Minutes of the Auburn University Senate Meeting
Tuesday, October 7, 2014
238 Broun Hall Auditorium
3:30 P.M.

Attendance
Officers:
Patricia Duffy, Chair; Larry Crowley , Immediate-Past Chair; Larry Teeter, Chair-Elect; Gisela Buschle-Diller; Secretary; Laura Plexico,  Secretary-Elect.

Administration:
Betty Lou Whitford, Dean, College of Education; Gregg Newschwander, Dean, School of Nursing;  Lee Evans, Dean, School of Pharmacy; Nicholas Giordano, Dean COSAM, Chris Roberts, Dean, College of Engineering, Calvin Johnson, Dean, College of Vet Med; George Flowers, Dean, Graduate School.

Ex-Officio
Present:
Tim Boosinger, Provost; Leonard Towns, Graduate Student Council President ; Michael Freeman, Staff Council Chair; Ashley Hamberlin, A&P Assembly Chair; Sara Wolf, Emily Myers, Keven Yost, Steering Committee.

Absent, sending substitute:
Joe Hanna for Bill Hardgrave, Dean, College of Business;  Charles Israel for Joseph A. Aistrup, Dean, College of Liberal Arts; Nancy Noe for Bonnie MacEwan, Dean, Libraries.

Absent, not sending substitute:
Logan Powell, President, Student Government Association; Michael Baginski, 2nd, Steering Committee

Senators, by Department:
Present: Robert Cochran, Accountancy; Andrew Sinclair, Aerospace Engineering; Valentina Hartaska, Agricultural Economics and Rural Sociology; Dale Coleman, Animal Sciences; Dean Schwartz, Anatomy, Physiology and Pharmacology; Barb Bondy, Art; Bob Locy, Biological Sciences; Mark Dougherty, Biosystems Engineering; Eduardus Duin, Chemistry; Cliff Lange, Civil Engineering; Ed Youngblood, Communication and Journalism; Allison Plumb, Communication Disorders; David Umphress, Computer Science and Software Engineering; Wi-Suk Kwon, Consumer Sciences; Jada Kohlmeier, Curriculum and Teaching; Michael Stern, Economics; Thomas Baginski, Electrical and Computer Engineering; Hilary Wyss, English; Jung Park, Finance; Rusty Wright, Fisheries and Allied Aquaculture; Traci O’Brien, Foreign Languages and Literature; David King, Geology and Geography; Brent Fox, Health Outcomes Research and Policy; Tiffany Sippial, History; Amy Wright, Horticulture; Jerrod Bradley Windham, Industrial Design;  Sean Gallagher, Industrial Systems Engineering; John Quindry, Kinesiology; Gregg Schmidt, Library; Peter Stanwick, Management; Dmitry Glotov, Mathematics and Statistics; Daniel Mackowski, Mechanical Engineering; Matthew Hoch, Music; Constance Hendricks, Nursing; Kevin Huggins, Nutrition and Foods; Vicky van Santen, Pathobiology; Muralikrishnan Dhanasekaran, Pharmacal Sciences; Wesley Lindsey, Pharmacy Practice; Michael Fogle, Physics; Murray Jardine, Political Science; Gwynedd Thomas, Polymer & Fiber Engineering; Tung-shi Huang, Poultry Science; Jill Meyer, Special Education, Rehab and Counseling; Kristina Shuler, Sociology, Anthropology and Social Work; Adrienne Wilson, Theater; Annette Smith, Veterinary Clinical Sciences.

Absent, sending substitute:
Julie Howe for Beth Guertal, Agronomy and Soils; Rusty Smith for Rebecca O’Neal-Dagg, Architecture;  W.R. Ashurst for Allan David, Chemical Engineering; James Witte for  Lisa Kensler, Educational Foundations and Leadership; Derrick Mathias for Leonardo  De La Fuente, Entomology and Plant Pathobiology;  Anuta Hamawaki for Eric Marcus, Philosophy; CPT Hartshorn for Scott Copeland, ROTC Army; Kat Stofer for Paul Michael Esposito, ROTC Navy.

