46th Faculty Senate
December 15, 2011 – 3:30p.m.
Robert C. Voight Faculty Senate Chambers – 325 Graff Main Hall
Vol. 46, No. 7
I. Roll Call.
Present: M. Abler, C. Angell, J. Baggett, E. Barnes, T. Blumentritt, J. Bryan, B. Butterfield, L. Dickmeyer, D.
Lake, A. Galbraith, K. Hoar, J, Hollenback, K. Hunt, S. Jessee, F. Klein, E. Kraemer, M. Leonard, W. Maas, D.
Riley, K. Rosacker, M. Rott, S. Senger, and M. Tollefson
Excused: R. Mikat
II. Minutes of December 1 approved.
III. Reports:
a. Chair (Steve Senger): The chair extended well wishes to Provost Enz Finken as she moves on to
her new position and much appreciation for the work that she has done at UWL.
b. Chancellor (Joe Gow):
 The first commencement at the La Crosse Center will take place on Sunday at 11am.
 Budget Lapse Update: UWS still has not gotten an official amount. UWL will be able to
cope with the lapse; however, a similar cut in the 13-15 budget could lead to cutting
services.
 Several searches are underway and all are proceeding well.
 Hate Graffiti Update: There have been no personal attacks. The campus email was
sent out as a result of a meeting with concerned students and staff. UWL will continue
to promote awareness.
c. Provost (Kathleen Enz Finken): Update on transition in Provost’s office: Second year retention
decisions are complete. The Provost will continue to work on personnel decisions until she leaves
and then Interim Provost Morgan will take over. This transition has been approved by System
Legal. The Provost will return in January for the Joint Promotion meetings. After this point, the
Interim will take over. Anyone with any questions or concerns should contact the Provost’s office.
d. CFO (Bob Hetzel): No Report.
e. Faculty Representative (Jeff Baggett): A handout was distributed.
 Reps have discussed how different campuses are planning for the budget lapse. Some
campuses are discussing combining departments, cutting back on new course offerings
and closing programs. The UW colleges are very concerned about their continuing
ability to offer curriculum beyond the first year.
 The majority of campuses have passed lapse resolutions critical of the disproportionate
cut.
 Benefits & Pay: President Reilly has pledged to find a way to allow 9-month employees
to choose to spread their salary over 12 months. UWS is working to change May
deductions. These payments will be spread out over more pay periods for everyone.
The possibility of a September 1 paycheck is being investigated.
 UWS is working on legislation that will allow retired state employees to return to work for
UWS.
IV. New Business.
a. Approval of List of Fall 2011 Graduates:
Motion to Approve the List of Fall 2011 Graduates contingent upon the successful completion of
the requirements for their respective degrees. Motion Approved.
b. Discussion of Summer Salary Proposal (Jen Miskowski):
Motion to approve Summer Salary Proposal.
Background: In the fall of 2010, the Provost created the Task Force on Workload and Equity, as
one of six task forces formed to work on issues that were discussed at a Provost’s Retreat in
August 2010 and were seen as having the most pressing need for action. This task force met and
set up subcommittees to address specific issues of workload and equity. One of these
subcommittees was given the task of coming up with an equitable formula for distributing
summer school salaries for faculty across the three colleges. The subcommittee did consider the
obvious scenario of summer salary being a percent of academic year salary. At this point, total
compensation must be no more than 39% of total tuition revenue. Under this constraint, the % of
salary compensation plan would fail if several of the highest paid faculty members were to teach
summer school. For this reason, an alternate model was investigated. PTS took the Task Force’s
Summer Salary Proposal and added two statements: 1) The salary pool for summer session should
not be less than 39% of revenues and 2) This plan will be reviewed annually by PTS. The proposal,
with the added statements, was passed unanimously by PTS (with 8 of 9 members present).
Discussion:
 There are concerns about the impact of this proposal on the department of Health
Professions. HP has always used academic initiatives funds to supplement summer salary. In
addition, the college is looking into increasing the number of 12-month contracts in this
department.
 Where does the 39% cap come from and why don’t we get paid the same amount for
summer teaching as we do during the academic year? This plan does make the across
campus pay plan equitable – everyone uses the same formula. The committee did look at a
standard salary for everyone, based on % salary and based on rank – this is the plan that the
committee put forward. The 39% is based on data from the last two summers.
 Why must it remain at 39% if it results in faculty continuing to be underpaid? The ultimate goal
is to increase summer offerings and grow summer school. These amounts are comparable to
what other institutions pay for summer school. It is not perfect, but is a good starting point.
Everything based on summer 2010 (revenue = $2 million and $800,000 went to salary = about
39/40% of total revenue).
 As a faculty member whose salary is $15,000 below average for comparable institutions, this is
positive and I can only applaud the work of the committee.
