phone: 325-6789
e-mail: facsen@ou.edu web site:
http://www.ou.edu/admin/facsen/
The Faculty Senate was called
to order by Professor Mike McInerney, Chair.
PRESENT: Baldwin,
Bozorgi, Bradford, Brady, Brown, Burns, Catlin, Cintrón,
Davis, Devenport, Dohrmann, Fincke,
Hartel, Havlicek, Hayes-Thumann, Henderson, Houser,
Huseman, C. Knapp, R. Knapp, Marcus-Mendoza, McInerney, Mendoza, Milton,
Pender, Raadschelders, Rai, Ransom, Rupp-Serrano,
Schramm, Sievers, Striz, Watts, Wheeler, Whitely,
Wyckoff, Yuan
Provost's office representative: Mergler
ABSENT: Abraham,
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
Announcements:
Assessment, program outcomes
assessment, and student satisfaction reports
Spring 2004 schedule of Faculty Senate meetings
Remarks by
Presentation on OU
chapter of the American Cancer Society
Senate Chair's Report:
Health benefits
Faculty development award
Student academic integrity statement
Faculty appointment letters
Course exchange program
Research compliance
Faculty length of service awards
Faculty Senate reapportionment
Faculty compensation program
Regents’ policy manual
Renewable term faculty
Research Council charge
Password sharing policy
Election, councils/committees/boards
Benefit deductions
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The Faculty Senate Journal
for the regular session of
The
2002-03 assessment report, program outcomes assessment report, and student
satisfaction report are available in the Faculty Senate office.
The
regular meetings of the Faculty Senate for spring 2004 will be held at 3:30
p.m. in Jacobson 102 on the following Mondays:
January 12, February 9, March 8, April 12, and May 3.
Graduate
College Dean Lee Williams gave an overview of the programs for graduate student
support (http://research.ou.edu/graduatesupportatou.ppt). He said the
Some fellowships are discipline-specific,
such as the American Meteorological Society, DeGolyer,
and Phillips, and other fellowships are offered in individual departments. The National Science Foundation has a number
of fellowships for students in physical, social, engineering, and biological
sciences. The McNair program provides
very structured support through the final years of students’ undergraduate
program, with the goal of having them attend graduate school. The
We have two kinds of tuition
waivers: the Qualified Graduate
Assistant and the fellowship. The
Prof. Milton said he was opposed
to reducing the number of hours of out-of-state tuition because his department
requires students to take nine hours. If
the University does not pay for those hours, his department will not get any
out-of-state students. Prof.
Raadschelders asked whether the increase in the number of graduate assistants
referred to teaching assistants. Dean
Williams said it referred to total GAs. Prof. Raadschelders pointed out that some
assistants are funded out of grants. Dean
Williams said we currently charge grants seven percent toward the tuition. At other universities, it ranges from not
charging grants to requiring grants to pay the full cost of the waiver. Provost Mergler asked about the average or
median percentage of waiver that is charged to a grant or contract. Dean Williams said his sense was that grants were
paying more than they did two years ago, but he had not done a systematic
survey. To some extent, we have to set
our support package so we are competitive.
Prof. Watts asked whether the
discretionary waiver was for students who had less than a half-time appointment. Dean Williams said it was, but it also was
for students who were particularly worthy or had a need. Three years ago, the program was dropped
because of budget problems. Prof. Watts asked
why the University only offered full waivers now. Dean Williams said it was for financial
reasons.
Prof. Striz said he was told
that appointments had to be processed in November for students who begin in
January. Dean Williams replied that
appointing a student early assured that the tuition waiver could be applied to
their Bursar account by the time classes begin.
Prof. Devenport
asked whether there was any plan in the future to phase out the assessment on
research grants. Dean Williams answered,
“No.” The assessment should be large
enough to cover the cost of tuition waivers; however, a full recovery would cripple
the competitiveness of grants. Right
now, the seven percent is on the low side of the average. Prof. Devenport asked,
“How best do we compensate?” Dean Williams
said the best way was to pay the students a higher stipend. If faculty assumed tuition would rise an average of ten percent and would write a ten percent
increase for a GA into a grant, then Dean William would not have to change the
percentage he charges. In many cases,
the stipend on a grant is well below what the agency expects to be
charged. A higher stipend means a larger
base on which the university can recover costs.
He urged departments to pay GRAs what the
market would bear and then use that mechanism to try to improve the situation for
GTAs. He said
we needed to recognize that we are state-assisted and had to make the rest
ourselves.
