The
Regular session – February 13, 2006 – 3:30 p.m. – Jacobson Faculty Hall 102
office: Jacobson Faculty Hall 206
phone: 325-6789
e-mail:
The Faculty Senate was called
to order by Professor Roy Knapp, Chair.
PRESENT: Albert,
Apanasov, Badhwar, Benson, Biggerstaff, Blank, Bradford, Brown, Burns, Catlin,
Civan, Clark, Croft, Elisens, Fast, Fincke, Frech, Gade, Garn, Geletzke, Gutierrez,
Hawamdeh, Houser, C. Knapp, R. Knapp, Kolar, Kutner, Lai, Lester, Marcus-Mendoza,
Megginson, Pace, Raadschelders, Ransom, Schwarzkopf, Skeeters, Tabb, Trytten,
Warnken, Weaver, Wei, Wyckoff
ISA representatives:
Hough
UOSA representatives: Vedala
ABSENT: Cramer,
Draheim,
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
Announcement: New senators
Big Event
Senate Chair’s Report:
Faculty length of service recognition
Plus/minus grading
Faculty teaching load
Legislation
Faculty death
National
Election, Senate Executive Committee
Courses with numbers ending in 60, 70, 80, 90
Central campus instruction
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The Faculty Senate Journal
for the regular session of January 23, 2006 was approved.
The following faculty members
were elected to the Faculty Senate as of February 2006:
William Clark (Economics), completing the 2003-06 term
of Susan Sharp (Sociology), representing the College of Arts & Sciences
Karen Hayes-Thumann (Art), completing the 2003-06 term
of Bob Dohrmann (Art), representing the College of Fine Arts
Barry Weaver (Geology & Geophysics), completing
the 2003-06 term of Tom Dewers (Geology & Geophysics), representing the
College of Earth & Energy
Mr. Chris Moody, recruitment
co-chair for this year’s Big Event, and Mr. Josh Davis, vice chair for
recruitment, described the Big Event.
Mr. Moody said the Big Event is the largest student-run community
service event in the country. It started
at Texas A&M in 1982. OU’s version began
in spring 2000. Nearly 5000 students, faculty,
and staff participated last year. Over
150 non-profit organizations will be assisted in
In response to a recommendation
from the Faculty Compensation Committee, the Provost has agreed to support recognition
awards for faculty length-of-service.
The first such awards recognizing 30 or more years of service will be
made at the spring faculty awards ceremony.
Faculty members from the
At last month’s meeting, President
Boren made some remarks about faculty teaching extra credit hours. The Senate Executive Committee discussed the
suggestion with the president, who agreed that such a program should be coordinated
with the departmental administration to make sure it is in agreement with the
department’s goals and long-term development goals of the involved faculty.
Three bills regarding
Intelligent Design have been filed for consideration by the state legislature. The Senate Executive Committee will start a
monitoring program so the senate can consider resolutions if appropriate.
This month’s report of
faculty retiree deaths includes Eugene Cates (Education), who died November 26.
Dusan Zrnic, senior scientist
at the National Severe Storms Lab and adjunct in Meteorology, was recently
elected to the National Academy of Engineering.
This year 76 new
The Faculty Senate approved
the nomination of Cecelia Brown (Library & Information Studies) to complete
the 2005-06 term of Susan Sharp (Sociology) on the Faculty Senate Executive
Committee.
At the December meeting, the
senate considered three proposals of the Academic Regulations Committee (ARC) concerning
courses with numbers ending in 60, 70, 80, 90 (http://www.ou.edu/admin/facsen/ARCprop.htm). As a result of the discussion, the ARC
revised the proposal (attached: http://www.ou.edu/admin/facsen/arcprop2.htm). Mr. Matt Hamilton, chair of the ARC, was not
able to attend this meeting and asked Rick Skeel, Academic Records Director,
and Breck Turkington, Enrollment Services Director, to represent him.
Prof. Knapp reminded the
senators that they had suggested that the three proposals be considered
separately. He proposed that the third
proposal be discussed first.
It is also requested that a
University policy be adopted so that Directed/Honors Readings, Independent
Study, Thesis/Dissertation/Honors Research and Special Topics/Seminar courses
will be added to the course inventory as part of process of creating any new
department. Existing departments which do
not have these courses established would also be identified, and the courses
would be created in coordination with the academic department. The Curricular Changes and Academic
Publications office will coordinate creating the course forms and will send the
forms to the department for departmental and dean’s office signatures in order
to record the date of the action. The
requests would not require review/approval by college committees or the
Academic Programs Council, which is normally required for adding a course.
