Faculty Development Council Meeting
Wednesday, December 7, 2011
10:00 - 11:00 a.m.
Adelbert Hall, Room M2
Members Present:
Chris Ash
Diana Bilimoria
Alison Hall
Ica Manas-Zloczower
Ronald Occhionero
Daniel Scherson
Amanda Shaffer
Unable to Attend:
Cleve Gilmore
Jacqueline Lipton
Invited to Attend:
Jean Gubbins
Colleen Nagy
Lynn Singer
Carol Stark
Patricia Underwood
Lynice Willis
The meeting was called to order by Lynn Singer, Deputy Provost and Vice President
for Academic Affairs, at 10:05 a.m.
Chris Ash introduced the three guest speakers at today’s meeting:
Jean Gubbins, Director, Institutional Research
Lynice Willis, Program Manager, Institutional Research
Colleen Nagy, Senior Director, Strategic Initiative Management
They summarized the PowerPoint presentation “Faculty Lifecycle Project” that was
distributed prior to the meeting. The presentation covered the following areas of the
project: Objectives, Current Challenges, Current State, Opportunities, Proposals for
both System View and Information Views and Next Steps. The following issues and
concerns were raised and discussed:

There is a need to change the current decentralized system into a single standalone system that can provide appropriate data more speedily. There is also
concern about creating a university-wide system rather than relying on a
couple of individuals in Institutional Research to access data when required.

Avoid duplication of efforts to maintain the system.
Faculty Development Council Meeting
Wednesday, December 7, 2011
Page 2

Verify data and standardize input forms between all schools.

Survey the faculty and administrators for what information would be needed
on a standard form.

Develop a web page for the database. Limit access by requiring passwords for
sensitive areas.

Set up a query system for data.

What is the vision and objectives of this new system, and whom does it
benefit? It seems that faculty may benefit less (i.e., it may not be so useful to
faculty to enable them to create their annual reports) and administrators the
most (e.g., to fulfill data requirements for reports).

Develop a program justification statement to give to leadership for total
university approval.

Review and revisit the program again in six months.
The Council was requested to send their input, comments and/or suggestions on how
to move forward to Chris Ash.
Minutes
The minutes from the prior meeting on the November 8, 2011 meeting were approved
by the Council.
Diana Bilimoria gave an overview of her presentation, “Faculty Development
Council 2011 Executive Summary” which was presented to the Strategic Planning
Retreat and the Academic Affairs Committee meeting in late 2011.
Discussion ensued on several open items stemming from this presentation:

Lynn Singer and Jean Gubbins have presented the Faculty Climate Survey to
the Board of Trustees and the Faculty Senate.

What are we doing to improve the faculty climate? Morale is low. Need
recommendations and then implement action plans.

Need to ask administration to conduct focus groups to find out where the
problems are located and take actions to correct.

Low level of responses to the survey items from the Diversity Office and
Underrepresented Minorities.
Faculty Development Council Meeting
Wednesday, December 7, 2011
Page 3

Start-up funds were indicated as an issue in the overall university summary
report, but may not be an issue in certain schools such as SOM.

The university needs to develop an action plan to better analyze, understand,
and correct low ratings, and look at specific problem areas at each school.

Need to develop and implement a transition program for new faculty to the
university.
Much discussion was spent at the meeting on the specific wording of the
recommendations for faculty development emerging from (a) the overall report of the
faculty climate survey, and (b) for the faculty development of assistant professors
(pages seven and eight of the presentation). It was suggested that comments and
suggestions to revise these last two pages of the presentation be sent to Diana.
Diana suggested that over the next several months we should add recommendations to
the report so that we can submit a comprehensive report to the Provost and Deputy
Provost outlining our recommendations based on discussions over our first year of
activities. There was discussion about when would be the best time to submit the
report. It was mentioned that the Council began its operations in January 2011.
Council members felt that the end of the academic year (i.e., April-May-June 2012)
would be an appropriate target timeframe for the report.
Council was urged to send their comments and/or suggestions to Diana Bilimoria to
revise the last two pages of presentation.
Meeting adjourned at 11:00 a.m.
Next Meeting:
Date:
Tuesday, January 24, 2012
Time:
1:00 - 2:00 p.m.
Location:
Adelbert Hall, Room M2
Minutes by Carol Stark at carol.stark@case.edu or (216) 368-4389