Minutes
Faculty Senate Meeting
*** The complete Recording for this meeting can be
April 8, 2015
Found at http://www.american.edu./facultysenate/agendas-minutes.cfm
Present: Professors: Lacey Wootton, Larry Engel, Candy Nelson, Tony Ahrens, Sheila Bedford,
John Douglass, Maria Gomez, Alex Hodges, Billie Jo Kaufman, Despina Kakoudaki, Joshua
Lansky, Christine Lawrence, Gwanhoo Lee, Jonathan Loesberg, Jun Lu, Mary Mintz, Glenn
Moomau, John Nolan, Arturo Porzecanski, Andrea Pearson, Steve Silvia, Chris Simpson,
Provost Scott Bass and DAA Mary L. Clark
Professor Wootton called the meeting to order at 2:35 PM
Approval of Minutes – Lacey Wootton
Professor Wootton opened the floor for questions or concerns with the March minutes. There
were none and the Senate VOTED in favor, 20-0-1.
Chair’s Report – Lacey Wootton
Professor Wootton stated to the Senate that at the last meeting VP Stallings came to the meeting
to request that the Senate establish a committee to develop a new conduct code for faculty. The
old Undergraduate Regulations did contain some of these codes but they have been pulled out
and no longer exist. Professor Wootton said that she would like representation of all units and to
please send her names by April 21 to be able to take to the Executive Committee. She requested
a mix of tenure and term faculty and stated that there will be a representative from HR and Legal
Counsel.
Professor Wootton informed the Senate that the Board of Trustees has approved the division of
the School of Education, Teaching and Health. They will now be the School of Education and
the Department of Health. This is a reflection of the evolution of both programs, allowing them
room to grow individually.
Professor Wootton closed her report with an update on the last two Senate meetings. There will
be an additional meeting on May 13. The remaining business for SETs and the Graduate
Regulations is substantial along with a few other small items so she stressed to the Senators the
importance of being at both of these meetings to close this year’s business.
Faculty Manual Change (Foreword) – Lacey Wootton
Professor Wootton stated that the previous version of the “Foreword” that was voted and
approved by the Senate was brought to the BOT Academics Affairs Committee, who felt that it
was not specific enough and it was not approved. New language was produced. The language
was agreed upon with members of the manual review committee and the Board and now needs
Senate approval. With edits the Senate VOTED 13-4-3 in favor.
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CFA Instructions – Steve Silvia
Professor Silvia, Chair of the Committee on Faculty Actions, stated that the annual review of the
memo includes the following changes:
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Title change of document from memo to instructions
Making explicit the number of letters that a candidate can submit and that will be used in
the process for review
Clarification on the process for responding to a letter
Changing the word “outside” to “external” for consistency with the Manual
Removal of passive voice throughout the document
Professor Loesberg stated that he felt strongly that if the information sent to the outside
candidates had clearer instructions of what being “to close to a candidate” means, that would
allow the writer to disqualify themselves. This would be a better way to resolve the issue.
Additionally, Professor Loesburg stated that candidates do often provide very good suggestions
as to who good external reviewers are because they know the reviewers in their field.
Professor Silvia stated that there was discussion on having the DAA review the letters when they
came in to the units to provide feedback early in case letters need to be disqualified and new
letters requested. This would happen early in the process to help avoid delaying the file.
Dean Clark stated that this year there was a frequent problem of relying on candidates to solicit
external reviewers when it is the responsibility of the Deans and the Chairs. This is an attempt to
be clear who the majority of responsibility lies with.
Professor Kakoudaki asked if the current letter review process is visible to the candidate?
The Senate VOTED with the friendly amendment to section 3 and the changes were approved
19-3-1. The Senate also VOTED on the clarification of the process for responding to internal
review letters and it was passed in favor 21-1-1.
Athletics Report – Billy Walker
Director of Athletics and Recreation Billy Walker stated that the overall GPA for all teams is a
3.8. Additionally, for the first time in AU recorded history, the GPA for all athletes is a 3.0 or
higher. He stated that this year there are 4 Student Athletes of the year picked from AU by the
Patriot League.
Director Walker stated that the AU athletes have selected majors all over the university and this
is something that he encourages his staff to support. The Athletics Department offers a wide
variety of support programs for the athletes from tutoring to life skills such as dealing with
stress, test anxiety and more.