Prof. Schwarzkopf asked how
the proposal would affect non-degree-granting units such as ROTC. Mr. Skeel said departments would not have to
use these courses. They would not
automatically be given thesis and dissertation courses but could have directed
readings. The proposal would not force
departments to use a particular number but would make it available if they were
interested. Prof. Schwarzkopf asked who
would decide whether a course would be created automatically. Mr. Skeel said the committee had not
discussed that issue or the issue of non-degree-granting units, but he assumed
that thesis and dissertation courses would not automatically be created for a
department that did not offer degrees.
Prof. Schwarzkopf pointed out that the honors college might want to
offer honors classes in such departments.
Mr. Skeel said the numbers would be available; the honors college would
make that decision. Prof. Schwarzkopf said
he assumed that a vote in favor of the proposal would not preclude the
administration from setting up rules to deal with special circumstances. Prof. Knapp noted that the proposal said the
courses would be created in coordination with the academic department, so he
presumed academic departments could say they did not want certain courses.
Prof. Raadschelders asked
whether the proposal was intended to standardize courses and facilitate program
changes. Mr. Skeel said some departments
have not set up directed readings or independent studies courses, so it would
facilitate the process if they chose to teach such a course. Prof. Raadschelders said as a member of the
Academic Programs Council, he thought the process of introducing a course would
be easier if a department already had a number.
Prof. Fincke proposed that
the third line read, “…new degree-granting department,” to satisfy the
earlier comment. Prof. Schwarzkopf pointed
out that non-degree-granting departments could want some of these classes. Prof. Benson asked whether
dissertation/research courses would be added to departments that did not have
graduate programs. Mr. Skeel said that
would not be done; the intent was to facilitate the establishment of these
courses. Prof. Knapp said the fourth
line could read “courses would be created, if appropriate...” Prof. Fincke said she thought that would make
the resolution ambiguous. Mr. Skeel pointed
out that some departments grant degrees but do not offer doctoral programs. Prof. Fincke said she assumed the language
she proposed implied that existing departments would also have to be degree
granting and would not prohibit non-degree-granting departments from creating
special topics courses. Prof. Schwarzkopf
said a solution would be to change “departmental and dean’s office signatures”
to “department, dean and provost approval” in order to have an administrative
structure to grant the exceptions. Prof.
Trytten said she thought the dean level was high enough to deal with most
concerns. Prof. Knapp asked whether
deans had final signature on approvals. Mr.
Skeel said course approvals go to the provost.
Prof. Knapp clarified that Prof. Schwarzkopf was trying to capture the full
list of approvals. Prof. Burns suggested
that every time “department” was mentioned, it should say “department or program”
since many programs are not departments.
Prof. Knapp summarized the changes:
first sentence should read “…new degree-granting department,” third
sentence should read “department, dean and provost approval,” and all
references to “department” should be changed to “department or program.”
It is also requested that a
University policy be adopted so that Directed/Honors Readings, Independent
Study, Thesis/Dissertation/Honors Research and Special Topics/Seminar courses
will be added to the course inventory as part of the process of creating
any new degree-granting department or program. Existing departments or programs which do
not have these courses established would also be identified, and the courses
would be created in coordination with the academic department or program.
The Curricular Changes and Academic
Publications office will coordinate creating the course forms and will send the
forms to the department or program for departmental and dean’s office
signatures department or program, dean and provost approval in order
to record the date of the action. The
requests would not require review/approval by college committees or the
Academic Programs Council, which is normally required for adding a course.
Prof. Schwarzkopf moved to
approve the third resolution as amended.
Resolution three as amended was approved on a voice vote.
Referring to proposal one,
Prof. Schwarzkopf asked whether the description of the courses was specific
enough so that existing courses ending in a number like 63 would not be redefined
as directed readings. Mr. Skeel said the
intent was not to affect any existing courses that have been approved. It would be less confusing if the courses
that end in 60 and 70 are consistent from this point forward. Courses that are not seminars should be
assigned a different number. Prof.
Lester asked whether proposal one would only apply to courses going forward and
not retroactively. Mr. Turkington said departments
would be encouraged but not required to change.
It is much easier to do degree audits with a structure that identifies
these types of courses so they do not look like regular courses.
