UNIVERSITY OF LOUISVILLE
FACULTY SENATE MEETING MINUTES
NOVEMBER 5, 2014
The regular meeting of the Faculty Senate was held on November 5, 2014 at 3:00 P.M. in the Chao Auditorium, Ekstrom Library, Belknap Campus, Pamela Feldhoff presiding.
Senators Registering Attendance:
A&S: David Brown, Jennie Burnet, Carrie Donald, Jasmine Farrier, Karen Hadley, Greg Hutcheson, Ron Sahoo, David Simpson, Joseph Steffen, Elaine Wise CoB: Bruce Kemelgor, Robert Myers DENTISTRY: Robert Staat, Dave Willis EDUCATION: Monica Delano, Patrick Hardesty, Caroline Sheffield KENT: Seana Golder, Martin Hall LAW: Kurt Metzmeier, Luke Milligan, Enid Trucios-Haynes LIBRARIES: Carrie Daniels, Terri Holtze, Margo Smith MEDICINE: Yousef Abu-Kwaik, Forest Arnold, Eric Burton, Pamela Feldhoff, Guomin Jiang, Saeed Jortani, Sham Kakar, Jeffery king, Chin Ng, David Stirling Michael Tseng MUSIC: Krista Wallace-Boaz NURSING: Heather Owens, Valerie McCarthy, Karen Singleton PART-TIME FACULTY: Donna Gaus, Joseph Gutmann, Rose Mills, Susan Peacock, John Ritz PUBLIC HEALTH: Ray Austin, Scott LaJoie SPEED SCHOOL: Roger Bradshaw, Kyung Kang, J.P. Mohsen, Kevin Walsh
Also Attending:
Ex Officio: James Ramsey, Shirley Willihnganz, Allie Funk, Ginger Brown
Others: Tracy Eells, Dale Billingsley, Robert Stenger (ULARP), Gretchen Henry, recording secretary
Press: Janet Cappiello, UofL Today
Senators Not Registering Attendance:
A&S: Beth Willey CoB: Rob Barker, Ben Foster DENTISTRY: Ricardo Caicedo, Donald Demuth EDUCATION: Thomas Simmons KENT: Wanda Lott Collins MEDICINE: Luz Fernandez, Arun Gadre, Brad Keller, Rainer Lenhardt, Kenneth Palmer MUSIC: Randi Boling, Dror Biran PART-TIME FACULTY: Michael Wade
CALL TO ORDER: – Feldhoff
IN MEMORIAM: Dr. Adam Matheny – Dr. Dale Billingsley
Dr. Dale Billingsley read his statement about Dr. Adam Matheny (attached below). A moment of silence was observed in honor of Dr. Matheny.
ACTION ITEM: Consideration of the Minutes - Feldhoff
The minutes of the October 1, 2014 meeting were unanimously approved as distributed.
The agenda was amended to allow President Ramsey and Provost Willihnganz to make their reports.
REPORT: University President – Dr. James Ramsey
After the state elections, the Kentucky House remains Democratic and the Senate, Republican. As 2015 is not a budget session, there probably will not be any aggressive action taken by the legislature. Based on the first quarter report, the state’s economic outlook is dire. There was a 1.1% growth over 2013, yet that is far below the forecasted growth of 3.6%. The 9 month economic forecast that the Executive Branch is legally-bound to produce, has not been released yet, so it is difficult to gauge exactly how anything has changed since last year. Last year ended with a $90M shortfall, but the governor transferred money to fix it. Most of that low-hanging fruit has been picked and there is not much left to provide a temporary patch. Currently, the budget shortfall is $136M. President Ramsey is concerned that there may be a mid-year cut. Nothing will happen until the December numbers are known. If they are bad, the governor may ask the General Assembly to tackle it, which will spare him politically. It is prudent for Uofl to begin discussing FY 2016/2017, which begins July 1, 2015. We need to prepare for a possible 3%-6% cut. Higher education is not a burning political issue, but we are hoping that the CPE will aggressively push our agenda in the primary elections. Asked if state government is concerned with higher education’s affordability, Dr. Ramsey said that the money from the lottery has not been sufficient to cover the need-based financial aid and that there is some concern about that. The CPE continues to work on developing a performance-based funding model. President Ramsey said that the Board of Trustees adopted the leadership team’s shared goals at its October meeting and will meet next week to approve his recommendation of Harlan Sands for Chief Operating Officer. If his recommendation is approved, Mr. Sands will begin full-time on January 1, 2015. Until then, he is under contract as a part-time consultant. Dr. Ramsey said the recent $5M gift to the College of Education will go a long way to help with teacher preparation.
