Minutes
Meeting of the College of Social Sciences (COSS) Faculty Council
February 5, 2016, 10:00 a.m., Pafford 202
Meeting was called to order at10:04 a.m.
In attendance: Jeannette Diaz, Ashley Smallwood, Mike Johnson, Neema Noori, Anthony
Fleming, Pam Hunt Kirk, Patrick Hadley
APPROVAL OF MINUTES
Minutes of January meeting approved http://www.westga.edu/coss/index_172.php)
NEW BUSINESS
1. Course/Program Modifications: all were approved except the following
a. ANTH 2100 - 33 CREDIT HOURS?
b. ANTH 3180 – SEE COMMENTS MODIFICATION – we couldn't open them to see the
comments
2. Improve efficiency of course/program modifications review during Faculty Council meetings
By creating a subcommittee to examine the modifications before Council meetings (this
had been done in past years). The subcommittee would only bring to FC those
modifications that were problematic in some way. However, at the time of this meeting,
none of the FC members have access to view each modification in the submission
system. Associate Dean Smallwood has been asked to allow us permission to view.
3. COSS Culture post-diversity training discussion ensued – some of the comments mentioned
were as folliows:
a. more discussion as a large group – where do we go now; how do we assess if it worked;
need dept training as followup; how to be an ally and still try to keep civility between
colleagues; confronting superior odd for junior faculty; follow-up with students and
faculty needed; these aren’t communication issues, they are about power imbalances,
some have more work than others, etc.; how might we suppport team teaching with
two diverse people
4. Junior faculty service concerns – Paul Rutledge wished to discuss; in his absence, we tabled this
until the next meeting
5. COSS Spring Elections
On Ballot for Spring 2016 COSS Elections
1. Chair-Elect of Faculty Council (only tenured faculty or those who will be tenured as of
Fall 2016 are eligible)
2. COSS Faculty Senate Senator At-Large is to be elected from the college for a 3-year
term. This is a new seat that was gained as a result of last year's Faculty Senate Census
3. Senate Committees:
a. Graduate Programs Committee
b. And the following committees (current rep listed, eligible for re-election, will also
put call out for nominations) NOTE: that Faculty Senators are not eligible to
serve on these committees because they already serve on a Senate subcommittee:
i.
ii.
iii.
iv.
v.
vi.
Academic Policies: Patrick Hadley (Mass Communications)
Faculty Development: Louis Howe (Political Science)
Strategic Planning: Randahl Morris (Mass Communications)
Budget: Paul Rutledge (Political Science)
Facilities and Services: Ashley Smallwood (Anthropology)
University Relations: Amber Smallwood (Mass Communications)
Decide in your department
1. Faculty Council Representatives for: Anthropology, (3 year terms), Criminology,
Sociology (decide after the election so that the new Chair-Elect at-large member is
chosen first)
2. COSS Promotion & Tenure Advisory Committee, Reps from: Political Science,
Psychology, and Sociology (must be tenured)
3. Faculty Senate Senators
a. Marjorie Snipes (Anthropology) is serving her first term and is eligible for re-election
for a second term. Ask department if she will remain
b. Gavin Lee (Criminology). Gavin is serving out Vanessa Woodward's term expiring in
2016. He is eligible for re-election as a first full term. Ask department if he will
remain
OTHER BUSINESS/ANNOUNCEMENTS
Faculty Salary Study
FC noted that the salary study should say that merit pay will be on top of the bump
FC also suggests that more space be provided on individual faculty servers