Council of Deans
-napproved Minutes
February 24, 2003
_Iembers:
McKellips
Buckley
Burgess
Dawe
Goode
Neale
Soelle
Young
Also Present:
TonyPokomy
1. Items from the Executive Committee.
a. Recently a solicitation was received via e-mail asking faculty members to contact
legislators in support of a bill about smoking. The President does not feel this is proper use of the
internal e-mail system and is asking that a policy be written on the proper use of our e-mail system.
He doesn't think she specifically assigned that to anyone but if she did, she assigned. that to Vice
President Pinkston. McKellips ,"vill get that clarified.
b. Starting time for classes. Deans \¥ill recall that in the Reasor report there are some
comments about the number of variations we have in the times when classes start. The President
asked McKellips ifhe had done anything about that and he said no, but that he did have a very brief
discussion about that with the deans and he did look up the last policy statement he had on it. He
plans to redistribute that. She asked him if we had handled it for the Fall semester and his answer
was no and that he does not think we have time to do anything at this point. He did make the
comment to the President that be doesn't believe the analysis that Reasor did properly reflects om
situation if we are talking abollt the kind of students the Reasor's report was written about. That
report was on how to get more traditional type students here for daytime type classes. He doesn't
believe that we have such an odd sitnation wit11 regard to our daytime statting schedules. We
regularly start our ~1WF sequence on a standard starting time from about 8:00 in the morning until
about 4:00 in the aftemoon. We also start our TTH sequence on a fairly standard fashion. What
Reasor pointed out was that there were many different starting times for classes here. If you start
drifting off into the night times and the weekends \vhere we have target populations we are trying
to serve, you can amass a lot of diJferent starting times. He doesn't think our day schedule is that
messed up. McKellips will try to go through a schedule and see if he confll1ns what he has said. It
doesn't seem to be that much of 311 issue. After a lengthy discussion McKellips stated he hesitates
to tell the deans to build a time schedule for a body of students we do not have yet. Ihve recruit aU
these sUldents and they come in and complain about the class schedule then \ve would deal with that
issue then. McKellips feels we have always planned our starting times with the aim of two things trying to maximize our enrollments in the classes and trying to maximize the utilization of our
facilities. Both of those are real iSS11es when you start tan1pering with schedules.
c. President Ross asked McKellips for a repOli on bow the Brev.rczyllski Chair ,\-vas
going. He reported to her that he and Burgess had a discussion about it and that Burgess is \vorking
on the document. Burgess replied she has talked to several of the faculty and they will have a
document fInished eal"ly next week. McKellips has heard the President say two or three times in the
last week that we are looking to the BrewczYllski Chair to be the head of the CETES (Center for
Emerging Tecb.nology and Entrepreneurial Studies). Burgess replied she did not know tbat was the
goal for that Chair. McKellips stated this is not inconsistent with the type ofperSall we will be trying
to recruit. Of course, the Center is a long way from reality but that is where the President is looking
to for manpower. If that Center happens, she wants the organization to be staffed by faculty
members devoted to that project and not people we would bring in. The .idea is to rebuild the
Physical Science building and that would be the Center building itself and then the faculty for that
would be from departments. Bmgess stated that would make a significant difference from what they
are presently proposing. McKellips will try to get something to her.
d. McKellips read to the deans the memo be v,rrote to tbe President regarding
Commencement Recommendations.
"Following two lengthy discussions on the possibility ofhaving a Decernber commencement
ceremony, the deans were unable to reach a consensus on a logistical plan for the event. The most
difncult issue was an acceptable date, but there was also concern about the adequacy of available
facilities, the necessity for requiring faculty participation in the midst of finals and holiday
preparation, and the bmdens placed on those who would plan and conduct the ceremony. Their
conclusion was that they did not support the current proposal for a December commencement, but
would be willing to reconsid.er if someone develops a logistical plan that addresses their concerns."
The President's reply was that she wants a more definite answer. McKellips asked ifanybody wants
a "yes." No one responded. McKellips stated he will give the President a "no." After the discussion
that followed, Buckley suggested the deans say no to the December graduation but open the May
graduation for the following December graduates to walk. All deans were in agreement.
e.
McKellips asked if the deans had received the new requirements for the Academic
Plan.
(1) McKellips said he asked Tom Sutherlin if the changes are reaIIy any better than
what we had before and he said tins is a lot better. The schools wiD have a lot less work to do.
Some of deans may "ivan! to talk with to Sutherl.in about it. McKeIlips said the President is chair of
that committee and she wants comments from the deans about the change. She wants deans to email their comments to her.
'.
