44th Faculty Senate
February 25, 2010 – 3:30p.m.
Robert C. Voight Faculty Senate Chambers – 325 Graff Main Hall
Vol. 44, No. 10
I. Roll Call.
Present: J. Anderson, C. Angell, J. Baggett, S. Brokaw, D. Buffton, V. Crank, G. Cravins, T.
Gendreau, J. Heim, K. Hoar, J. Holman, D. Hoskins, K. Hunt, D. Lake, R. LeDocq (excused), A. Loh,
C. Lee, R. Mikat, J. Miskowski, S. Shillinger, R. Smith, M. Tollefson, B. Van Voorhis and M. WycoffHorn
II. Minutes of February 11, 2010, will be approved at the March 11 FS meeting.
III. Reports.
a. Chair’s Report.
i. Faculty Senate Elections: There were 9 petitions for 8 seats. CLS will hold an
election (4 candidates for 3 seats); all others are uncontested.
ii. Committee Preference Forms will be electronic this year. This is a pilot, so please
contact the FS office with any problems. Faculty will have two weeks to complete the
online survey.
iii. Online Handbook Update: An ad-hoc group met and revised the online policies.
This item will be on the March 11 FS agenda. The ad-hoc group consisted of Adrienne
Loh and Kerrie Hoar from SEC, Kenny Hunt and Steve Brokaw from FS and Jodie
Rindt (and Steve Brokaw) from the Online Advisory Committee.
iv. Faculty are asked to be sensitive in any discussion about the recent death of Craig
Meyers.
v. Teri Hinds introduced Debbie Valine, new UWL Director of Institutional Research
b. Faculty Reps Report.
i. The FS chair attended in Joe Heim’s place.
ii. The Bachelor’s of Applied Arts and Sciences (BAAS ) degree – This is a degree that
is to be offered at 6 UW-Colleges. At its last meeting, the Regents approved the request
for the entitlement to plan for a pilot program on these 6 campuses. This is a degree
completion program targeted at “place-bound” adults. The 4-year degree would be
granted by UW-College campus (a 2-year campus). Apparently, no 4-year campuses
came forward with the idea of partnering with the Colleges in this way, so the Regents
agreed to let the Colleges proceed.
iii. Educational Attainment and the Growth Agenda – President Reilly told the faculty
reps that this is to be used to help determine and promote the UW-System budget
request for the 2011-2013 biennial budget.
iv. UW e-campus – This is to be a single portal for all online courses offered at UWSystem schools. The idea is to make it easier for students to find online offering
throughout the System.
v. Collective Bargaining – UW-Eau Claire, Superior and La Crosse have established
organizing committees.
c. Joint Planning & Budget Report (Adrienne Loh).
i. Educational Attainment: JPB met to discuss the Educational Attainment template.
Concerns similar to those voiced by FS were voiced by members of JPB.
ii. Fall 2010 GQA Enrollment: Our current growth target to increase by 115 students
has been difficult to attain. We will meet the target through transfer and international
student enrollment. However, this brings up the question of how difficult it will be to
meet next year’s growth target of an additional 147 students (this equates to $2.4
million when differential tuition is included). The administration would like to
strategically plan for the scenario in which we do not make the target. This plan would
include suspending four non-instructional academic staff positions, reducing some
S&E funds and changing/suspending four faculty searches. The four faculty searches
would be affected in the following manner: one search failed and will not be reopened, one search has a very weak pool of applicants and will be suspended, and two
positions will be moved from GQA funding to 102 funding. All of these would be reinstated if GQA funds do become available. JPB voted to endorse this plan.
Discussion:
1. How many students do we turn away each year? Last year, the acceptance rate
was 66%. Several factors are affecting enrollment: admissions applications are
decreasing statewide, the number of high school graduates is decreasing in the
state, students are applying to fewer institutions, students are reluctant to pay
their deposit early, UWL has issues with reduced student housing and reduced
scholarship dollars. All of there are affecting our Fall 2010 enrollment
numbers.
2. Will UWL simply have to lower its admission standards to meet the GQA and
possibly Educational Attainment targets? The main focus right now is to
change our recruitment strategies to become more aggressive in recruiting
freshman applicants. We can no longer take it for granted that UWL will have
the luxury of demand exceeding supply.
d. Student Association Report (Erik Kahl). Haiti: Day of Action flyers were handed out.
This event will take place on Wednesday, March 3. The SA is asking faculty to help promote
this event by showing the flyer in their classes.
IV. ESL Language Policy from Graduate Council (Rob Dixon).
As UW-La Crosse is expanding and developing programs in conjunction with other universities (i.e.,
contract programs), some of the students that were enrolled in these programs were not taking the Test
of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL) and some were not achieving the required TOEFL score of
550 (or equivalent). This caused problems with visas and required emergency Graduate Council
meetings over the summer to grant exceptions for students. Programs offered anecdotal evidence from
faculty members that the students that were applying for the exception to this admission policy did have
the requisite English skills based on conversations and interactions in the classroom.
