Executive Committee Minutes

The Executive Committee meeting was called to order at 12:19 p.m. by FA Vice-President, Jeffrey Harrison.

Members Present:	Patrick Plumlee, Jeffrey Harrison, Melissa Bush, Candice Carter, Diane Tanner, Peter Magyari, Lauren Newton, Elinor Scheirer, Adel Boules, Pingying Zhang, Caroline Guardino, Alan Harris

Members Absent:	Kathy Robinson, Lian An, Chris Brown

Ex-Officio Staff:	Cindy Chin


I.	Approval of Minutes
	A motion to approve the September 20, 2011 minutes (as posted on the web) was made by Diane Tanner. The minutes were approved

II.	New Business

	STANDING COMMITTEE REPORTS:

	Adjunct Affairs- Peter Magyari
	The Committee has one agenda item which is a resolution in response to the salary issues raised in the UNF Adjunct Faculty Surveys conducted in 2003 and 2009. The Committee proposes that adjunct compensation be increased by 10.71% (from $667-$917 per credit hour to a minimum of $738 $1015 per credit hour). It is important to note that UNF adjunct salaries are currently the lowest in the Florida SUS and with the proposed increase will still be lower than all but two schools. Peter Magyari made a motion to place this item on the agenda for a faculty vote. The motion passed.

	Executive Committee- Jeffrey Harrison
	The proposed amendment to the UNF Constitution to establish a term limit and a retention vote for the Provost which was originally presented at the April 7, 2011 FA meeting was returned back to the Executive Committee for further consideration and possible resubmission. There was a lengthy discussion among EC members on whether to move this item further. Some committee members felt it was important for faculty to have a voice on who should represent them, while others felt it would be very difficult for this item to pass. Plus, there have already been efforts made by the President and Academic Affairs to rectify the problems that originally led up to this proposed amendment. No motion was made to place this item on the agenda.

	Academic Programs Committee – Candice Carter
	The Committee has eight agenda items. Candice reviewed each item. The first item is the second reading of the Faculty Association Bylaws Amendment to change the make-up of the APC committee to fifteen members in order to have two faculty representatives from each of the colleges (including CCEC which currently has only one member). There are six agenda items from COAS (Undergraduate & Graduate) which include a new degree program request, the addition of a new minor, the termination of two degree majors, course additions, existing course changes, a change to a degree major, and the termination of a degree major concentration. Elinor asked why new degree programs were still being created when there has been a declared moratorium by the Provost’s office of any new degree programs. Candice indicated that these items had already been in place and had not been told otherwise. Based on how the APC workflow system is currently designed the approval and endorsement steps for new programs by Academic Affairs come after it reaches the APC committee when in the past it was done prior to its submission to APC. Candice will address these issues at the next meeting. The last agenda item is from COEHS (Graduate) which is a change to a degree major to remove a six credit pre-requisite of courses in sociology and/or psychology. This already has approval from Dean Hetrick. Elinor noted a spelling change in one of the memos of the agenda packet. Candice indicated that due to the large number of items moving through the APC system there will not be any time for any language editing or spelling corrections before it goes to the catalog. Faculty should be sure to check their APC items at the college level. There was a discussion on which items to include on the consent agenda. Items that will be excluded from the consent agenda include FA 11-50, FA 11-51, and FA 11-55.

	Academic Standards Committee – Diane Tanner
	The Committee met on October 13^th where they discussed the policy for student active/inactive statuses and an issue with IT not implementing it properly. The Committee has one agenda item today pertaining to a number of changes made to the First Baccalaureate Degree Requirements Policy. Diane reviewed these policy changes and recommended to exclude this item from the consent agenda. The next meeting will be November 18th from 12:00-1:30pm. The Committee currently doesn’t have any agenda items, so please forward any academic standards issues to this committee.

	Budget Advisory Committee – Kathy Robinson
	No report. Kathy is out on medical leave right now.