....,
(2) Soelle said it appears the changes do not address anything that is useful internally
ill the Scbool of Liberal Arts. It is more philosophical - where are we going, what are our three to
five major goals, and that sort of thing. That isn't what we have been focusing on in our Academic
Plan in the past. Asked ifthe Academic Plan bas sort of gone away. The Academic Plan is the piece
that closes the loop between assessment and the budget process. McKellips stated he th.inks it has
gone away as far as having to send an Academic Plan to the State Regents is concerned. Discussion
followed
f. McKellips distributed a document showing the scholarship program that has been
developed in an effort to try to support the movement to recruit more traditional students. Notice
that it is very much based on academic requirements. The one that doesn't appear to be so is the
PLUS scholarship that right now bas an ACT of20 but that is on there for consistency sake because
this was the announced and published requirement and minimrnu criteria for PLUS scholarships.
McKellips suspects when it is published next year it will change quite a bit fi'om that and there will
be an ACT score required that is considerably higher than 20 in order to get a PLUS scholarship.
This list has been published in about three or four versions and tills is the latest and has some minor
changes in it. This does not include the fee waiver scholarships that we have traditionally made
available to departments to award. Those awards will be continued in the same format. These
scholarships are supposed to be automatic. If the student meets the criteria listed tJlere, they get
awarded a scholarship, subject to the asterisks at the bottom of the page. When the money runs out
they quit being automatic.
g. McKellips distributed a document, "Oklahoma's Economic Pros.'Perity - A Statewide
Plan." He was handed this a few minutes ago and has not read it alL McKellips asked deans to look
at the paragraph, Guidelines for the Analysis Papers. He read from that paragraph - "Each discussion
paper will be written by a fom-person committee, two faculty members from the State System of
Higher Education and two members from the private sector." He called attention also the paragraph
Process for Synthesis of tile Results - "The synthesis process will be complicated and demanding.
About 20-25 papers will be synthesized to identify the highest priority actions and to analyze
possible interactions among the proposed actions." McKellips has had only about 30 seconds to
skim through this quickly but apparently what is going to happen is that a document will be
developed called "Oklahoma's Economic Prosperi ty - A Statewide Plan." The plan is going to come
out ofthe set ofpapers that were just mentioned; there is going to be a State level steering committee
appointed by the Sta.te Regents staff; and the steering committee \\Till identify faculty members to
write the papers McKellips was just talking about. The President has asked McKellips to ask the
deans to read this and come up with some thoughts for a paper or several papers ifpossible, that one
or all of us or somebody might ",;rite at Canleron that fit this general scheme. At this moment, the
deans need to be thinking about topics and potential Vvriters for those topics. Deans are to send their
responses to McKellips, not the President.
h. McKellips stated that when President Ross first came here, one of her early
observations was tbat we have far too few cooperative agreements \.vith the Career Technology
Centers. She has now asked McKellips to ask the deans to think of areas where they might be able
to develop some cooperative agreements with the career tech schools. Asked the deans to come lip
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\vith some ideas to see which tech schools in our area (Great Plains and Red River particularly)
might be interested in signing ou to oue of those agreements. Dr. Reasor told McKellips last week
tbat she would send him some examples of cooperative agreements they had worked out at Rogers
State. Wben he receives those he will pass them along to the cleans. If a dean comes to McKellips
with an idea that looks feasible he will get with that dean and then 11)' to make a contact with tile
career tech school to see if they are interested. This involves some infOImatiou the deans will not
readily have in hand. They will have to do some research on this. Deans will have to know what
they are doing at the career tech schools in order to find something that makes sense for a
cooperative agreement. 111 working with these cooperative agreements, you budd courses into an
associate degree program where the students get credi[ in the associate degree program for work
they have done at the \la-tech schools. Under the present policy, Cameron is responsible for assuring
that the quality of the work that is being done at the va-tech school is college level and that it is
being taught with the properly qualified person. Discussion followed.
2. McKellips stated it is about time for budget hearings. Call Yvonne when the deans feel
they are ready to make an appointment. A copy of the budgets should be given to McKellips and
Pinkston. McKellips would like to have these budgets at least a week ahead of the deans'
appointment. Get them to McKellips as soon as they are ready and then start c.alling for
appointments. One thing McKellips wants to be sure the deans come to the hearing with is a list of
faculty vacancies within their school. If deans anticipate they \\till have some vacancies, list those
too but identify that they are not in existence now but are anticipated, and give an estimate ofwbat
salary it will take to fill the position. Also, be sme justification is prepared for any kiud of an
increase being requested, whether it is an increase in the existing budget or a new area to be
budgeted. Discussion followed.
