Council of Deans
Unapproved Minutes
March 3, 2003
Members:
McKellips
Buckley
Burgess
Dawe
Goode
Neale
Soelle
Young
1. McKellips had called the deans this morning because President Ross wanted a rundown
on what the deans were doing for Saturday and most of the deans were able to respond quite well
to that. An item that Buckley raised and we talked a ljttle bit about is the business ofhaving faculty
members available in the afternoon for students to explore the programs in more depth. Asked
Buckley what he had been told about that so far. Buckley replied that most of the communication
has gone directly to the chairs. He gets whatever Keith Mitchell puts out. Soelle said she just talked
with her chairs and they said they will all have one or two folks in the departments for students. One
thing they did raise was to make sure the buildings are unlocked so that we don't have faculty sitting
in buildings that no one can get into. Keith Mitchell informed McKellips this morning that what he
had in mind was to have facu1ty available just from 1:00 to 2:00 o'clock, not all afternoon.
McKellips stated Buckley had a good idea this morning - at the tables where you are meeting
students, have a sign-up sheet for meeting someone in the afternoon. Ifyou don't get anyone signed
up there wou1d not be any point in having anyone there very long. Buckley said pre-registration is
pretty low right now - it was 40 on Friday. Short discussion followed.
2. The President is having these open sessions with students and one ofthe notes that came
from the last session applies directly to us. It says, "could we have a seminar or give main points
or let our Comp I be MLA and Comp II be APA or a separate section for education and psychology
majors." The original question was: "Why do we education/psychology majors not learn APA until
our first class ofeducation or psychology." McKellips asked ifthere are undergraduate courses that
include discussions ofAPA. Dawe stated all the psychology classes emphasize APA - undergraduate
and graduate. Neale said that all education classes use APA, but she thinks in Comp I students learn
MLA. Soelle stated that students do not like to have to become familiar with different styles. She
always told students in her classes that it is good to know about the different styles. They have to
have flexibility and be willing to use whatever style that is required. Young stated that they have a
real problem with this in the Library. Students get confused about the styles and how to use them
and are constantly asking the librarians questions. It is a big problem. It is very complicated and the
students don't have enough training. Perhaps a one hour course could be taught to students.
McKellips stated he believes that is what this suggestion is getting at - why can't we have some sort
of an APA seminar type class. Soelle suggested her school could easily do some workshops. That
would not be so difficult to address. Vivian Thomlinson or someone could do a workshop on MLA.
McKellips stated we might get a faculty member to put a course in our Educational Outreach
Saturday workshops and see if the students really would come. Dawe stated that we are expecting
too much of Freshman students to know both. McKellips stated that he assumes this would be
something we would offer Juniors or Seniors and not Freshmen. After some discussion McKellips
stated this might be something in the future that would be worth looking into as an additional
offering for those students who have to become, at some point, somewhat familiar with APA.
3. McKellips stated he had asked the people here to start scheduling their budget hearings
and one or two have done that.
a. The President thinks we need to do a trial budget and have it ready by the time we
have the Regents retreat in April. There will not be time to conduct detailed budget hearings and get
it done by April. McKellips suggested those here turn in some sort ofan advanced budget statement
which as a minimum would include the total of the operating budgets and the listing of positions
with salaries, categorized as: filled and continuing (assume the person who now holds the position
is going to continue in that position unless it is otherwise known); positions that are vacant and
essential to be filled; and then vacant and we sure would like to fill them. If departments are
functioning pretty well with a position not filled this year, don't bother to list it because it is not
likely the position will be filled. If there are serious problems and a department is not functioning
well because the position is vacant, list it as one that you would sure would like to fill. Also, if a
dean feels there is a new position they think they really need, go ahead and list it. McKellips would
certainly want any new positions listed in the detailed budget that will be looked at in the individual
school hearings. Make sure what is given to McKellips has all the essentials in it - don't overlook
something. Soelle stated they normally list needs for their facilities - curtains, carpeting and such.