	Campus Technology Committee – Lauren Newton
	The Committee has an information item announcing that IT services will be unavailable between December 26-31 when the University installs new wiring, power supplies, and generators.

	Faculty Affairs Committee – Elinor Scheirer
	The Committee met on October 13^th where they discussed at length a proposal for a new Community Engaged Scholarship Award. The Committee is in support of this award and will need to develop procedures for how it will be advertised as well as the eligibility criteria. Per his request, Newton Jackson will be attending the committee’s next meeting.

	Faculty Enhancement Committee –Adel Boules
	The Committee met approximately one month ago where they have been discussing the logistics and the criteria implemented for the Summer Research Grants. They have addressed an apparent discrepancy between the evaluation criteria distributed by Academic Affairs and the instructions given to the reviewers. Their next meeting will be October 20th to finalize the procedures to be used for this round of applications. They are currently recruiting application reviewers which they currently have 16 but hope to have 21.

	Nominations & Elections Committee –Diane Tanner for Lian An
	The Committee has one information item and one agenda item. The agenda item pertains to a proposed change to the bylaws to account for electronic elections. The information item is an announcement of upcoming vacancies for the 2012-2014 Nominations and Elections Committee: one from COEHS, one from Library, and one from At-large. Cindy Chin pointed out several errors and omissions that appear in the proposed bylaws change. Elinor mentioned an issue with faculty being nominated without consent. As a result, this item will be removed from the agenda and forwarded back to the committee.

	Research Committee – Caroline Guardino
	The Committee originally planned to meet September 23^rd to discuss a request for two funding cycles of research grants but cancelled the meeting due to the Provost’s response. A record of the emails exchanged between Caroline, Provost Workman, and Marianne Jaffee is included as an information item. The next meeting is planned for Friday, November 4^th at 3:30 p.m. in the Boathouse to divide up the research proposals and discuss the plan going forward.

	Strategic Planning Advisory Committee – Pingying Zhang
	The Committee met on Wednesday, October 5^th with the President and the Provost. They discussed the previous activities from 2010-2011 and upcoming activities for 2011-2012. The next meeting will be Wednesday, November 2 at noon in 50/2800.

	Support Services Committee – Alan Harris
	The Committee met October 11^th where Dan Richard shared the services of Faculty Enhancement. Alan will attach the flyer from Faculty Enhancement to the meeting minutes. The next meeting date has not been set yet as the committee wants to invite Frederick Beck from Student Health Services to attend.

III.	Association President---Patrick Plumlee
	Patrick asked Lauren to over emphasize that there will be zero IT capacity during the week of December 26-31. There will be repair work performed on the HVAC in Bldg 10 from December 9-January 3. Funds have been secured to complete at least one of the floors designated for the Faculty Association in the new dining facility. At some point, there may be a planning committee to discuss the design of this space. Patrick noted that he had distributed to faculty a copy of a letter sent from Rick Scott to the UNF Board of Trustees, as well as the response from BOG. Patrick also shared that UNF is currently being sued over its policy of prohibiting firearms in private vehicles on university property. This is alleged to be a violation of statutes passed in the last legislative session. Essentially, this is a test case that should clarify some ambiguity in the current law.

IV.	Other Announcements:
	-	Faculty Commons closed for HVAC renovation
	-	2012-2013 Important Dates for Faculty
	-	Faculty Athletic Report by Jay Coleman for FA meeting
	-	Campus Safety Advisory Council Report
	-	Breakthrough Solutions for Higher Education
	-	Letter to BOT from Governor Rick Scott
	-	Update by Chartwells on Cantaloupe Recall
	-	SkillSoft e-Learning

V.	Adjournment & Next Meeting
	Meeting adjourned at 1:29 p.m.

	Association Meeting:
	Thursday, November 3, 2011 at 12:15 p.m. @Schultz Hall 9/1421

	Next Executive Committee Meeting:
	Next meeting is Tuesday, November 15, 2011 at 12:15 p.m. @Faculty Commons – 10/1102



Respectfully Submitted:

Melissa Bush, FA Secretary