Librarian Mary Mintz asked who the NCAA rep was for the University and was told it was Bob
Karsh.
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Budget Report – Doug Kudravetz
Vice President and CFO Doug Kudravetz opened with an overview of this year’s budget
formulation. The budget committee had many challenges. The last 4 years’ revenues have fallen
and the university has not met the budget. Revenues across campus in various areas have had
shortfalls.
The Budget committee faced challenges when they came together this year. This is very different
from previous years. The committee did a great job working to meet the challenges.
VP Kudravetz stated the following recommendations from the Budget Committee (BC):
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Tuition increase of a range from 3.5 to 4 percent
Reducing the merit pool from 2.5% to 1.25%
Reduce the quasi endowment contribution from 2% to 1%
President Kerwin requested a 1% budget reduction in FY 16 and the Budget Committee
decided to do this also in FY 17 to spread it over two years
VPs submitted their budget requests and the BC reduced them by 50%, approving only
funding for essential items
Additional funding for term faculty salaries as recommended by the Senate
Instructional resources for adjunct faculty
Additional funding for student employees such as RA stipends
The overall increase for tuition, room and board will be 2.5% in 2016 and 3% for 2017.
Compared to AU’s competitors AU is among the lowest.
SET Progress/Preview – Tony Ahrens
Professor Ahrens stated that there will be more opportunity for feedback on the SET report. They
have announced two town halls in April and email is another option. The goal for today is to
highlight some of the feedback the committee has received so far.:
 Smart phone and the use of them for SETs. Is this a good option or not?
 Should class time be used for this process?
 Should narratives be made available to administrators?
 Should a different rating system be used?
 Mid-term evaluations for formative feedback are being done but if this is part of the
overall evaluations how to be sure it is not part of the final evaluations.
 Should we even be using SETs?
 What can be done to insure that students understand the importance of the SETs?
Professor Ahrens stated that a final version of the report after all the feedback has been reviewed
and implemented into the report will be brought to the Senate at the additional May 13 meeting.
The information today has been presented to encourage the senators to speak with their
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colleagues about it and submit all input to the committee since this has to be voted on and
finalized at the May meeting.
Graduate Regulations – Michael Keynes
Associate Dean of Graduate Studies Michael Keynes stated that the Graduate Regulations were
updated three years ago and this will be the first revision of them since then. The first draft was
written by a writing group of representatives from all areas across the university that serve
graduate education. The second draft was sent to all campus stakeholders for their feedback and
this is the draft after that review. There are many policy changes as well as structural changes
but the main ones are:
 All sections are now numbered
 Redundant language throughout the document has been corrected
 Adverbs like “customarily” and “usually” have been replaced where needed to be clear
in policy usage
 A glossary has been added
The Senate began the review process and decided to vote on small sections at a time, not the
entire document at once.
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Preamble - Revised for clarity
2.1.1 – Minimum Requirements for Full Admission - added language that Graduate
Degree Programs may establish additional requirements.
2.1.2 – Provisional Admission – language added to allow units to establish more
restrictive standards.
2.3 – Admission to a Combined Bachelor’s/Master’s Program – Students do not have
to reapply for a graduate combined program once they have been accepted and a student
can be denied if they do not meet the minimum requirements.
2.5 Admission with Non-Degree Status – Students must have approval to enroll in a
class with a non-degree status
2.8 – Re-admission of Students with Previous AU Graduate Records - This is a new
section to clarify the process; if the student has been academically dismissed from AU or
has graduate coursework from AU with a GPA below a 3.0 that has not been counted
towards a completed degree, admission must be approved by the VP of Graduate Studies
by the academic unit.
3.2 Grade Point Average – This policy has not changed but the revision helps explain
how to calculate a cumulative GPA.
3.5 Pass/Fail Courses – Revised language for clarity
3.7 Incompletes – Recommended to assign an incomplete by add/drop. This section was
sent back for further clarification.
Professor Wootton asked the Senate to approve the sections that have been reviewed through 3.6.
The Senate VOTED and the Preamble through section 3.6 were approved in favor 18-0-0.
The meeting was adjourned at 4:55 PM
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