Absent, not sending substitute:
Paul Brown, ACES; Cliff Defee, Aviation Management and Logistics; Mark Taylor, Building Sciences; Latif Kalin, Forestry and Wildlife Science; Tom Smith, Human Development and Family Studies; James Carver, Marketing;  Chippewa Thomas, Outreach; Daniel Sventek, Psychology; Jeffrey Hemmes, ROTC Air Force.

Minutes
At 3:30 P.M. Chair Patricia Duffy called the meeting to order, reminded the Senators of the rules of speaking at Senate meetings and to speak into the microphones for better recording. She then established a quorum. There are currently 87 members of the Senate and a quorum requires therefore 45 members to be present. The minutes of the Senate meeting of September 16, 2014 were approved without modifications.

Remarks and Announcements
Office of the President, Jay Gogue, President:
The President reported of a retreat he and the Provost had attended and expressed his gratitude to people that helped making progress towards achieving the goals of the strategic plan which is now in its 1st year. This year’s graduation rates were over 70%, a dramatic increase from 61% the year he started in Auburn. The retention rate for freshmen was over 90%. Research dollars in terms of expenditures are also up as are publications and publication citations of Auburn researchers.

He further mentioned that the University needs to look at supporting really bright, Pell Grant eligible kids that do not have the resources to come to Auburn. A number of smaller but helpful things have been done to help these kids, such as waving the application fee and the deposit once they have been admitted.

Office of the Provost; Tim Boosinger, Provost: no formal remarks
No questions or comments for either the President or the Provost

University Senate Chair, Patricia Duffy:
In her remarks, Patricia Duffy briefly introduced the Senate officers and announced the Pending Action and Information items on the agenda. Pending Action items will be up for voting by the Senate at the  next Senate meeting on November 4, 2014. She further mentioned that the Steering Committee approved the formation of an ad hoc committee to work on issues of copyright, especially with respect to classroom materials. The Rules Committee will staff this committee. Regarding other committees, she stated that the Administrator Evaluation Committee under Yasser Gowayed as the Chair has begun its work on looking into annual and periodic evaluations and practices currently used in evaluating University administrators. The Salaries and Welfare Committee has taking up issues regarding emeritus professor privileges and the potential pay of 9 months salaries over a pay period of 12 months. Michael Kozuh is chairing this committee. Finally, she mentioned that the Teaching Effectiveness Committee has been asked to assess the current course evaluation forms if they are effective in evaluating teaching. Don Mulvaney is the Chair of the TEC
.
Lastly Patricia Duffy reminded everyone of the upcoming General Faculty meeting on Tuesday, October 28, 2014.
Questions: none

Action Item
None

Pending Action Items
1. Academic Standards Committee: two proposals; Presenter: Larry Teeter for Lisa Kensler
Exploratory Freshman Admission and Conditional Admission presentation (ppt)
Although not a member of the Academic Standards Committee, Larry Teeter presented both proposals and requested for the Senators to take the basic ideas of the proposals back to their faculty and to return with questions and comments for the Committee. Melissa Baumann (Honors College) was in the audience to answer some immediate questions.

Questions
Michael Stern (Senator Economics) asked if insufficient standardized test scores are the issue in regard to the Conditional Admittance.

Melissa Bauman confirmed and added it could also be unsufficient scores on high school diplomas. There is an ongoing debate whether ACT/SAT or high school grades are the better indicator for College success. The proposal is looking at all of them.

Michael Stern (Senator Economics) further asked if the statement “this would prevent steering students toward particular majors” suggests that colleges are misadvising students, favoring some majors over others.

Melissa Bauman replied that if a student is “Undeclared Engineering”, the Engineering advisors would help this student find his/her match, but if it is outside of Engineering they might not be as well prepared. This might also apply for COSAM or CLA. They would probably advise a student to remain in the College. A Center for Advising would take away the home advantage.