The stress on the Office of International Education, the Programs and the cooperating Universities, and
the students led the Graduate Council to reconsider the admission policy. The previous policy included
The previous policy included the following expectation:
TOEFL score of 550 (paper-based), 213 (computer-based) or 79 (internet-based). This is not
required for native speakers of English or for applicants currently enrolled in or graduated from
an undergraduate degree program in the United States. In lieu of a TOEFL score, a band score of
6 is acceptable on the International English Language Testing System (IELTS) exam.
Several constituencies weighed in on the discussion to come up with the best solution that preserved the
standard of 550, but also allowed the graduate programs with foreign connections the latitude to accept
well-qualified students that did not meet the standard of 550.
New Policy:
The graduate council endorsed the following policy (addition is underlined).
TOEFL score of 550 (paper-based), 213 (computer-based) or 79 (internet-based). This is not
required for native speakers of English or for applicants currently enrolled in or graduated from
an undergraduate degree program in the United States. In lieu of a TOEFL score, a band score of
6 is acceptable on the International English Language Testing System (IELTS) exam. Some
programs require higher scores for admission, including the Doctor of Physical Therapy
program. Graduate programs may allow exceptions to the language proficiency admission
requirements if there is evidence of a student’s ability to succeed in the graduate program.
Motion to approve the new ESL Policy from Graduate Council. Motion Approved.
V. Budget Review Committee Response to Proposed Redistribution of Indirect Funds from External
Grant Awards (Adrienne Loh). Materials were not posted on the FS website and will, therefore, be
discussed at the next FS meeting on March 11.
VI. Revised Textbook Services Policies from Textbook Oversight Committee (Chuck Lee).
This committee has been meeting weekly since January to look at the policy and to make revisions. In
the document on the FS website, those passages with strike-throughs represent deletions, while those
underlined passages represent additions to the policy.
The Oversight Committee discussed the following issues at length:
a. $5 fine for late returns: Many books were returned late after Fall semester, however, since
Textbook Rental was inventorying and bar coding books as they came in, wait times for
returns was excessively long. Since this most likely did affect the late return rate, the
Committee voted to continue to monitor this and increase fines incrementally until the late fee
becomes a deterrent.
b. The issue of how to distribute iClickers was not resolved; therefore, the moratorium was put in
place. It is hoped to have this issue resolved for Fall semester, but those departments who use
the iClickers need to be involved in the discussion.
c. The policy will go into effect in two weeks when the textbook ordering cycle begins.
d. The Higher Education Opportunity Act (HEOA), which goes into effect on July 1, is driving
the deadlines included in the policy.
SEC suggested the following revisions to the posted document:
a. The faculty members and the convener of the committee will be determined by Committee on
Committees.
b. Item D under Guidelines for New Textbook Purchases on page 8 and 9 will be re-ranked with
Existing Course, Enrollment Increase moving to #3 and Existing Course, Time Period
Fulfilled moving to #4.
Motion to approve the revised Textbook Services Policy with the SEC edits. Motion approved.
VII. Academic Program Review Report for Recreation Management/Therapeutic Recreation (Sandy
Grunwald; George Arimond, Jim Longhurst).
Jim Longhurst summarized the APR report. The external review process for RM/TR began in 2007 and
the report contained only a few critiques – most of which have already been addressed by the
department. The accrediting agency for this program requires that 125 standards have been met. Most
programs across the nation are told that they do not meet 6 to 13 of those standards. Of the 125, UWL’s
program had only one standard that was considered to be “partially met.”
Recommendations from the APR Committee:
- The Academic Program Review committee recommends that the Recreation Management and
Therapeutic Recreation department continue its commitment to offering a “highly respected” and
“student-centered” education program. The demonstrable successes of this program indicate that the
current program, including its faculty, staff, administration, curriculum, and implementation, is
fundamentally sound.
- In response to the letter written by Associate Dean Ray Abhold, the APR recommends that the
program, communally, develop a strategic plan with lists of targeted hires in specific areas, with the
intent of reaching and maintaining the envisioned 11-12 FTE staff level for the next several years.
- Taking into account the response in the above letter, the APR recommends exploring alternate paths
to decrease the 300+ SCH/IFTE, including imposing voluntary limits on overload teaching, maintaining
enrollment caps on the program and courses, discouraging any redundancy within the curriculum, and
seeking any possible efficiencies from combining course offerings or covering multiple student learning
outcomes in a single course.
- APR recommends that the program continue to promote, highlight, and reward scholarly
publication and professional involvement on the part of its faculty, and to encourage professional
development on the part of the students. The department may wish to increase the visibility of research
within the department, perhaps by creating individual web pages for all faculty members that list or
reproduce their research, publications, scholarly credentials, and professional memberships.
□ No serious areas to address – review in 7 years □ Some areas to address – review in 7 years □ Some
areas to address – department should submit short report on progress to FacSenate/Provost’s Office in
3 years.
Motion to accept the APR Report for Recreation Management/Therapeutic Recreation. Motion
approved.
VIII. Adjournment at 4:30 p.m.
Respectfully submitted,
Kerrie Hoar