SOS Steering Committee Minutes

September 8, 2006

 

Present: Voting members: William Bosron (DEAN), Ray Chin (PRESIDENT), John Watson (BIOL), Stephanie Sen (Chem and Chem Biol), Mihran Tuceryan (CSCI), Michal Misiurewicz (MATH), Drugu Rao (PHYSICS), Jane Williams (for Silvia Bigatti, PSYC).  Non-Voting Ex-Officio Members: Steve Randall (SECRETARY), Pam Crowell, Jeff Watt, (ASSOCIATE DEANS), Kim Nguyen (ASSISTANT DEAN), Phil Fasteneau (for Andy Barth, PAST PRESIDENT and for Jane Williams, PSYC).   Guests: None

 

Chin brought the meeting to order at 10:05.  Introductions of members were made. 

 

I.   Chin presented the agenda which was adopted with a modification to allow discussion of scheduling of future meetings.

 

II.  Chin presented minutes from May 5, 2006 for approval. They were approved with no revision.

 

III.      Discussion of future meeting times led to a consensus of meeting the 3rd Friday of each month from 9-11 am.  Tentative time for the Fall SOS Faculty Assembly was set for Tuesday, Nov 28 from the hours of either 11-1 or 12-2 pending availability of the UL auditorium. Randall will check on room availability and report back to the Steering Committee.

 

IV.    A Review of accomplishments from last year was presented by Phil Fasteneau (for Andy Barth).

 

Course buyouts policy and ICR: Bosron suggest this may be important to discuss in context of the anticipated Strategic Planning efforts.

 

Non-Tenure Track Faculty (NTTF’s) involvement in Faculty governance:  It was noted that by the end of 2007, there will be 10 NTTF’s (non-voting, at large) representatives on the Faculty Council and that we should encourage NTTF’s in the SOS to represent Science in this capacity.  The involvement of NTTF’s in administrative reviews was discussed with the main issue being the usefulness of aggregate responses.  Andy Barth worked with the NTTF’s on this year and expressed the opinion (read by Fasteneau) that NTTF’s clearly want to contribute to administrative reviews but, because of the small numbers of NTTF’s in most departments, there is a concern by the NTTF’s of loss of anonymity if results are reported as department specific.  Therefore last year the responses were aggregated.  This seems to be of limited utility as feedback to the chairs, however; Williams suggested it was important to keep NTTF’s involved and that we continue using the aggregate format and see if NTTF’s become more comfortable over time.

 

This discussion lead to general one about the administrative reviews;  The use of “SURVEY MONKEY” , a WEB based survey, led to a recent high response rate of  approximately 60% (compared to 30-40% by paper surveys).  Williams commented that the Survey process belongs to the SOS Steering Committee and that they release the data.  Individual reports for each departmental head are forwarded to the respective department faculty. Watson asked whether verbatim written comments were returned to the chairs and the Deans.  Williams responded that although the presentation of the results to the whole faculty was distilled, the administrators did receive verbatim comments.  Misiurewicz suggested we make it clear at the beginning of the survey that there is only one opportunity to enter written comments. Williams was credited with her considerable effort last year in getting the WEB based survey up and running. Barth (via Fasteneau), suggested working through Jane or another qualified person to administer the logistics of the survey.  Sen agreed to work with Williams in this process. Crowell noted that it was important for the Deans to provide summaries of their work.  After some discussion a consensus was reached that a similar invitation to summarize the previous years work should be extended to the chairs and that a timetable for the survey should be provided to the Deans and chairs (All Chairs and Associate Deans will be reviewed this year).   It was also suggested that for the Deans purposes (raises etc) that these reviews be completed by late Februrary/early March.

 

Watson asked about status of the Steering Committees recommendations for promotion and tenure guidelines.  It was answered that the completed document was forwarded to the previous Dean last May.   Bosron suggested he would take the document to the Unit committee for their opinion, and will bring it back to the Steering Committee next meeting.

 

V.      Chin discussed the primary roles of the SOS Steering Committee (Administrative reviews, Budget advisement, and communication between Deans and faculty) and presented an excellent summary of the bylaws in this regard (See Appendix 1).

 

 

VI.    Deans Announcements:

 

A list of faculty assignments to School committees was presented (Will be uploaded on the SOS faculty Web site).

 

Bosron lead an extensive discussion of financial and budget affairs (To be continued next meeting).  Bosron mentioned that RCM seem s to be going strong as a financial system with a reaffirmation in recent reviews.  He related some perspectives revealed by Bob Martin (Vice Chancellor, Administration and Finance, IUPUI).  The president will continue to divert funds from appropriations for special projects, 2) there will be more transparency, 3) credit hours fees will continue to be preserved at school level. 4) Schools can continue to maintain carry over but if in deficit must develop a plan to pay back (as our school has done) and the school must have assets to guarantee coverage of deficits (i.e. 22- and foundation accounts) 5) Overhead will continue to be charged to units primarily based upon faculty lines (regardless whether vacant or filled), credit hours taught, and space.