3. McKellips asked Buckley about the letter from the Wichi ta Mountains Wildlife Refuge.
Buckley replied that the Biology Department decided that in their workshop arena they wanted to
do simply S or U in grading oftheir workshops. They had been giving letter grades up to that point
The people at the Wildlife Refuge were highly resistant to that. They wanted to keep the letter
grades. Their expectation was that if we \:vent to the S's and V's, that somehow we would get a
lower quality of students and would not have people enroll. Buckley wrote a letter to the Wildlife
to tell them we had decided to go to S' s and V's and that we would like for them to continue to
participate but that we would understand fundamentally if they decided not to operate under those
conditions. He tried to point out that academicalIytbe S's and U's were more appropriate. Buckley
stated that he had talked about this to the President back in November and she was kept pretty \,vell
informed all the way from the start. After the lengthy discussion that followed Buckley stated that
the last comment he received back on this issue was that they would see how it went in the spring
and then they would make a decision on whether or not to continue.
4. McKellips distributed an analysis ofthe Gulf War Enrollment prepared by Tom Sutherlin
as pllii of the budget planning effolis. McKellips went over the charts. He stated that we are now
processing a lot of withdrawals and we may see a bump very much akin to that one. Discussion
followed.
COMMENTS
Burgess - No comments.
Soelle - Had a question about assessment.
a. She stated that in a deans meetlllg about 3 weeks ago, the deans discussed the possibility
ofMcKellips writing a memo encouraging faculty to get up to speed all assessment. Asked ifhe was
going to wfite one. McKellips replied that be discussed this v·..i th the President and she said that a
memo of iliat type should come from the deans not from the Provost.
b. McKellips stated this is a very serious matter. What we are faced with is that we have
a North Central report due in two years. We are supposed to have all asse.ssment programs at level
ill by the time we write that report. Tom Sutherlin has reported to McKellips that not only are we
not all approaching level ill but there bas been some deterioration sillce the accreditation. Sutherlin
called it a post-accreditation let-down. Some of the programs have weakened since our
accreditation. If the report that we will be making is judged to be llIlsatisfactory, that can trigger an
early full-blown accreditation visit and probably because of the timing the accreditation would be
conducted under the new criteria that we have received. We could really come out oftbis with a
black eye over something a minority ofthe institution has brought on us. McKellips stated that the
process is not that difficult. You state your learning objectives, you develop some measmements
to see if the learning objectives are being met, you statistically report your results - then if they are
Dot being met you ask yourself why and how does the curriculum have to be adjusted to achieve the
results required. The concept we presently have is one that everybody wants. Everybody that looks
at it admires it. Hardly anyone else has figured out how to close the loop with the way we do the
PQffi.'s. If we don't get it working North Central -v.riU look at the report and say here is your
deadline and they will be here on that date. That is the point when action will have to take place those who don't take care ofthe responsibilities \wljust not be here and we will find somebody that
will. There may be some faculty members who don't understand that tenme is not a blanket
protection against all personnel actions. A facility member can be terminated for cause. It happens
every year somewhere. It is not an easy task but it can be done. Failure to carry out your
responsibilities is clearly an actionable cause.
c. McKellips stated that he was going to write the memo along the lines that no additional
positive personnel actions will be approved for a department that does not have a level ill
accreditation program. The discussion ben:veen the President and McKellips was that if he wTites
the letter then tile next Provost gets stuck \\lith having to enforce it because McKellips will not be
here for the next rowld of personnel actions and it would be unfair to impose that this spring. That
is when the President said the deans should take the leadersh.ip to get the assessment program in
check. Lengthy discussion followed.
Neale - No comments.
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Pokorny - Asked the deans who are preparing endowed chair budgets to get them in as SOOD as
possible. He has had to accelerate the budget cycle on those. He had asked for them by March 3 but
he \vould appreciate it ifthey can have them in before that date.
Da\ve - Asked if McKellips had heard anything about our MBA on-line proposal. Dawe is at the
point where they have to start responding to specific student inquiries regarding their options over
in Europe. McKellips replied that no, he does not have a response. He is working 00 some related
things that may help him get a response. He \vill push it as ha.rd as he can.
Young - Stated the installation of the new computers \vent smoothly and they have bad a lot of
compliments and some very happy students ill the Library. Dawe asked what happened to the
computers that came out of the Library. Goode stated they are taking out some of the components
for repairing other computers and the others are going in the auction - they are not usable. Dawe
mentioned that he has a couple of faculty that would like to have an extra computer to run
experiments. They really don't need a new computer to do that. Goode asked him to e-mail her and
give her the requirements they need and she will see what they can do. McKellips stated they have
always had a program to recycle computers ifthey were recyclable. lithey are declared not to be and
someone still wanted one of them for some use, then that person has to assume all the responsibility
for maintaining it. When we get too much of that old equipment sitting around we can have
techn.icians tied up 'ivith old equipment all the time and it is just not worth it.
Buckley - Asked on the out-of-state leave requests, if there is anymecbanism where the deans would
know when a decision has been made - yes or no. McKellips said that he gets the ones back that are
not approved and they are sent back to the departments. After discussion, it was decided that
Yvonne, when making copies of the approved requests, will made an extra copy to send back to the
deans.
Goode - No comments.
Adjourned 12:10 p.m.
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