Prof. Marcus-Mendoza commented
that grading issues should rest with the departmental faculty and not be a
standard. She asked whether the
department chair would have to fill out a form for every instructor every
semester if the instructor wanted to change the grading scheme. Mr. Skeel said he agreed that the grading
should be at the department and faculty discretion. The goal is to set a base that is consistent,
and any changes would have a consistent process. If a course is set up as S/U, it can be
approved as letter graded for a given semester or permanently by section or
whole course, so the approval process would not have to be done every
term. Prof. Marcus-Mendoza said the
process takes the decision away from the faculty because the approval must go
to the dean and graduate college. It is
arbitrary since the department picks one grading scheme and then gets exceptions. Mr. Skeel noted that there is a long-standing
graduate college policy that all graduate directed readings and independent
studies courses are S/U graded. His
office is required to have approval away from S/U. The objective is to build some consistency so
everyone knows how to start and how to make a change. The easiest scheme would be for the entire
campus to agree that courses could be optional grading. Mr. Turkington said the proposal formalizes
what is already in place. Prof. Apanasov
pointed out that some courses are offered as directed readings or independent
studies if they do not meet the minimum enrollment. In those cases, the class should be graded in
the same way as a regular class. He
recommended that courses ending in 60 and 90 be letter graded or S/U graded at
the instructor’s discretion. Mr. Skeel said
because we are obligated to uphold a graduate college policy that says the opposite,
we have a process for making those kinds of exceptions. There has been some inconsistency in the
grading scheme between undergraduate and graduate independent study courses.
Prof. Gade noted that the
proposal suggests that 70 courses be letter or S/U graded, yet the form says a
graduate student must be graded S/U for special problems or studies. Mr. Skeel replied that the special problems
courses typically end in 90. The form
has never been intended to be used for seminar or special topics numbers. Prof. Lester commented that there is no
consistency across the university in the numbers used. Proposal two would make it even more
complicated since courses are already in place and have been approved. Prof. Knapp responded that the hope for proposal
two is to provide uniformity in numbering between departments. The staff is prepared to fill out the
paperwork to minimize the burden on individual departments. Prof. Lester said the Graduate Council had
some concerns related to proposal two. Mr.
Skeel reiterated that it was not intended to be a retroactive policy, and no
change would be made to courses that have already been approved. Prof. Benson said he understood the intention
but would feel better if the first line said “all new courses.” Otherwise, it sounds as though every
department would have to fix its courses.
Prof. Raadschelders asked whether the proposals had come before the Academic
Programs Council (APC) and if so, whether the members were happy with the
changes. Mr. Skeel said there was some
initial conversation with the APC but not a thorough discussion. The ARC had discussed the issues in detail on
two occasions. Prof. Raadschelders remarked
that any effort to standardize current procedures would be welcome.
Prof. Schwarzkopf said his
understanding was the instructor should use a topics course for a letter-graded
experimental course. Some courses that
are and ought to be letter graded end in 63 or 73. Describing courses with only the terminal two
digits applies policy to courses that should not be included. He suggested that the courses be defined by
the three terminal digits and preferably all four digits. Prof. Marcus-Mendoza commented that adding
“all new courses” would not fix her complaint that the department should decide
what makes sense pedagogically in terms of grading. It would be a logistical nightmare for department
chairs to know for each section how the professor has decided to grade it. Mr. Skeel explained that if a department
decides that all undergraduate courses will be letter graded, it sends in one form
and is finished, just as it is done now.
Responding to Prof. Schwarzkopf, he said the proposal was intended to
apply to courses that end in 960, 970, 980, not courses that end in a number
such as 663. He thought the committee would
be willing to make that change for the sake of clarity.
Prof. Biggerstaff asked
whether the grading scheme for a course could be permanently optional. Mr. Skeel explained that his preference would
be to have optional grading for all courses as long as each section was graded
the same way. However, the graduate
college does not allow that as a choice on a permanent basis for graduate
readings courses. Prof. Biggerstaff noted
that it would remove a lot of the confusion if the graduate college would allow
faculty to have optional grading. Prof. Hawamdeh
asked whether a form would have to be filled out every time a new professor
taught a graduate course. Mr. Skeel said
they would fill out the form only if they wanted to change what had last been
approved for the course. Professors can have
their section of a course graded a certain way permanently or temporarily. If a new professor came on board and had a
section number that had previously been approved, s/he would have to request a
change. If the department gave the
individual a different section number, s/he could assign S/U grades. Letter grading would have to go through the
approval process. Prof. Knapp said
professors would have to submit a form for each section if they wanted to make
a change. Prof. Houser said he had put
in a number of requests, had never had any denied, and thought it was a pretty
streamlined process. He thought there
could be some logistical issues, though, if very many instructors submitted the
number of forms he had.
