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Sept 7, 2005 Minutes

Approved Faculty Senate Minutes 09/07/05

Members present: Chair Stone, Senators Brennan, Davidson, Hindson, Hohmeyer McCall, McKinney, Montondon, Rao, Shah, Sorensen, Warms, Winek

Visitors: Various members of the press

Meeting called to order at 4:00.

Updates and Announcements

Enrollment for Fall, 05

Texas State

RHEC

Undergraduate: up 2.9%

Undergraduate: down 6.9%

Graduate: down 6.1%

Graduate: down 27.2%

Overall: up 1.5%

Overall: down19.5%

Undergraduate enrollment: 23,257

Undergraduate enrollment: 577

Graduate enrollment:,963

Graduate enrollment:740

Total enrollment: 27,220

Total enrollment: 1317

There is a 10% increase in new freshman enrollment

Registrar Search Committee: Mary Brennan was selected to serve

PAAG dates:

September 14
October 5

November 9
December 7

Liaisons Elections: Chair Stone announced the need to get Senate Liaisons elected from  Theatre/Dance, Communication Studies, and Health Professions. The first meeting with  the liaisons will be September 28.

Alliance Group Letter: Senators who chose to were invited to sign a letter endorsing a member of Texas State Alliance Group to be a member of the Equity and Access Committee.

Discussion of PAAG Agenda Items 

Chair Stone encouraged Senators to suggest items for the upcoming PAAG Agenda. Items to be brought forward include:

1.      Enrollment concerns:

a.       What has happened to the RRHEC enrollment?

b.      Are other universities experiencing declining graduate enrollment?

2.      Construction plans

a.       What is the building maintenance plan?

b.      What is the status of construction of the Performing Arts Center?

c.       What are the plans for other new construction? (i.e. undergraduate classroom building)

3.      Carnegie classification update

During the discussion of PAAG agenda items, "'to do" items arose. These include:

1.  Report on Equity/Market adjustments to salaries

2.  Tenure/Promotion statistics for 2004-5

Senate Priorities and Action Items for 2005

Senators suggested the following agenda items to be included for Fall, 2005:

Acquiring workload audits from each Department Chair

By 2008, degree audits must be 120 hours. Senator Winek asked that Dr. Ron Brown be invited to the Senate to discuss Coordinating Board determinations of the rules regarding this mandate. It was suggested that perhaps professional programs would be exempt from the new 120 limit due to accreditation requirements.

Clarification regarding student records retention

Constitutional Amendment Balloting

The final vote count was 316 for the amendment and 22 against it. It passed.

Dean and Chair Evaluations

Numerical rankings of Deans and Chairs will be posted to the Senate website 9/21.

Executive Session

The Senate entered into executive session to discuss whether or not the written comments regarding Deans and Chairs should be posted.

Senator Hindson made a motion that the comments not be published this year.

Senator Rao seconded the motion.

The motion failed with 3 votes cast for not publishing comments to 9 votes for publishing comments.

Further discussion ensued regarding certain comments included that could be hurtful to a non-administrator University employee's family.

Senator Hohmeyer moved to remove a small section of the comments which included potentially hurtful information in order to protect the personal privacy of a non-administrator. An amendment was suggested by Senator Warms that this revised version of the document be released to all of the campus community. A notation will be made in the revised comments as to why part of a comment was removed

 2nd by Senator Warms

 Vote passed 11 - 1.

This information will be released by 9/21/05.

Executive Session ended

New Business

Senator Hohmeyer moved that a letter of commendation be sent to retired College of Education Dean John Beck regarding his achievement of being ranked #1 Dean for 3 years. Senator Shah 2nd the motion. Vote was unanimous to send the letter.

 Senator Hindson suggested a commendation for a Chair who has been ranked high for 3 years, but Senator Sorensen suggested that this type of commendation not be done for a sitting administrator.

Senator Shah requested that a representative from Parking Services be asked to address the Senate regarding their long range plans for the cost of parking permits. Chair Stone said that he would invite Vice-President JoAnne Smith to speak to the group in two weeks.

Senator Shah asked if salary data for Fall, 05 was available. Chair Stone reported that it should be ready soon at which time he would bring the data to the Senate.

Senator Shah requested a discussion in a future meeting regarding the policy that a Senator desiring to apply for Developmental Leave be required to resign from Senate prior to being able to apply for the Leave.

The Senate agreed to postpone voting on the August 31 minutes until all could review  them.

The Senate was adjourned at 5:30 PM.