Faculty Council News
4 September 2012
Welcome back everyone. Council held its first meeting of the year last night. First order of
business was the Provost’s report. She informed us that work continues on ICC, and she
anticipates that everything will be in place by next fall. Her next priorities are the advising center
and the first year residential experience. She concluded by indicating that we are not in
compliance with the Higher Education Act, a federal law that applies to all institutions that
receive federal support for student aid. The law mandates that all costs associated with a course,
such as books, lab fees, art supplies, etc, must be available to students before they preregister for
classes each semester. At best, only 25% of our courses comply. The easiest way to meet the
mandate is to get your book orders in on time. And if you don’t use the campus book store?
Well, we will find out about that conundrum at the next meeting.
The Provost then yielded the floor to questions, whereupon Representative Lifton from the
Business School raised concerns about the recent folding of campus affairs and student life under
the Provost’s umbrella. Don wondered if this would overwhelm the Provost, forcing her to
compromise student affairs for academic affairs and vice versus. He also wondered if this move
would lower morale in student affairs. The Provost expressed her respect for Don’s concerns, but
perceives that the change elevates rather than diminishes the stature of student affairs and
provides an opportunity to better integrate student and academic affairs to achieve a major aim of
the College—a great education.
Next up was Carol Henderson, Associate Provost for Accreditation, Assessment and Curriculum.
Carol spoke to us about a proposed change in academic policy regarding repeating classes. In
short the new policy will limit how many times a student may repeat a class and also how the new
grade will affect GPA. In the old policy, all grades for a class were factored into the GPA,
whereas now, only the highest grade will be factored in. Council approved the changes—all in
favor with two abstentions.
Council spent the remainder of the night filling campus wide committee vacancies and on a
preliminary discussion of faculty budget priorities. More to follow on the latter topic.
Respectfully,
Tom Swensen