Faculty Council Meeting
November 10, 2015 7:00 PM
Taughannock Falls Room, Campus Center
In Attendance: Matthew Geizler, Moustafa AbuELFadl, Duncan Duke, Bradley Rappa, Jason
Harrington, Patrick Winters, Lisa Barnard, Chirs Hummel, Kyle Woody, Kari Bossard Stoos, Tom
Swensen, Diane Long, Christin McNamara, Saviana Condeescu, Vivian Bruce Conger, Fae
Dremock, Colin Stewart, Don Tindall, Ted Galanthay, Jason Freitag, Tatiana Patrone, John
Rosenthal, Stanley Selter, Alex Moon, Matt Sullivan, Michael Trotti, Denise Nuttall, Jeff Holmes,
Bridget Bower, Jennifer Strickland, Diane Birr, Deborah Rifkin, Peter Rothbart, Ivy Walz
Absent: David Turkon, Charis Dimaras
Excused: Cynthia Henderson
Guest: Mary Bentley, Shoshe Cole, Max Denning, Bari Doeffinger, Grace Elletson, Sarah
Grunberg, Honginer Guam, Don Lifton, Dominck Recckio
Meeting Open at 7:00 PM
7:01
Open Session:
Don Lifton from the School of Business believes that if a referendum for a vote of no confidence
in the President of the college is had, that even with one third of the faculty not in support of
the president, that it would be challenging for him to lead the shared governments.
Mary Bentley from the Department of Health Promotion and Physical Education believes that
the faculty have been engaged in the process with other faculty members and students in
securing the opportunity for a formal vote of no confidence in the president of the college.
Dominick Recckio, the Student Body President at Ithaca College, wanted to bring the student
vote of no confidence to the attention of Faculty Council. The decision for the vote was passed
unanimously by the SGA executive board and full Senate. He urged the council to do the same.
7:07
Chair Comments
The Provost is not in attendance of the meeting to encourage members to speak openly and
freely. He looks forward to rejoining at a time that people are comfortable with it.
APC Policy – More discussion needed about single session required courses in the 4-6 PM time
slot. Discussion and vote delayed to December 1, 2015 meeting.
Part-Time Faculty Member Representative – This person should be elected by the part-time
faculty, but only one person has volunteered. Rachel Kaufman? Will join us at the next meeting
as a full rights member of the council.
Parking Policy Committee – There have been two volunteers. Upon more information, there
will be an electronic vote hopefully next month.
Assessment Committee – The letter has not yet been delivered to the Provost, but upon
settling of other campus matters, will be.
Election for Parliamentarian – Stan Seltzer has been asked to step in for this meeting and
hopefully for the rest of the year.
7:10
Motion to accept upon correction of grammatical errors and striking a sentence on the
last page from the budget presentation (subject to approval from Gerald Hector), the
minutes were approved and passed.
7:13 Developing a Plan of Action for Inclusion and Cross Cultural Effectiveness for Faculty –
This is supposed to be the response from the faculty on how they can help improve the racial
climate on campus. Chair, Peter Rothbart believes that faculty should be in control of this
decision and what kind of training they would like to do which they feel would be most
beneficial. Being proposed for the beginning of Fall 2016:
I.
New Orientation for new faculty will include a half day session on inclusion.
II.
Over the coming year, each department will hold an event or workshop designed
to increase inclusivity, collegiality, and professionalism.
III.
On November 10, 2015, Faculty Council will develop a plan of inclusion and cross
cultural effectiveness for faculty. This should help faculty decide appropriate
responses for anything that may arise in their classrooms or on campus.
The Chair has started a spread sheet database with currently twenty credible resources to help
faculty on this topic. This menu of items should be open to all for departments to select what
they would like to use and be most beneficial. The goal is transparency; there is no filtering of
this database. All materials will be available. The Executive Council is suggesting a Task Force
made up of Faculty Council members (2-3) to take responsibility of soliciting these sources and
materials, posting them on the database, and making sure they are available to all
departments.
Discussion –
 The librarians, upon approval, offered to put together a subject guide and curate it, but
it needs to be without filtering to avoid any perceived bias.
 Input for credible sources will be taken from anyone within the IC community.
 Departments can use this database to find resources for workshops, webinars, readings,
etc.
 It was suggested to create individualized talking circles (formal or informal gathering of
people working toward common pedagogical strategies that are inclusive for everyone)
for faculty to help within the classroom as preemptive rather than reactive.
 Decided that the database is a good first step, departments should be using this
information, but so should the college. More rigorous faculty involvement, college wide,
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would be helpful to unify the faculty. Suggestions included faculty symposiums, panels,
workshops, conferences etc. Mentioned that those who may need the extra training and
not those who would seek for the help on their own, so a more fully encompassing,
mandatory approach would also be affective.
Suggested to have departments that use these resources leave a report as which
resources where used, how they were utilized and give a review of how affective the
sources were in aiding their process.
The Provost has made it clear that some funds will be made available to implement
these opportunities for faculty so that department funds do not need to be used.
It was recommended that a reoccurring annual symposium or presentation that is
supported by the administration for all faculty would help establish this additional
training in the future.
Using those with more expertise in diversity would be a great addition to the task force,
especially those from our immediate community such as those from the LGBT Center on
campus and Luca Maurer.
There is a need for more experts in diversity training on campus. Should we be looking
to create a center for diversity?
There was a question as to whether this topic should involve the Provost’s Council for
Diversity and Inclusion initially?
o Answer – No. This process needs to be under faculty responsibility so that faculty
has full say for what they would like to do.
8:00 Motion to create a Task Force made up of primarily Faculty Council members is
directed to find resources, drawing upon other experts from the college community for help
passed with one abstention.
Further Discussion –
 Recommended that the task force take a broader view and create a plan to provide
orientation, continuing education, and exposure to issues relevant to this topic. For
example: a symposium, the departmental options, etc.
 Also suggested that the Task Force should have regular consultations with the Student
Government for their input and ongoing communication.
8:10 Motion to have the Task Force come up with a plan for orientation, continuing
education, and exposure to issues relevant to this topic of diversity and inclusion, including
one or more plans for various levels of campus for programming. For example: a symposium,
departmental programming etc. was passed with one abstention.
Further Discussion on Size of the Task Force –
 There should be at least three Faculty Council members on the Task Force leaving it
open that if more people would like to serve, they may.
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Rather than listing the experts the Task Force must work with without first consulting
with those experts, the Task Force should be free to choose and contact any experts
that they think could help.
8:15 Motion to have at least three Faculty Council members on the Task Force with the
number of Faculty Council members always being the majority in ratio to any other members
such as experts passed, one opposed and no abstentions.
Motion to leave the sunset provision up to the Executive Board passed unanimously.
Task Force Volunteers –
Jennifer Strickland (Library)
Lisa Barnard (Communications)
Alex Moon (Humanities and Sciences)
Jason Freitag (Humanities and Sciences)
8:20
Motion to elect the above individuals to serve on this Task Force passed unanimously.
Motion to move into Executive Session passed unanimously.
Adjournment 10:35 PM.