Prof. Knapp asked whether the
proposals were clear enough to vote on, or whether they should go back to ARC
and ask them to work with APC. Prof. Lester
suggested that the “9” be included when describing the courses and that “new” be
inserted in both proposals as proposed earlier.
Prof. Apanasov brought up his prior suggestion to have optional grading
for 60 and 90 courses. Prof. Benson pointed
out that adding the “9” would resolve a lot of difficulties. Prof. Marcus-Mendoza moved to table proposals
one and two, remand them to the ARC for clarification, and ask them to work
with the APC. The motion was approved on
a voice vote.
Prof. Biggerstaff, a member
of the ad hoc committee on central campus instruction, presented the proposed
resolution from the committee (attached:
http://www.ou.edu/admin/facsen/cctfrsln.htm). He said the committee met three times,
received input from Student Congress representative Rachel Muchmore, and the
committee chair, Prof. Hobbs, met with the provost. The committee’s charge was to determine a recommendation
for the kinds of classes that should be reserved for instruction on the central
campus. The committee had to come up
with an idea of why courses should be taught on central campus. The discussion involved both philosophical
and practical issues, for instance, the logistics of having two separate main regions
where students congregate. We are very fortunate
to have a problem like this in the sense that our campus is growing and we have
new infrastructure in place for our students to be able to get a world-class
education. The committee wanted to
acknowledge that this is a good problem to have and to encourage the
administration to work with the Faculty Senate as a stakeholder in the
educational enterprise in
Prof. Knapp pointed out that
the usual practice was for the senators to discuss the resolution with their colleagues,
and it would come off the table at the March meeting. Prof. Benson asked whether the task force was
aware that there used to be a council that was supposed to be involved in these
sorts of decisions and that the council asked to be eliminated because it was
never consulted. Prof. Biggerstaff said
the task force was aware of the former council but not the reasons it dissolved. Prof. Schwarzkopf asked if he was correct
that the committee approved the idea of putting smaller sized classes on the south
campus and not trying to force them onto the central campus. Prof. Biggerstaff said it was reasonable to
allow courses that involve small numbers of students to be on south campus. Some of that will happen anyway with
Meteorology moving to south campus in the fall.
At the same time, the committee recognizes that the infrastructure is
not in place to allow large groups of students to be moved back and forth
between the campuses. The committee
encourages the administration, if that is in their future plans, to participate
in two-way communications with faculty, staff, and students to facilitate
involvement with the infrastructure necessary to do that.
Prof. Marcus-Mendoza asked
about the intent of the word, “should,” in the resolution. Prof. Biggerstaff said the committee discussed
whether to have absolutes or to encourage an activity but not necessarily make
it impossible. The committee thought it
was best to leave some wiggle room. The
recommendation is that large groups of students should not be transported at
this time until scheduling is changed and transportation is there. So “should” is the word the committee
intended. Prof. Frech suggested that “on
the main campus” should come after “offer” in number one. Prof. Biggerstaff agreed that the intent was
courses should be offered on the main campus if they affect a large number of
students.
Prof. Lester asked whether
there was discussion of what “efficient, sound and reliable transportation”
would look like and how we would know when we reach that point. Prof. Biggerstaff said the committee had
talked about a monorail and buses. He said
there should be some real evaluation of what that transportation system should
look like. Prof. Knapp said the
committee was not trying to specify the measure of value. Prof. Trytten said she was concerned that the
scheduling infrastructure was mixed with the transportation infrastructure. Since scheduling would probably take less
time, she thought the two should be separated.
Scheduling could move forward even now.
Transportation is a much longer scale and more expensive problem. Prof. Biggerstaff reported that the
Meteorology chair recently worked out the schedule for courses to be taught at the
national weather center, and it required a lot of manual intervention. If we are moving a large number of students,
scheduling will be a big issue and could take a couple of years to do well. The resolution will be discussed again at the
March meeting.
The meeting adjourned at 4:50
p.m. The next regular session of the
Faculty Senate will be held at 3:30 p.m. on Monday, March 20, 2006, in Jacobson
Faculty Hall 102.
____________________________________
Sonya Fallgatter, Administrative Coordinator
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A. Steve Bradford, Secretary