Bosron suggested that Martin would be receptive to the possibility of increasing lab fees and graduate tuition (particularly, program specific, such as for certificates and for preprofessional programs), and a suggestion was made that Bob Martin be invited to the SOS steering Committee for discussion.

 

Dean Bosron presented a budgetary model for discussion that is designed to have the school operating in the black at the end of four years.  This requires the school to get cash from unfilled faculty lines (approximately 16 over the next four years).  Open lines have been held for replacements for the Chair positions in Computer Sci and Chemistry.

 

Further discussion of the budget will be continued next meeting.

 

The meeting was adjourned at 12:15

Approved 10-20-06
Appendix I . Steering Committee Meeting

September 8, 2006

 

 

The Steering Committee

 

·        Membership

 

  • Voting - President of Faculty Assembly, Dean or Dean’s designate, and one representative from each Department
  • Each Departmental Representative serves a one year term but none may serve a three consecutive complete term

v     Departmental representatives represent their departments

v     Responsible for effective communication between the faculty of their departments and this committee

  • Non-Voting Ex-Officio - Secretary of the Faculty, Past-President of the Faculty (missing from By-Laws), Assistant, and Associate Deans

 

·        Duties and Responsibilities

  • Serve primary legislative body of School of Science
  • Serve as representative of the Faculty with higher administration or the Trustees
  • Receive, review, initiate or make recommendations concerning proposal relating to the general welfare of the faculty
  • Receive, review, initiate or make recommendations concerning proposal relating to administrative practices and policies
  • Review the long-range plans of the School and advise the Dean on them
  • Call special Faculty Assembly as necessary
  • Propose agenda for each Faculty Assembly
  • Conduct mail ballots as necessary
  • Receive, review, initiate or make recommendations concerning budgetary matters and School’s financial health in accordance with current university policies
  • Collaborate with Dean in appointment of an ad hoc committee to revise the School’s Guidelines for Promotion, Tenure and Reappointment as necessary.

 

 

Administrative Reviews

·        Administrative Reviews will be performed by a Subcommittee for Administrative Review (SAR)

 

·        Subcommittee for Administrative Review (SAR) consists of Departmental Steering Committee Representatives as well as  the President and the Secretary of the Faculty

 

 

 

 

 

·        Duties of SAR

  • Finding most appropriate means for analyzing data
  • Communicating results in constructive and collaborative  manner
  • Providing a summary of the evaluation of the Dean’s administration to the Dean and to the Faculty
  • Providing a summary of the evaluation of each Chair’s Administration to the Departmental Chair, to the faculty of respective Department and to the Dean
  • Meeting each fall semester to formulate and modify the review instrument

v     Attempts to minimize changes in order to allow comparisons of faculty response over time

v     May consult each administration for items added or deleted

  • Archiving one copy of final report for each administrator  in Dean’s office

v     Archived report of Dean and of assistant and associate Deans will be available for all faculty

v     Archived report of Chairs will be available to faculty in their respective departments and to members of the Steering Committee

 

·        Dean's Review

o       Be approved by the SAR,

o       Be based on input from voting faculty,

o       Evaluate the Dean’s administration in relation to its responsible tasks,

o       Produce results (report) by July 1 at the end of the prescribed academic year.

o       Schedule of review

v     First review at the third full academic year

v     Campus-level review every five years

v     Reviewed once every three years, either by the University or internal to SoS but not twice in successive years.

 

·        Assistant, Associate Deans and Departmental Chairs

o       Be approved by the SAR,

o       Be based on input from voting faculty,

o       Evaluate the Dean’s administration in relation to its responsible tasks,

o       Produce results (report) by July 1 at the end of the prescribed academic year.

o       Schedule of review

v     First review - no sooner than 2 years after assumption of position under review - The present set of Assistant and Associate Deans will be reviewed this year.

v     Review also in the same years as the Dean (internal as well as campus)

v     Exception - in a period longer than three years without review, SAR may schedule an interim review.

 

·        Full internal reviews

  • Consist of a qualitative and a quantitative component

 

 

 

·        Brief Reviews

  • Consist essentially of the quantitative components of the Full review
  • Apply annually for the Dean and for each Assistant Dean, Associate Dean, and Departmental Chair
  • No sooner than one (error should be two) year after assumption of the position under review.