Ed Youngblood (Comm. & Journalism) asked whether this policy is meant to find a way to serve students better that have already been admitted to Auburn. Melissa Baumann confirmed.

David King (Geology & geography) asked whether the Seamless Admission program will be related to/replaced by this process.

Melissa Baumann replied that these programs are separate and unrelated. Those students are still admitted to AUM and transfer into Auburn. A student from the Seamless Admission program would not qualify for Conditional Admission.

Bob Locy (Biological Sciences) wanted to know if Seamless Admission students not entering in fall would not be calculated into the graduation rate and what the impact of the Conditional Admission policy on graduation rates would have. Melissa Baumann said that she did not know the answer.

Bob Locy (Biol. Sci.) said that a similar category of students is coming from the Community Colleges and asked whether there are considerations to include this group.

Melissa Baumann stated that literature suggests that students have a better chance to graduate if starting from a 4-year school than from a 2-year school. So the goal is to attract these students and help them with better support programs in place.

Ed Duin (Chemistry & Biochemistry) expressed concern that advising should be done within the College and not with advisors from outside. He said that students will only find out if they like what they are doing by doing it. Waiting for a year will delay taking certain classes and students will fall behind by a year. The Committee needs to clarify this. He further said that they had bad experience with outside advisors that let students take, for example, physics before calculus. Students then decided to stay and had to retake physics with calculus and again fell behind by a year.

Melissa Baumann emphasized that a larger number of advisors is needed. It is different if a student basically knows what he/she wants to do or has absolutely no idea. It would lower the load of the College advisors by taking the group of students out that does not at all know what they want to major in. It would be good if students that do not know which major to take to change early on.

Ed Duin (Chem & Biochem) repeated his question why this problem cannot be fixed within the College.
Melissa Baumann answered that advisors in Colleges usually have too many advisees. The idea is to decrease the ratio by increasing the number of advisors. The College advisors would then help the more focused group of students.

Jerrod Windham (Industrial Design) asked what a typical ratio is (150:1?) and if the basic idea of the proposal was to increase the number of advisors. In Colleges that are already practicing Exploratory Admission does the program seem to help?
Melissa Baumann emphasized that the number here is more in the range of 300:1. Engineering, COSAM and CLA have undeclared majors (pre-engineering in the case of Engineering). Those students would not fall under the Exploratory Admission program.  She looked for representatives of these Colleges in the audience. She mentioned that Bob Karcher from Engineering is supportive of the proposal.

Chris Roberts (Dean, College of Engineering) asked about pre-engineering students that are undeclared within the College and how they will select their major. Melissa Baumann reaffirmed that this type of advising will remain the same and stay within the College.

2. University Curriculum Committee: Adding an ex-officio Library representative to the UCC; Presenter: Sara Wolf
It was proposed to add a permanent ex-officio member from the Library to the University Curriculum Committee. The Dean of Libraries would assign this duty to a member of the Library staff.
Questions: none

Information Items
Update on the Academic Sustainability Programs; Presenter: Nanette Chadwick presentation (ppt)
Nanette Chadwick followed up on Mike Kensler’s presentation at the last Senate meeting with an update on academic sustainability programs from which about 100 students graduated so far. About 60 students declared it as their minor. She introduced the Rails with Trails project with the City and mentioned faculty involvement opportunities in the Sustainability minor and the annual workshop of incorporating sustainability into course curricula, and the integration of sustainability research at Research Week. She also pointed out other opportunities, such as guided tours on campus and the Arboretum (energy, food, waste tour, and more) and that these tours can also be used for classes.
Questions: none.

New Business: Patricia Duffy, Senate Chair: none
Unfinished Business: Patricia Duffy, Senate Chair: none
Adjournment: Patricia Duffy, Senate Chair: the meeting was adjourned at 4:30 P.M.