REPORT: University Provost – Dr. Shirley Willihnganz
After hearing all the budget woes, it’s difficult to enthusiastically talk about growth and the 21st Century Initiatives. The Provost expects to have a memo summarizing the reports out on Friday. All groups will be asked for feedback by the end of the semester that will lead to list of agreed-upon items to take forward. Some of the recommendations will be tabled until funding is available. Work will begin on the SACS review in 2017. She feels that salary is a very important issue that needs to be addressed. It will take about $12M to get faculty salaries to the median of market values. She has asked deans to load analysis of faculty work and to look at all the funds they have before VSIP money is returned. She wants to ensure that all money is well-spent. Much of the money raised through the Capital Campaign is earmarked by the donor. Of that money, about $25M is undesignated. The Provost asked for suggestions on ways to spend this, other than salary.
REPORT: Student Government Association – Allie Funk
The SGA’s “Big Idea” this semester has been safety. The SGA’s Safety Committee has drafted its own Safety Resolution; supports the L Trail between the library and Betty Johnson Hall; and, is seeking funds for safety initiatives. Ms. Funk is interested in the possibility of an International Affairs major and is asking for faculty advice. She met with Libraries Dean Fox regarding the 24 hour study area, and it was decided to increase chairs by 54%. SGA elections take place in February and packets have been sent out. The SGA started an awareness campaign directed towards students encouraging them to fill out the course evaluations.
REPORT: Staff Senate – Ginger Brown
The Staff Senate met on HSC in October. Dana Hummel from HR presented on open enrollment. The Executive Committee met with the President and Provost yesterday. UBMs are still concerned with the unknowns of the service center pilot programs. VPHR Connally said that RIFs would be held off for 1 year as the service center pilot programs are implemented.
INFORMATION ITEM: Music Personnel Documents and Speed School Bylaws– Wallace-Boaz
This was the first reading of these documents, which does not allow for discussion. The School of Music’s personnel document was revised due to the restructure of the school’s departments. Speed School bylaws were revised to reflect the change in the number of departmental committees – from 10 to 4. The documents are on the Faculty Senate website and will be discussed and voted on in December.
INFORMATION ITEM: Vision & Strategic Plan for College of Education – Dean Ann Larson
Chair Feldhoff welcomed the College of Education and Human Development’s new dean, Ann Larson. Dean Larson presented her vision for the future of the college. Noting that she has been a CEHD faculty member since 1995, she is humbled by her appointment as dean and looks forward to working with her colleagues. The college has 6 departments and 3200 students. As the college continues to grow, its greatest challenge is financial. She plans to hire two new Associate Deans and two new department chairs. Dr. Larson comes with the desire for UofL to become a leader in education reform. She believes team work and collaboration, effective communication, equity and cultural competence will advance the college’s mission. The $5M gift to the college and a $1.2M grant will work together to prepare our future teachers. The college is engaged in the community through its clinics in Shawnee High School and the Nia Center, Western Middle School and Portland and Cochran elementary schools. Focus will be put on the state’s priorities of high quality teaching and learning, diversity and innovation. Some of the issues that she wants to address are: developing a strategic plan; strengthening the CEHD brand; the college has outgrown its building; and, closing disparity gaps. This fall the college had its second largest undergraduate and largest graduate enrollment. Asked about the high enrollment in the Teacher Education program, Dean Larson said that there is a high need for middle school teachers. Noting that the Exercise Physiology graduate program is ranked 65th by U.S. News and World Report, Dean Larson said she is seeking other accreditations to improve the school’s rank.
