Date: February 22, 2005
From: Debra Berlanstein, Secretary
Subject: February 21, 2005 - Continuation of the February 7 Meeting of the University Senate
Professor Sullivan called the meeting to order at 4:05 p.m. Secretary Berlanstein called the roll.
Agenda item 04/05-16, to accept the proposed changes to Chapter 3, Part IV of the Faculty Handbook from the University Promotion and Tenure Committee (UPT) was to be discussed.
Prof. Sullivan acknowledged the long and difficult work done by the committee and thanked them for their service. He suggested that we begin with a discussion of the generalities of the document.
Prof. Dianne Taylor, Chair of the UPT thanked her committee members and gave an overview of how the Committee received its charge. They began last May by looking at Chapter 3 and realized there were many unclear sections, particularly regarding appeals. After examining departmental and college documents, they realized that there were varied interpretations of the process. Their goal was to streamline the process and clarify some gray areas. The Dean's worked on a separate document.
Prof. Vatz recognized the committee's extensive work but stated that he believes the changes overcomplicate the P&T process and may lead to a campus obsessed with P&T issues. He also expressed concern about the amount of work this will entail for larger departments. He does not believe the merit monies warrant going to a 4-level system of recommendation, and that the hierarchical nature of how things are done now is working fine. He asked what problems, exactly, was the new document attempting to correct?
Prof. Zimmerman stated that he has heard from AAUP members concerned with the separate evaluation process for departments and administrators.
Prof. Sullivan asked Prof. Siegel whether there was any pressure coming from the system to define the chair's role in a specific manner. Prof. Siegel responded that she was not aware of anything of that nature.
Prof. Lu handed out a resolution from the Council of Chairs meeting on February 7, 2005 that stated:
The Towson University Council of Chairpersons asks that the University Senate postpone a vote on the motion to revise the University Promotion, Tenure, and Merit policies.
The Council of Chairpersons also recommends that the proposed changes be made available to all faculty and chairpersons in electronic form and that the University Senate solicit comments regarding the changes from chairpersons and faculty at large.
He continued that it is important that the Chairs be part of the departmental process and comments on the work done by the department. He is not comfortable with the chairs generating a completely separate evaluation letter through a separate channel.
Prof. Pitcher added that the chairs in the College of Education share that opinion and feel it is better to be part of the departmental committee, and have the opportunity to add valuable information to the process. She expressed concern about the role of program directors included in the new document.
Prof. Cox (a member of the committee) responded that only those program directors with a supervisory role over the faculty are included in the definition.
Prof. Siegel agreed concerning the role of the chair and felt it was important to have the chair's letter in the folder at the time of the discussions. She asked about the structure within the departments and felt concern about the idea of one large committee that would be unwieldy. She thought we should preserve the separate committee for rank, promotion, and tenure.
Prof. Zimmerman again wanted to clarify that there were not going to be two separate tracks.
Prof. Vatz again asked whether we are trying to solve a problem that doesn't exist. For each recommendation in the document - what is exactly being resolved?
Prof. Lu stated that it is harmful to keep P&T as a year-round topic. If the chair has a separate role it may be more likely that this happens and negatively affect all departmental business.
Prof. Siegel thought we could isolate 5 or 6 issues that need discussion. They include: makeup of the departmental committee, role of the chair, role of the dean, how prescriptive are we regarding scholarship, and merit.
Prof. Roberge suggested that we form 3 subcommittees to deal with the document: one to look at typos and grammar, one to address organizational issues and one to isolate the problem issues.
Provost Brennan addressed why the process was put in motion. He explained that he encouraged merging the Dean's work on P&T with the work of the UPT to codify the process and improve consistency and transparency. Currently there is no consistent way for Chairs and Deans to interact with the faculty bodies. Each looks at the candidate through a different lens and as much information as possible is needed for the Provost to make decisions. He hopes to codify those inputs to the process, and to make the process as fair and transparent as possible. This will also allow the candidate to comment of each of those inputs as well and the process remains as open as possible.
Prof. Sullivan asked about the timetable for this revision.
Provost Brennan indicated that if it were printed in Fall 2005 it would go into effect for the 2006-2007 academic year.
Prof. Fisher asked about the scholarship addition to Appendix J and suggested that terminology needed to be clarified through the document.
Prof. Roberge again stressed that the biggest issue among faculty in his College was the idea of parallel track for administration and faculty that impacts the prerogative of the faculty to go through the peer-review process.
Prof. Siegel made a motion that the Senate go to a committee of the whole to discuss the details of the document.
After discussion the question was called and the motion passed 14-8-0.
More discussion continued regarding the role of the chair in the process and whether the chair is indeed part of the administration or the faculty, or both.
Prof. Zimmerman asked to clarify what the status of the chair's role is under the current document.
Prof. Taylor responded that currently the Chair "may" write a letter and the chair serves as a voting member of the department committee.
Prof. Pitcher stressed the change in the chair's role to evaluator rather than as a participant.
Prof. Siegel raised the concern over the need for chairs to write annual reviews for everyone in their department.
Prof. Sullivan stated that there was a consensus in the discussion that these letter be written at the integral career events for a faculty member including reappoint, tenure, promotion, and post-tenure review.
A straw poll indicated that a majority of members agreed that the Chair needed to remain part of the departmental deliberations.
Discussion will continue at the next Senate meeting.
Prof. Zimmerman moved and Senator Shechtel seconded a motion to adjourn.
The motion was unanimously approved. The Senate adjourned at 6:05 p.m.
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