Faculty Assembly
The College of William and Mary
Minutes of the Faculty Assembly Meeting
April 22, 2003
Faculty Assembly President Robert Archibald opened the April meeting of the Faculty Assembly of the 2002-2003 academic year at 3:37 p.m.
Members present: Robert Archibald, Jonathan Aries, Carl Hobbs (representing
Bob Diaz), Alan Fuchs, Nancy Gray, Keith Griffioen, Bill Hawthorne, Lu Ann Homza,
Martha Houle, John Lee, Scott Nelson, Roger Ries, Ron Rosenberg, Larry Ventis,
Wanda Wallace, and Ron Wheeler.
Members absent: Elizabeth Canuel, Bob Diaz, Margaret Saha, and Laurie Sanderson.
The minutes of the March 25, 2003, meeting were approved.
I. Report of Administrative Officers
No report.
II. Standing Committees
Academic Affairs Committee: Lu Ann Homza, Chair
Prof. Homza reported on the findings of the computer liaison group on the actions of the Instructional Technology Advisory Committee regarding the Information Security Policy. She stated that Courtney Carpenter, Associate Provost for IT, has authorized Gene Roche to state that Information Technology will abide by the guidelines of the 1973 policy statement regarding privacy, and that, absent a court order, there will be no monitoring of e-mail or faculty files. A second issue discussed was the status of the faculty/course evaluation system. During next academic year, the system will go to a single, college-wide form to save costs. However, the new system will include a template that allows each department or school to develop up to 12 questions tailored to its specific needs. To save handling costs, only departments that want narrative evaluations on the backside of the paper forms will get them back. According to Vice President Kreps, the College plans ultimately to institute a software program that will allow students to evaluate faculty and courses completely online, thus avoiding the use of paper all together. A number of Faculty Assembly members thought the proposed changes might undermine the integrity of the College's faculty/course evaluation system. Trial runs in the English Department indicate that students don't like the inconvenience of going online to evaluate faculty and courses. This may explain why fewer students bother to participate online, compared to in-class evaluation, and why there might be a tendency for those who do participate to hold extreme opinions. The proposed elimination of paper evaluation documents also raises concerns about security. It was pointed out that since decisions on tenure and promotion hang in the balance, the integrity and confidentiality of faculty evaluation data must be diligently safeguarded.
Faculty Affairs Committee: Scott Nelson, Chair
Prof. Clemens, chair of the Faculty Research Committee, asked the Faculty Assembly to accept three changes in its procedures (which was distributed at the meeting, see attachment). The first, a statement entitled "Procedure on Procedure," which would require the Faculty Research Committee to bring proposed revisions of its policies and procedures to the Faculty Assembly for endorsement, was approved by the Faculty Assembly unanimously. The Faculty Assembly also supported a second procedural change, proposed by the Faculty Research Committee, that would allow "years of service beyond six to be considered" as a criterion in the selection process for Faculty Research Assignments. (The two major criteria would remain "merit of proposal" and "research record.") The Faculty Assembly recommended two changes in the proposal on FRA selection. One was to insert "clarity and" between "the" and "merit" in the first italicized sentence, and the other to delete the last italicized sentence completely. The third change dealt with the terms of the Summer Research Grant. Although the Faculty Assembly supported the proposed procedure that explicated the terms under which a faculty member was expected to perform his/her summer research grant obligations, it was felt that the issue needed more study and clarification before any final action could be taken. Henceforth, the Faculty Assembly's Faculty Affairs Committee must approve changes in procedures of the Faculty Research Committee.
Committee on Planning and Resources: Keith Griffioen, Chair
Prof. Griffioen distributed the sub-committee on parking on campus's "Proposed Resolution of the Faculty Assembly of the College of William and Mary"(see attachment). He also presented graphs that tracked parking decal sales, which showed no drastic increase in demand. There was strong support for the resolution, which questioned the wisdom of building an expensive parking deck on campus. It was argued that in addition to its high cost and questionable value, the deck would be bad for the environment. To maintain the residential nature of the College, priority should be given to off-campus, satellite parking for students who live on campus. Also cited in the resolution was a parking study done in 1999 that was seriously flawed. One change to the resolution was made: in item 2.f, "resident" was inserted between "increased" and "student." The resolution, which enumerated parking concerns and options, was passed unanimously.
Executive Committee: Robert Archibald, Chair
Prof. Archibald reported the Executive Committee:
" dealt with one more request for a single-year, specified year extension
in the government department.
" approved the composition of the Committee for Arts and Sciences Dean
Search
" believes it would be valuable for the Faculty Assembly to study faculty
attrition to determine reasons for leaving
Liaison Committee: Ron Rosenberg, Chair
No report.
III. Old Business
None was noted.
IV. New Business
" A resolution on Burma was distributed to Faculty Assembly members. It was decided that the Executive Committee was the proper entity to study the resolution next year.
" The Arts and Sciences' Faculty Affairs Committee requested the following: that the composition of the Admissions Policy Committee be reduced from 5 Arts and Science members to 3, and from 4 members from Professional Schools to 3; and that the Admission Policy Committee report directly to the provost. Prof. Archibald stated that the admissions policy ought to be a Faculty Assembly issue and that the committee should report to the Faculty Assembly.
The meeting was adjourned at 6:05 p.m.
Respectfully submitted,
Ron Wheeler, Secretary