Ms. Becca Eckstein, President
of the OU chapter of the American Cancer Society, said she started the OU
chapter three years ago. The Relay for
Life is the national signature event of the society to raise money to fight
cancer. It is a 12-hour event that will
take place April 23 at
“I would like to inform the
Senate of a potential conflict of interest that I may have regarding the
upcoming Request for Proposals on health care. My wife works for an insurance
agency in
“I have talked with Nick
Kelly and Julius Hilburn about the request for proposal. It has been discussed
with the employment benefits committee and the faculty welfare committee.
Faculty members from these groups will be involved in reviewing the proposals
when they are received. The request for proposals will be sent out on
“Last week, members of the
Faculty Welfare Committee, Nick Kelly, Julius Hilburn and other interested
parties met with representatives from Health Choice to discuss some of our
“The Faculty Welfare
Committee will send out a survey requesting information on faculty experiences
with Health Choice and problems with out-of-state coverage. This information
will be transmitted to Health Choice so that they can improve coverage so that
it better fits the needs of our faculty.
“The announcement about the
Faculty Development Award was sent to chairs and directors last week. The due
date for submission of proposals is
“The Student Congress and the
Graduate Student Senate have passed the student integrity code. Academic
integrity is fundamental to our mission and we commend both bodies for their
efforts in improving the quality of the educational experience at OU. The
executive committee talked to the Provost about implementation of the policy.
We will work with the Provost and representatives of the student government to
develop an implementation plan that will be easy to use. I have also
volunteered to serve as a liaison to the student honor council to provide
faculty input into the implementation process.
“There have been a few
questions regarding appointment letters, which have not as yet been sent out.
Provost Mergler said that these letters will be sent out shortly.
“The students have
implemented a reciprocal course exchange program where students can swap
enrollment in high demand courses. I have talked to the Provost about potential
problems that may occur with this system. Her office is already monitoring this
activity to make sure that the system is implemented appropriately.
“There have been some
“The Faculty Compensation
Committee is drafting a memo to Provost with their recommendations for
recognition for faculty length of service.
“Given the change to
PeopleSoft, the easiest way for the reapportionment of the Senate will be by
Faculty Time Equivalent rather than by headcount. I don’t believe that this
will cause any problems, but I will ask the committee to review this to make
sure. A recommendation on
reapportionment will be made to the senate in the spring.
“As you may have seen in the
newspaper, President Boren made a presentation to the General Conference
Committee on Appropriations Subcommittee on Education
“The Board of Regents at
their December meeting approved several sections of the Regents’ Policy Manual.
In consultation with David Levy, I recommended that sections 1, 5, 6 and 7 be
placed on the Regents’ December agenda. Section 1 deals with
the functions of the universities under the oversight of the Board and the
functions of the Board itself. Section 5 deals with student affairs and
the university community. Section 6 deals with athletics and Section 7 deals
with fund raising and university development. The Task Force that reviewed the
Regents’ Policy Manual last year did not have any
“David Levy’s committee that
is reviewing the Regents’ Policy Manual met with the Provost before
Thanksgiving break. They have resolved the numerous questions and
“The Committee on Renewable
Term Faculty met last week and will be drafting a resolution that hopefully
will be brought to the Senate at our January meeting. It is likely that the
resolution will recommend that renewable term faculty with rank of assistant
professor, associate professor and professor be designated as regular faculty.
This would allow these individuals to serve in the Senate and the appropriate university
committees. I should note that the Provost has set a limit on the number of
renewable term faculty on the Norman campus. This is in the Regents’ Policy
manual. The limit is that the number of renewable term faculty cannot exceed 10
percent of the tenured and tenure-track faculty.”
The Research Council proposed
the following changes in its charge (see 11/03 Senate Journal).
[1] Add a 13th faculty
member to be appointed by the Senate from the
[2] Add the following sentence
immediately after the first sentence of the last paragraph. "If a member of the Council is nominated
for a research professorship considered by the Research Council, the member
must either have his/her name withdrawn from nomination or resign from the
Council for the remainder of his/her term."
Prof.
Hugh Benson, chair of the Research Council, said these were reasonably small
changes. The second recommendation was
what occurs in the Faculty Awards and Honors Council. The only two awards currently considered by the
Research Council are the Cross and Rinsland, but they
were not specified in case the Research Council considers additional research
professorships in the future. The other
change is to add a member in order to have input on fine arts proposals. Currently eight members are appointed by the Faculty
Senate and four are presidential appointments.
