Minutes for the Meeting of April 1, 2005

Attending:  Peter Hlebowitsh (Chair), Micheline Chalhoub-Deville, Ellen Herman, John Northup, and Chris Ogren

Minutes of the last (March) meeting were read and approved; members who missed the March meeting also read and approved the minutes of the February meeting.

Further follow-up on Rahima Wade’s report on program coordinators:  Peter referred to Gary Sasso’s comments at our last meeting, especially his observation that programs have a great deal of autonomy in decisions about program coordinators.  This suggests that perhaps there is no role for the FAC in reform of the program-coordinator position.  Nevertheless, we discussed how we could still look at process and procedure at the college level in this area. The recommendations from Rahima’s report were:

1. Each program (or division) should develop written policies about how program coordinators are chosen, how the position is rotated (or why it isn't), and what the associated responsibilities are.

2. Program coordinators should receive staff support to assist with their tasks.  For example, a division secretary could be assigned to handle all program inquiries and mailings to prospective students.

3. Program coordinators should receive flexible resources to assist them in fulfilling their responsibilities as teachers and scholars.  Possible resource support could be: a research assistant, a teaching assistant, a course release, or the option to teach a required course during the summer for additional pay instead of during the school year.

We could possibly use the FAC seat on the Administrative Council to bring this matter to the attention of DEOs. Peter will write a report to the Dean in relation to points 1-3, then possibly share it with the Administrative Council as well.  Our suggestion would be that each department do recommendation 1 and continue 2 and 3.  We think that, at the very least, FAC involvement would help to increase consciousness of the issues.

Curriculum Committee:  Peter raised the question of whether the past policy of the Curriculum Committee tells us anything about a standing Curriculum Committee today?  The first step toward reactivating the Curriculum Committee would be a mission statement.  The official mission statement for the Committee was:

The purpose of this committee shall be to facilitate communication among divisions and programs about curricular issues in the College and to advise the dean and dean's staff on matters related to curriculum, especially about issues that concern multiple programs or have a more college-wide impact. 

We agreed that that the notion of “curricular issues” was broad in a good sense, and thought it would be useful to add examples of issues covered by the Committee in the past.  Peter will look up examples in old minutes and take a new mission statement to the Dean. We agreed that we would like to see the Curriculum Committee reinstated.  

Faculty departures and exit interviews:  Peter reminded us that L. Clark has the data but it is not for public consumption.  We discussed what seems to us to be large numbers of faculty who have left the College in the last five or so years (22 from C & I alone).  This raises questions about why people are leaving and whether there is a plan for filling the spots left vacant.  We would like to discuss a possible exit interview protocol with the Dean, and will invite her to our next meeting.  

Other business:  Reallocation:  We would like an update on developments in this area.

FAC Website:  Moon contacted Chris about updating the site.  Chris had Moon update the membership list, but Moon is also willing to change other aspects of the site.  We will look at it and think about how to make improvements.  One idea is to add a mechanism for faculty suggestions of issues for FAC consideration.