 The document refers to GPR funds – NOT grants and contracts.
 In the proposal model, some salaries will go down. If some salaries go down, will summer
school offerings then go down as well? The vast majority of people do better under this plan.
How is this possible? The constraints of the plan, such as a minimum number of students,
makes this possible.
 The plan does not address graduate versus undergraduate courses, especially as far as
minimum number of students. The deans have talked about making exceptions for graduate
courses (such as determining the size of the cohort and setting the minimum at that number).
 Other exceptions for required courses taught in the summer to small cohorts (e.g., SAA has 15
students in a cohort; faculty paid for graduate thesis work if that is required in the summer).
The deans have made a list of exceptions and will work to formulate a consensus on how
exceptions will be treated across colleges.
 If UWL couldn’t pay market salary, we would not have a viable computer science program.
This is an issue with setting a single pay plan for all disciplines. Someone will ask the question
that if this is good enough for summer, why isn’t it good enough for the academic year as
well. This was discussed in PTS and it was decided that summer school is a different ball of
wax. We are academic year employees and have a contract for the academic year.
Summer school is a choice and we can choose whether or not to teach summer school. For
this reason, PTS felt that it would be a hard argument to say that what applies to summer
school should also apply to the academic year.
 CBA supports this plan even though it does have a negative impact on some members of
that college.
 Some could be penalized by being assigned to a smaller class due to no fault of their own.
 There is enough flexibility to allow deans and department chairs to make exceptions for
mission critical courses.
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As a science person, I am okay with not maxing out. I am willing to try this plan even though
some colleagues will be paid less and trust that PTS will monitor this and that people will be
paid more if summer school grows.
What do you mean by salary pool? Is this the pool of money that will support summer session
or summer salary? Summer is not just salary. There are also lab equipment and supplies
needed. In addition, we will need a pool of money to handle exceptions. Salary pool and
funding needed to support summer session is different. The term summer salary pool was
intentional. PTS intended that the salary pool to remain at no less than 39%. If tuition is going
up and more money is being generated then faculty should benefit from this.
As a practical part of the issue, a budget cannot be built with an unknown number and there
is a time lag between summer school and knowing summer school revenue. We do not know
summer school revenues until December. The plan would be for the salary pool to be 39%;
however, each year we would build a budget, pay people and then learn revenues – so
each year’s summer salary pool may not be exactly 39% of that summer’s revenues.
If we approve this plan, we are saying that we are going to pay the amount in the plan. If we
generate more revenue this coming summer, we will not automatically be paid more – it
would have to come back to the table to negotiate a new, higher pay plan. In other words,
generating more money does not automatically mean a raise.
Reminder that we have not hit our summer targets for some years and are losing money on
summer school – and using academic year tuition to make up for it.
This summer pay plan is comparable to the summer pay of other institutions.
The Health Professions department is supportive of the plan for the rest of the campus, but the
HP state of affairs is still unsettled.
This plan applies only to GPR summer session – not to grant or contract related pay.
Motion approved.
c. Discussion of PTS Recommendation regarding Promotion for Part-Time Appointments:
The guidelines for promotion of faculty with part-time appointments were approved on March 3,
2011. Today we are considering an addition to the language that states that a department chair
is a special case in that the duties of a chair are laid out in the Faculty Senate policies; therefore,
no additional documentation is needed and that departments are in charge of evaluating
department chairs
Motion to Approve additional language to PTS document. Motion approved.
d. Discussion of SEC Proposal Regarding TEGC/SoE – Second Reading:
Motion to approve.
There are issues with TEGC: 1) The SoE Director is a voting member – something that FS changed
for Graduate Council last year. 2) The Director appoints community members who are voting
members. 3) The bylaws talk about TEGC holding an advisory role to the SoE Director. The work
of TEGC is appropriate as it stands right now – it is just not appropriate for a FS committee. In
addition, on December 3, 2009, an amendment to hiring, retention and promotion of SoE faculty
to address DPI concerns was approved – but was never instituted. SEC became aware of these
issues last summer when reviewing the revised bylaws of TEGC and has been in discussion since
that time. There were also questions about the director’s review letter – what is the scope and
who is the letter addressed to. The letter should address the faculty member’s work on items that
are within the scope of DPI. The letter should be addressed to the faculty member’s home
department as it is the department that makes the decision to retain and promote faculty.
The proposal from SEC recognizes that TEGC is not a FS committee, but that this committee
should continue as it is in the School of Ed. It also describes the role of the SoE Director in the
hiring, retention and promotion of faculty and makes this a policy. SEC has talked to many
members of TEGC about their concerns with this proposal. The core of concerns was that FS
delay a vote on this issue to allow TEGC to reshape the committee as a FS committee. SEC
believes that there is no need to reshape TEGC. TEGC does important and necessary work and it
needs to continue as a SoE committee. If TEGC finds appropriate need for the development of a
FS committee, then they can propose this, but this will not be TEGC. There is no need to delay
voting on this matter as TEGC will continue its work. There were other concerns about TEGC not
being a FS committee; such as, would people receive appropriate recognition for their work on
the committee? The bylaws should note that SoE faculty have a responsibility and commitment
to SoE and should be recognized for their service.