Two members each are chosen from six areas. The council thought it would be helpful to
have an additional member so nobody would lose any representation. This recommendation comes from the Research
Council, not the
Fine Arts (1 member)
Humanities
and Arts: Classics, English, Fine
Arts, History, History of Science, Modern Languages, and Philosophy
.
.
Individuals recommended for Council membership should be currently active in either research, scholarship, or creative activities. If a member of the Council is nominated
for a research professorship considered by the Research Council, the member
must either have his/her name withdrawn from nomination or resign from the
Council for the remainder of his/her term.
The above representation will be review by the Council every 3 years.
The
Information Technology Council (ITC) proposed the following policy on password
sharing (see 11/03 Senate Journal).
Introduction
The value policy to falsely represent oneself as
another individual, to use the name or identity of another person without
authorization as that individual's delegated agent, or to present oneself as
the spokesperson of an organization or unit without proper authorization to do
so.
Password Policy
Accounts and passwords are given to individuals for
individual use and should not ordinarily be shared, except when necessary to
accomplish the mission of the University. If a password has to be shared, it should
be changed as soon as possible.
Disclaimer
Observance of this policy and adherence to the rules of good
practice in use of user IDs and passwords does not imply or suggest privacy in
use of the information resources included in University computing systems and
networks. The University policy on privacy in electronic communication is found
in the Policy on Email
Use at the University of Oklahoma and in the Policy
on Information Systems Security. Enforcement of this policy is detailed in these documents.
Prof. Deborah Trytten, chair
of the ITC subcommittee on policy, explained that last year, the ITC delayed
including a password sharing policy in the acceptable use of information
resources policy because the issue was so contentious. This proposal is not the council’s dream
policy. Disallowing password sharing
makes system administration simpler and makes it simpler for Legal Counsel to
prosecute people who, for instance, break into accounts. The difficulty with completely disallowing password
sharing is it requires significant training of faculty and staff, and there is no
money for training. It is unreasonable
to have a policy that people would essentially be breaking every day. ITC made a commitment to try to beef up the
policy as training resources grow and the sophistication of faculty and staff
regarding information technology (IT) security grows. Prof. Trytten explained that since we do not have
a policy against sharing passwords, it is virtually impossible for Legal
Counsel to prosecute someone who sends out a defamatory or threatening e-mail. ITC guidelines (attached --http://www.ou.edu/committees/itc/policy/Password_Recommendations.html)
show the direction ITC would like to go, which
is a more stringent process. Prof. Knapp
clarified that the policy was really just the two sentences. Prof. Trytten said that was correct. Avoiding situations where people have to
share passwords requires a fair amount of sophistication and IT support that
does not exist right now. Legal Counsel
and IT would like to have stringent requirements, but ITC did not think that
was reasonable in an environment in which we do not have the resources to train
faculty and staff and in which the policy would be violated by every faculty
and staff member virtually every day. Prof.
Huseman asked for an example of sharing a password. Prof. Trytten said deans and directors often
have staff members read their e-mail and get documents from their
computers. There are ways to avoid
password sharing, but they require skill that is not well distributed across
the university. Prof. Fran Ayres, chair
of ITC, said another example was deans needing access to various research
projects. If there is a misuse, such as
a student logging on as somebody else in Blackboard or inappropriate use of a
stolen password, at least there is a policy that says those are violations. Prof. McInerney said another situation would
be if someone got on a network and erased all the data. The motion to accept the policy was approved
on a voice vote.
The senate approved the
following nominations of the senate committee on committees to fill a vacancy
on the Research Council.
To replace Lee Krumholz (Botany &
Micro.), 2003-06 term: Ralph Tanner (Botany
& Micro.) [biological sciences]
Prof. Raadschelders asked why
it was necessary to increase the monthly benefit deductions just when insurance
premiums were taking a big jump in January.
Prof. McInerney said the university was going to a system in which people
paid in 9 months would pay deductions over eight months. Prof. Striz commented that it was because the
system could not handle the half months.
Prof. Burns pointed out that a person on a 9-month appointment but paid
over 12 months would have a deduction every month for 12 months. This would only apply to a person on a
9-month appointment and paid in 9 months.
Prof. McInerney said that was correct.
The meeting adjourned at
____________________________________
Sonya Fallgatter, Administrative Coordinator
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Karen Rupp-Serrano, Secretary