Wichita State University Faculty Senate
March 28, 2011
Minutes of the meeting of the Faculty Senate Monday, March 28, 1011
MEMBERS PRESENT: Adler, Ahmed, Anderson, Barut, Bennett, Bolin, Bryant, Celestin, Close, Decker,
DeSilva, D'Souza, Hemans, Henry, Hershfield, Horn, Klunder, Matveyeva, Miller, Mosack, L. Russell,
Skinner, Smith, Smith-Campbell, Soles, Strattman, Thompson, Yeager, Yildirim
MEMBERS ABSENT: Baker, Brooks, Carruthers, DiLollo, Jeffers, Kreinath, Smith, Taher
MEMBERS EXCUSED: Gibson, Lewis, Rillema, Rokosz, Ross, D. Russell
Ex-OFFICO: Pickus, Muma
SUMMARY OF ACTION:
1. Accepted the proposed revisions to Tenure & Promotion Policy 4.18
2. Endorsed the Guidelines for Registrar to evaluate Transfer Coursed for General education with
some amendments
I. Call of the Meeting to Order: President Hemans called the meeting to order at 3:30 pm.
II. Informal Statements and Proposals: President Hemans asked Elmer Hoyer to bring the Senate up to
date on the near term activities of the AAUP. Hoyer announced that the AAUP state meeting will be held
at the Newman University April 9, 2011 (Saturday). The doors will open at 10 am and the business
meeting will begin at 10:30am. Guest speaker, Donna Potts, will address national issues of interest at
12:45pm. Interested individuals may register on-line at AAUP-in-KS.org, or pay at the door the morning of
the meeting.
III. Approval of the Minutes: Senator Klunder noted that there appeared to be a misspelled name in the
list of members present at the March 14, 2011, meeting of the senate and that several of the names were
unnecessarily bolded. The minutes of the meeting were accepted with the understanding that those
corrections would be made.
|IV. President’s Report:
A. President Hemans announced that he and the presidents of the Unclassified Senate and the Classified
Senate (Grady Landrum and Linda Claypool) had met with President Beggs to request his input and
support for a proposal for Tuition Remission Benefit for the WSU faculty and staff. The President agreed
to consider the recommendation and a task force with two members from each senate was formed to
develop a proposal to present to President Beggs.
B. President Hemans reminded the members of the senate about the President’s Service Award
ceremony scheduled for 3:30 pm, Tuesday, May 3, and the Faculty Awards ceremony scheduled for May
10. He encouraged all senators to publicize both events within their departments and to attend the
ceremonies.
C. President Hemans relayed the good news that the Kansas Senate passed the University Engineering
Initiative act (passed by the House earlier). The purpose of the legislation is to increase the number of
domestic engineering graduates per year at KU, KSU, and WSU from 875 to 1,365 by 2020. One million
dollars will be provided during FY’12, four million dollars in FY’13, and another seven million dollars in
FY’14. A one-to-one match for this support will be required of the three universities.
D. President Hemans announced that the results of a KBOR supported Economic Impact Study of the
benefits of the state’s investment in higher education on the state’s economy are now available on the
KBOR website. Among the many positive findings highlighted include the fact that a $1 investment in
higher education brings a $12.80 return, and 52% of the graduates of the KBOR system remain in
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Wichita State University Faculty Senate
March 28, 2011
Kansas after graduation. These positive results are counter to the logic of no increase of state support of
higher education in recent history.
F. President Hemans informed the senate of that the KBOR Articulation Task Force had met. The
members of the task force recommend the following: the creation of a web portal to be used to assist in
the examination of transfer credits across the KBOR system if institutions and the creation of an advisory
Articulation Council. Each institution has been tasked to develop a formal process for appeal of denied
transfer credit by July 1. The senate Executive Committee will create a proposal for the appeal process to
bring to the senate for approval.
V. Committee Reports: Johnnie Thompson, Vice President, alerted the senate that six vacancies remain
for seats in the AY’11-‘12 senate. She will be contacting the following areas/departments this week to
request their assistance in filling these seats: Nursing, Electrical Engineering, Health Professions, LAS
Math/Natural Sciences, and LAS Humanities, which has two vacancies. All senators from the affected
colleges were also urged to help fill the vacant senate seats.
She also announced that the annual Faculty Senate Committee Preference forms would be distributed
this week.
VI. Report on Academy for Effective Teaching Awards Selection Process:
Elmer Hoyer, chair of the Academy for Effective Teaching, reported on the Academy’s procedure of
selecting the faculty member to receive the AFET Outstanding Educator Award. This year (as was
initiated last year) students were able to vote on-line for members of the faculty that they judged to be the
best teachers. The members of the AFET met with several classes of students to encourage them to vote
on-line. The members of the Academy believe that this was the primary reason that the number of
students participating this year was far greater than last year’s on-line voting.
VII. Old Business:
1. Proposed revisions to 4.18, Tenure and Promotion – (2nd reading) The second reading of the
proposal to revise the Tenure and Promotion appeal process prompted a suggestion to change the
wording in the added paragraph from “tenure or promotion” to “tenure and/or promotion.” It was moved by
Senator Klunder (2nd Close) to accept the revisions with this minor correction the proposed change to the
section “Appeal of Decisions Related to Tenure or Promotion” of section 4.18 of the Policies and
Procedures Manual was approved with no dissent.
2. “Guidelines for the Registrar to Evaluate Transfer Courses for General Education Credit”- (2nd
reading) This produced considerable discussion and proposed changes to the document. President
Hemans emphasized the point that the intent of this document was to provide guidance regarding the
granting of general education credit rather than course equivalency. Most concerns were focused on
preventing the assignment of equivalency of upper division courses for transfer courses from community
colleges; and, statement d. of the document that appeared to hamper the re-evaluation of a course that
had been previously approved for transfer credit. These concerns were addressed by narrowing the
scope of the document to only courses from out-of-state institutions; and, by replacing the wording of part
d. with appropriate language to indicate that the university would honor its “approval” of general education
credit for a course for a specific case (student), regardless of any subsequent reevaluation of the course
for general education credit. Senator Klunder moved (2nd Hershfield) to accept the proposal with those
changes to the document, it was approved by a vote of the senate with no dissent.
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March 28, 2011
VIII. New Business
A. Proposal from the ad hoc General Education committee - President Hemans presented the current
draft of the proposal from the ad hoc General Education Committee. He spoke to the history of recent
attempts to improve the general education criterion of the university. Most were unsuccessful in bringing
about significant change because of the lack of faculty “buy in” throughout the process. That is, a
committee worked hard to create a new General Education structure, which was disassembled when it
was brought to the senate and/or full faculty. In order to prevent this same fate for this attempt at general
education reform, he emphasized that this proposal will require a great deal of scrutiny by the senate as
well as constructive input during the time of its creation. He encouraged the members of the senate to be
prepared to discuss the issues of the ad hoc committee’s proposal, and to help facilitate that education he
will provide “reading materials” for all senators on-line regarding the history, rationale, and committee
discussions of the key points of the proposal.
Time limited any further discussion of the proposal, and President Hemans said that the proposal would
be a major part of the senate’s work for the remainder of this semester.
VIII. As May Arise: none.
IX. Adjournment: The meeting was adjourned at 5:00 pm.
Respectfully Submitted,
Walter Horn for, Dan Russell, Secretary
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