Motion to Postpone.
Discussion:
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What does TEGC hope to accomplish by postponing? This issue came up on November 10
and TEGC only meets once a month. This is not enough time to decide if TEGC’s role is in SoE
or in FS.
How does TEGC not being a FS committee change the work that TEGC does? It doesn’t, but
does it affect the legitimacy of its work.
How will this be viewed in reviews of university and college service?
Provost: TEGC’s work and responsibilities do not fit with FS and, therefore, supports the idea
that TEGC is not a FS committee. Concerns about the legitimacy of the committee are
important. So much of the work in SoE is about raising the level of respect for SoE – but
whether TEGC is a FS committee or not will not do that. Because TEGC is not a FS committee,
TEGC’s work should continue in SoE and they should continue to discuss what the role of
TEGC is and define it clearly. The faculty on TEGC deserve to be supported, but respect is
earned and is not given freely.
Motion Fails (2/16).
Back to the original motion: An additional proposal: If we remove TEGC as a FS committee, FS
does not have the authority to create it as a SoE committee and there are concerns that it falls
through the administrative cracks. FS could adopt a companion motion that TEGC will continue
its work in SoE.
Motion Approved (20/0).
Motion that Faculty Senate expects that TEGC continue its current work as a School of Education
committee. Motion Approved.
e. Discussion of Graduate Faculty Status (Kasi Periyasamy):
Motion to Approve Graduate Faculty Status Application.
Discussion: Different programs may have to set the bar for grad faculty status at different points
for different duties. Program directors and deans can now put in different conditions for grad
faculty duties.
Motion Approved.
f.
Discussion of GRC 799:
The campus policy is not under consideration. Graduate Council has simply revised the
procedures governing its implementation. Currently, GC asks programs for a list of students
registered for GRC 799 – the responsibility lies with the program to send that list. Some students
may be missed and some may not get registered. This new proposal puts the responsibility on the
student to register for GRC 799 on their own. If a student does not register, they will still be
penalized. If they are not registered, they are considered inactive and when they come back,
they are charged a back fee for each semester that they were not registered.
Motion to Approve.
Discussion:
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The policy states that students have to pay for continuation credit throughout. This is not
under consideration – just the way in with the policy is implemented. It is the student’s
responsibility and choice to register – the consequences are laid out so that they know what
will happen. This makes the implementation of the policy consistent for all grad students.
The fee is equivalent to one (1) in-state credit dollar amount. It does not actually add credits
to the transcript.
How can we charge a fee for no services? If a student chooses not to come to this institution
for a period of time, they have to pay a fee to come back. There are exceptions where the
fee would be waived. It is not illegal and is done at other universities.
Suggested edits to wording:
o 4. GRC 799 Fee Exceptions: Exceptions to the fee payment may be made on a case by
case basis if a student was unable to register for GRC 799 in a timely manner due to
extenuating circumstances beyond her/his control leading. When seeking an exception,
the student must complete the Reinstatement & Continuous Registration Fee Waiver
Form. The completed form must be submitted to the Graduate Council Chair via the
Graduate Studies Office. The request must clearly explain the extenuating
circumstances for why the registration did not occur and why the fees should not be
assessed. Student should aAttach supporting documents that address these
aforementioned extenuating circumstances.
o The implementation date should be changed.
o Decisions can be appealed.
Motion approved.
g. Discussion of HLC Planning:
There is a new process for how HLC accredits institutions. It was unclear what the new process
was – and it is still unclear, but we now have better understanding of what we will need to do.
Betsy Morgan will lead the writing of our accreditation report (presumably with a task force). The
University must develop accreditation projects – a short-term project that will be implemented
and analyzed for the report and a 10-year accreditation project. A UWL task force will most likely
be in place and we will send a team of individuals to an HLC conference. After the conference,
there will be more discussions. UWL will need to identify a formal HLC liaison since our former HLC
liaison, Carmen Wilson, has left UWL. This liaison will receive all official correspondence from HLC.
We will aggressively seek more information from HLC. Our ten-year accreditation is set for 201516, so we will need to have our project for this identified next fall. We are in the first round of
institutions to go through this new process, so we will be learning about the process as we go.
h. The rest of today’s agenda items will go on the agenda for first FS meeting in spring.
V. Old Business.
VI. Adjournment at 5:10 p.m.
Respectfully submitted,
Kerrie Hoar