REPORT: Standing Committee Reports
Academic Programs Committee (APC) – This committee report was online.
Committee on Committees and Credentials (CCC) – This committee had no report.
Part-time Faculty Committee (PTFC) - This committee report was online.
Planning & Budget Committee (P&B) - This committee report was online.
Redbook & Bylaws Committee (RB) –This committee report was online.
Executive Committee (XC) - This committee report was online.
OTHER REPORTS
Chair’s Report – This report was available online.
Faculty Athletic Representative (FAR) – This report was available online.
Human Resources Advisory Committee (HRAC) – Open enrollment was October 17 – 31st. The Get Healthy Now assessment is through November 17th for $40 discount.
New Business
None
Old Business
None
Announcements
- Senator Steffen reminded the senators that the Celebration of Teaching and Learning will take place in February. A brochure will be sent out soon.
- A brief discussion took place on the low student participation rate on the course evaluations.
Adjournment
The meeting was adjourned at 4:45 P.M.
Respectfully submitted,
Gretchen Stein Henry
Faculty Senate Secretary
In memoriam Adam Matheny
Faculty Senate, 11/5/2014
Professor Adam Pence Matheny was born in Stanford, KY, on September 6, 1932, and he died October 7 this year. He attended Western Kentucky State College and Columbia University, and he earned his Ph.D. from Vanderbilt. He was a Navy veteran of the Korean War, after which he worked for a while as a chemist and clinician, including service as a human-systems engineer in the NASA Gemini and Apollo space programs and as a clinical researcher at the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development.
Professor Matheny had a distinguished university career of research and service. He came to the University of Louisville in 1969 as associate director of the Louisville Twin Study. During his tenure as its director from 1986 until his retirement in 2000, the Louisville project was the largest longitudinal study of twins in the world. As Professor in the Department of Pediatrics, he wrote more than 100 articles and book chapters, and he was co-author of a genetic-counseling textbook. He was a member of many boards and committees in the city of Louisville and the Commonwealth of Kentucky.
Adam was a Faculty Senator from 1980 until his retirement in 2000, serving for much of that time on the executive committee, where I first knew and worked with him. He was a brisk, incisive thinker but a confirmed back-bencher in the Senate, with a settled preference for the way-back row of individual chairs at the rear of the old Ekstrom auditorium, from which he would make a silent exit if the tenor of the proceedings or the report of the then president (doesn’t matter which one, Miller, Swain or Shumaker) overcame his patience or good sense. He was a strong advocate of academic freedom and faculty independence at a time when the School of Medicine was at least officially under the tight control of its dean and vice president, and he was one of the most censorious of the executive committee in his critique of new personnel policies imposed by the Board in the early 90s. Even more than B. Edward Campbell, one of his contemporaries and another titan in the Senate, he had so extreme a distaste for university administration that he would not stand for Senate office, saying that even the chair of the executive committee would pollute his faculty standing; he always looked askance at a Faculty Senator who fell into the abyss of the Board of Trustees. His combination of quick apprehension, wry wit and glacial skepticism made him a robust critic and a good tactician, and to be crossways with him on a matter of policy was to invite either an abrupt cold shower of counter-arguments or, worse still, withering silence. As a friend and co-conspirator, he was generous, thoughtful, tender and surprising; he read vastly and shared scraps clipped or, more often, torn from newspapers and magazines and then tucked into campus mail, sometimes without signature or explanation.
He was, in short, a character, and I am very sad that he is gone.
Dale B. Billingsley
Professor of English
Faculty Senate Chair 1992-94