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Academic Council
Meeting Notes
November 28, 2000
Present: Curtis Johnson,
Dean of the College; Dinah Dodds; Dean of Arts and
Humanities; Gary Reiness, Dean of Mathematical and Natural
Sciences; Harold Schleef, Dean of Social Sciences; Terri
Banasek, Administrative Assistant and recorder; and Rosie
Felton, Administrative Assistant for Budgets and
Contracts.
Announcements
- Dean Dodds asked how to get information to the CPT
regarding selection of outside reviewers. The Academic
Council will review a one-page description of procedures,
drafted last year, which were followed in the past. The
main intent is to ensure that all deans are following the
same process.
- Diane Nelson has declined the invitation to serve as
faculty secretary, and Dean Johnson will ask Deborah
Lycan to serve. Andrew Cortell has agreed to serve on the
fringe benefits committee.
- Dean Johnson distributed a draft parental leave
policy prepared by Greg Walters. The divisional deans
will review and send their feedback to Dean Johnson via
email.
Agenda Items
- Inventing America: Dean Reiness noted that two
members of the chemistry department will teach Inventing
America sections next year: Evan Williams in the fall and
Barbara Balko in the spring. Dean Dodds did not have an
exact number yet. Arts and Humanities contributed 20
sections last year. Not including lecturers, she
currently has 21 sections covered (including new faculty
positions in Spanish, French, and philosophy). In
addition, Chana Cox will teach four sections, Susan
Kirschner will teach four, and there is a possibility
that Rebecca Becker will teach three. The deans will
email the final department breakdowns to Dean
Johnson.
- Academic Council meeting time for spring semester:
Mondays, 9 a.m. to noon.
- Accreditation Update: The College has requested one
of two dates for a visit from the NWASC: mid-May or
middle to late March. Dean Schleef said the institutional
concerns that were raised by the accreditation team need
to be addressed. Mervyn Brockett is working on a report
describing what the College has put in place, but the
whole response needs to be coordinated. The Accreditation
Task Force is developing an outline for the report to the
NWASC. Sections include:
- General education - Inventing America
- Information on where the Writing and Speaking Task
Force is heading
- Information literacy
- Description of the activities of the Task Force,
including a description of the four-step process and
its implementation.
- Two appendices: Reports from departments that were
prepared last year
- To tie it together, they will talk about
assessment that will be done routinely at the
institutional level, including reports generated by
the registrar - number of majors and minors graduating
in each department; credit-hour production report; GPA
by division and department - and how those reports
would be distributed to chairs and deans and how they
will be used.
At this point, the Task Force is collecting the last
of the departmental responses to items 1 and 4. (Item
1: linking goals of the department to the College's
goals; Item 4: identifying measurable outcomes and
performance standards) The internal deadline is
mid-January.
It was suggested that it would be useful to have a
report on alumni who go on to graduate school. There
is no body that currently oversees this information.
The best approach would be for the alumni office to
contact department chairs in the spring to request the
information. Dean Schleef reported that the Social
Sciences faculty recently met to discuss web page
usage. It was suggested that the College provide
lifetime email accounts to alumni, along with the
possibility of a lifetime web page. (The College
already provides lifetime email accounts.)
There could be links from department web pages to
outstanding senior theses and other student work. The
College also could allow students to post their
résumés on their personal web pages. The
chairs need to convey this message to seniors,
starting in senior theses classes.
- Academic Council meeting schedule in December: The
Council will meet at its regularly scheduled time on
December 5, with a possible meeting on December 14, 8-11
a.m.
- Status of searches: Political Science has brought in
three candidates and is likely to recommend one of them.
The top candidate is a senior person from Lafayette
College in Pennsylvania and is an extremely appealing
person from the standpoint of the needs of the
department. She likely will not come here without being
awarded tenure, and the CPT will need to review her
credentials and award tenure. The CPT will need teaching
evaluations for the last three years as well as some of
her publications.
East Asian Art History: Two top candidates are coming to
campus in the next two weeks, and the committee wants to
make an offer this semester.
Islamic Studies: There are two decent candidates out of
three applications. Dean Dodds will bring the files to
Dean Johnson.
Biology: The two committees are doing phone screening
before putting together a list. The pool for
developmental biology is not as deep as for some past
searches, but several excellent candidates are being
contacted for phone interviews. The systematic biology
committee has sent 10 files to the department for review.
They plan to issue interview invitations to three
candidates in each search to visit campus early next
semester.
Environmental Studies Review: The review
committee will consist of the head of the environmental
studies program at Middlebury (chair), the former chair
of the environmental studies program at Allegheny and an
observer from Colorado College. The committee will visit
next semester. Dean Reiness will meet with the internal
review committee to assess their progress.
- Faculty/Staff Housing Program: Dean Reiness is
unclear of the purpose of this program and of who decides
who gets the houses. The houses might make an appealing
offer to new faculty we are trying to attract who might
have a difficult time getting into the Portland housing
market. Dean Johnson suggested that divisional deans
selectively market these houses to younger faculty. He
added the reason the president wants to continue this
program is to create an academic village. The Master Plan
calls for an integrated academic/residential college..
The high price of these properties limits how much we can
do in terms of junior faculty. Dean Johnson will find out
if some of these properties are available for rent or
lease.
- Status of partially retired faculty: Roger Nelsen has
inquired whether partially retired faculty continue to
receive certain benefits, e.g., an office on campus,
travel funds, the same sabbatical schedule. The
sabbatical question is a policy issue, and the current
policy does not spell out what regular status is. The
Academic Council will investigate.
Next meeting: Tuesday, December 5, 8 a.m., Dean's
Office.
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