McKellips replied that she should put those things in her detailed budget. This is in two parts - what .
we need to have to open our doors next Fall and then the more standard presentation that will be
looked at in the hearings where facilities and those kinds ofthings will be discussed. After a lengthy
discussion McKellips stated that what he is asking ofthe group is not an overwhelming assignment.
It is going to be a matter ofjust moving some numbers from existing documents to other documents.
He needs the money broken out in the way it is broken out in the budgets - salaries, operating, travel,
student workers, etc.
b. Soelle asked if we have given up on the possibility of consolidating any of the
computer labs. Some time ago, Soelle, Neale and Goode worked on lab consolidation and they
concluded that some money might be saved by consolidating some labs. McKellips stated that he
was not sure what brought that to a halt. Goode replied that Dr. Sullivan and McKellips did a walkthrough and after that Sullivan said they were not going to do anything right then. Lengthy
discussion followed.
c. Neale stated that the vacancy created by the retirement of Dr. McMahan is the only
vacancy she knows of. McMahan has a relatively high salary and they will need to replace her but
probably not at that level. McKellips asked Neale what she has done about the Child Development
2
Center. Neale replied she is waiting for a decision to be made. Neale said she needs to know what
is going to be done because parents will be calling in to sign up for the Fall semester. The Child
Development Center will not be in operation at all this summer. If a decision is made not to open
it next Fall, she needs to be able to notify the parents. Neale feels we will have a substantial savings
there in terms of upkeep, utilities, materials, and everything that is going into that center. The
number of students is steadily declining because ofthe four-year old programs in the public schools
where they can go free. Discussion followed.
d. Goode asked if our active National Guard employees are kept on our payroll and on
the budget sheets. McKellips replied that yes. The State law of Oklahoma requires we give them
25 days ofpaid leave for the fIrst part oftheir absence. Federal law doesn't require that we do that.
Keep the position on the budget because we are under obligation by Federal law to re-employ the
people when they return providing they follow the right steps. Discussion followed.
4. McKellips mentioned to Goode that we are getting a lot ofcomplaints about the condition
of computers in the lounge in North Shepler. Asked ifthose were in bad shape. Goode replied they
are all back up to par unless they have torn them up over the last week. They have them padlocked
and cabled - students cannot take any cards out the back. The only other thing that can be done to
secure those computers is to build a cabinet to put them inside it. Discussion followed.
5. McKellips stated there has been a complaint about the new computers in the Librarythey don't have a Zip drive. Young said that no, they have the CD and it is a problem. Some
students already have their material on a Zip disk and they are coming in and all the new computers
just have the CD drive. Goode said she might can fmd a ZIP drive somewhere. Young said they
need to get at least one or two in the Library. Goode stated that students can go to Margo and she
can take care ofit for them. Goode had to put a Zip drive over there for students. Goode and Soelle
said they had students come to them and thank them for the new computers in the Library.
COMMENTS
Goode - No comments. McKellips asked if she had received his e-mail about the visit of Kurt
Snodgrass. Goode replied yes, and that it has been a year since he was here. McKellips mentioned
that we now have Internet 2 capabilities and there is some concern that schools that have just recently
gotten it are not making use ofit. Kurt is going to come down and make a presentation. He says he
has a road show that they bring to sell the advantages of Internet 2. McKellips and Goode will set
something up and try to get people there who need to be there. If anyone here has particular people
they would like to see participate in that, get their names to McKellips and Goode and they will make
the information available when they know it is going to happen. Discussion followed.
Buckley - Asked if they were going to discuss general education. McKellips had previously sent
out a memo to the deans and asked that they review the proposed changes to the general education
program made by the General Education Committee and be prepared to accept or rej ect the changes
at the next meeting of the Council of Deans. McKellips said that the academic deans and Provost
3
combined form what is called the General Education Council and they are supposed to review any
proposal that comes out of the General Education Committee from primarily the point of view what is the impact on our resources - things we can do and not have serious impact on our resources.
We need to ignore the Military Science items because those were approved through the Curriculum
Committee and so they are properly in the mix. Obviously what we don't want to happen is that the
number of credit hours on the general education courses change in some way that the deans didn't
have the opportunity to plan for the impact on faculty resources, elimination ofa course from general
education that has been a credit hour generating course for a school where the impact will adversely
affect them, and that sort of thing. We are now ready for a discussion on the changes and then the
deans recommendations. Buckley stated that he polled his chairs and they didn't have any problems
and they were aware of these changes. Soelle stated that she remembers the actions in the English
Department but she doesn't remember what those courses are now. McKellips asked her if she feels
like the English Department is aware of these proposals. He asked if they formally submitted this
and endorsed this so that we are not about to approve something that nobody knew was coming.
Soelle said yes, they were aware ofthe changes. Discussion followed about the listing ofthe foreign
language courses. McKellips stated that this is the fIrst product that has come out ofthat committee
and they have worked so hard at it that he is inclined to try to encourage them and certainly does not
see anything here that is objectionable. Neale stated she served on the General Education Committee
at the time all this was being discussed. They did work very hard and they took courses and
evaluations from departments and went through them one by one to see if they did meet the
objectives. It was very tedious. The departments had prepared four or fIve pages about the course
in addition to the syllabus. They looked through the syllabus to see if, in deed, the objectives could
be correlated or be noted on that syllabus. They spent hours doing this. McKellips stated that in his
35 years of knowledge about the Cameron curriculum that has never been done for general
education. There have been some attempts to revise general education in the past, but the basis for
revisions had nothing to do with that kind of analysis. Neale stated that is why they did not include
the foreign language intensive type courses, because the syllabi as well as the ratings by the faculty
or chair did not correspond to the objectives ofthe General Education Committee. Members ofthe
General Education Committee went to the various departments and helped them analyze the courses
and said these are the general education objectives - where are they mentioned in your course and
then how are they implemented and how are they measured. After some discussion McKellips stated
he needed to have a formal action from the General Education Council. Neale made a motion that
the General Education Council accept these changes as proposed by the General Education
Committee. Seconded by Burgess. Passed unanimously.
Young - Distributed some documents that deal with proposed legislation.
a. One is Dniform Commercial Computer Information Transactions Act which is called
DCITA. This is proposed legislation in the 50 states that would replace the public law ofthe fair use
doctrine with the contract law. This would hurt libraries at universities in their attempt to distribute
educational information under the fair use doctrine. It could also hurt the ability to license data bases
and make the data bases available to libraries. This handout will familiarize the deans with the
issues involved. In Oklahoma the legislators are currently trying to attach DCITA to a existing bill.
Ed Johnson has asked the libraries to contact the legislators and register opposition against DCITA.
4
It is really more than a library issue because potentially universities could get into a lot oflitigation
over data base licensing because of this. When she went to Higher Education Day she mentioned
DelTA to some of the legislators and none of them had even heard of it.
b. The other thing is that the Oklahoma Department ofLibraries is funded with State monies
and that support has been cut back. They have had to take reductions in their budgets and have dealt
with that by not filling their vacant positions. If they have more cuts they may have to reduce the
data base access to the libraries in Oklahoma. If that data base access were cut off that would hurt
the library because these data bases are made available to the students and they are very important
to us. Young distributed a list of the data bases that are currently available. Young stated that if
anyone gets a chance to talk to legislators, tell them to fund Oklahoma Department of Libraries
because they do a lot of important things for academic libraries. Discussion followed.
Dawe - No comments.
Neale - No comments. McKellips stated that another issue that was in one ofthe memos he had sent
to the President is that we still have not formalized the withdrawal of our secondary courses and
programs. Neale stated that the reason that has not happened is that Music objects and if we still
have to serve Music that sort of defeats the purpose because we will still have to offer those
education courses for Music. She just left it at a standstill. Soelle stated that originally she thought
it was not going to be an issue but if it is an issue she will go back and talk with Music about it.
McKellips stated that it is going to be hard to get it through the various Regents agendas and cannot
be done in time to do anything about the catalog. That was what was on his mind when he wrote his
last memo. We will probably just have to put out the new catalog with it in there. Discussion
followed.
Soelle - Mentioned that the campus-wide academic conference is coming up on March 27 and 28.
Burgess - No comments.
Adjourned 11 :54 a.m.
5