Transcript Senate Meeting
June 14, 2016
Larry Teeter chair: We have a relatively short agenda today, so maybe we can all get out of here a little bit early. If you are a senator or a substitute for a senator make sure you sign in in the back and pick up a clicker because we have a vote today.
If you’d like to speak about an issue or ask a question, please go to the microphone and wait to be recognized then state your name, whether or not you are a senator and the unit you. The rules of the Senate require that senators or substitute senators be allowed to speak first. After senators have had a chance to speak guests are welcome to speak as well.
The agenda today was set by the Senate Steering Committee and was sent around and posted in advance and is now shown on the screen. So if we’d please come to order we need to establish a quorum. Turn your clickers on. We have 86 members of the Senate and we have to have 44 senators present for a quorum. Okay we have a quorum.
Before we get to our main agenda the first order of business today is to approve the minutes of the May 17 Senate meeting. The minutes have been previously posted on the Senate Web site. Are there any additions or changes or corrections to these minutes? Do I have a motion to approve? So moved. Second? All in favor please say aye.
Group: aye.
Larry Teeter, chair: Opposed? (no response) Okay the motion carries.
The first item on our agenda is comments from the President’s Office, Dr. Gogue. [2:58]
Dr. Gogue, President: Thank you, it’s good to be with you today. I wanted to make sure that you all know that we have contacted our students as well as our alumni in the Orlando area to express our thoughts during the events that happened there over the last few days. We also have some information up on Web sites to be also responsive.
We had a Board of Trustees meeting last week. I would report first of all that all items on the agenda that we had shared with you at the previous Senate meeting were approved. So that was a good session. Mike Demaribus was selected as the Vice Pro-tem. Apparently in years that Mr. McCreary had served for a 2 year term, what I’d call chair of the Board, they call it Pro-tem and in the second year of that individual’s term, they elect a Vice Pro-tem. So Mike DeMaioribus out of the Huntsville area was selected for that. They also approved budget guidelines that we will work on during the summer and present to them in the Board meeting in September. It terms of permanent salary increases the Board looked at a range from 0 to 6% based on merit, and for one-time funds 2% provided university wide with an opportunity in the colleges for there to be adjustments or additions to that depending on their budgets.
Third thing I wanted to mention is probably one of the hottest topics going on in Higher Ed right now has to do with the change in the numbers from hourly employees to exempt employees. I would just complement HR at Auburn in terms of early contact, lot of discussion, I think Don we have about 600 employees that are affected by that change and trying to work through to make sure that the impacts are as minimal as possible to our employees. [5:00]
The forth thing I wanted to mention; I think most of you saw our House of Representatives member was found guilty on a number of ethics charges, so the new speaker of the House, tentative speaker of the House is Victor Gaston. He’s from the Mobile area. When they meet again, they will actually decide on a new speaker of the House. As far as our House seat, locally the governor will call for a special election. My understanding is that if you have more than 2 years left in a term then they call for a special election. I am not sure of the details of when that will be.
Final thing that I wanted to just say is thank you to Dr. Patricia Duffy, who has represented this body and this university extremely well as a part of the Board of Trustees in the last year. We certainly look forward to Larry in his role that will start soon. I would simply say thank you to both of them. I missed one of their early morning meetings that they have this past year and they have all kind of interesting discussions and I really feel bad about missing your meeting. That’s one of the meetings that I enjoy the most at the university. You learn a lot and it is a good give and take, we take about an hour and a half at least once a month doing that. I’d be happy to respond to any questions.
Mike Stern, substitute senator, Economics: You mentioned Mike Hubbard’s conviction on Friday and his removal. I’ve got a couple of questions from faculty and even from my neighbor; Auburn University has a building named after Mike Hubbard. So they want to know what’s happening with that, do we have a process, is there a policy in regard to building name changes and so forth.
Dr. Gogue, President: As you might image there have been a lot of comments that have come in the last 48 hours or so relative to the facility. We have a facility in the Research Park that’s named for Mike Hubbard. So a lot of comments have come in, we are receiving the comments and we can assure you that the information will be provided. It goes to the Board of Trustees. They are the ones that have the naming responsibilities. It will go to the Board of Trustees and I can assure you that we will do what’s best for Auburn. Thank you. [7:44]
Larry Teeter, chair: Thank you Dr. Gogue. Once again as part of our procedure for beginning these meetings, I’d first like to introduce the Senate officers. Dr. Laura Plexico is our secretary, Dr. Xing Ping Hu is our secretary-elect, Dr. James Goldstein is our chair-elect, and Dr. Patricia Duffy, our immediate past chair and serves as our faculty representative on the Board of Trustees. Bob Locy is normally here as our parliamentarian, he’s not here, but this would also be his final meeting. Laura Kloberg is our administrative assistant, she helps us stay organized with the general procedures of the Senate and helps gets things ready before every Senate meeting. Dr. Plexico, Dr. Duffy, and Dr. Locy are finishing their terms at the end of this month and I hope you let them know how much you appreciate their service.
In light of that comment I have a few additional remarks that I’d like to make about this year in the Senate. This is the last Senate meeting of the academic year and my last meeting as chair. So before we go any further I’d like to acknowledge what an honor it has been for me to serve the campus in this capacity. I’ve learned a tremendous amount about how the campus operates and quite a bit about why at times it seems as if it doesn’t. I owe this eye-opening learning opportunity to the faculty and it’s important to me that you know how much I appreciate it. In it’s own right the Senate is also a complex organization charged not only with the fundamental responsibility of overseeing the curriculum but also dealing with research compliance issues, faculty promotion and tenure issues, benefits, grievances, parking, and many more, and the volunteer faculty serving on all the relevant committees deserve our thanks.
I think we had a pretty productive year. We finally brought several items to conclusion that have been talked about for years. We now have a system in place for providing new faculty of spreading 9-month salary over 12 months. What seemed to many over the years to be a silly request kept being requested in surveys of faculty. Thanks to support, primarily from Marcie Smith and Karla McCormick, we now have a system in place to accommodate faculty both here and at AUM.
Important work was also presented early in the year by Beth Guertal, to describe the findings on the commission on women in academic careers, which ultimately lead in part to the campus climate study and recommendations that are now emanating from that.
We also addressed the issue of making allowances under special circumstances for lecturers and senior lecturers to serve on graduate committees and teach graduate courses. This policy is a result of the cooperative efforts of the members of the Graduate Council and the Non-tenure Track Faculty Committee, and I commend them for staying focused and coming up with a compromised solution.
We also have a new policy on the creation and fair use of copyrighted materials, updating a policy last addressed in 1984 and obviously not in step with the internet era. I’d especially like to thank Sara Wolf and Jan Thornton and the rest of their committee for their efforts to bring us into the 21st Century by developing this new policy.
We have a new policy on development of undergraduate certificates. This was the result of the careful work of the Academic Standards Committee, chaired by Lisa Kensler. This is a faculty driven contribution to the goal of increases student success, which will allow students to better market their skills when they leave Auburn.
Through the work of Yasser Gowayed, the Administrator Evaluation has been improved. This new survey instrument was used this year for the very first time. It’s more comprehensive in the questions asked and it only takes several minutes for faculty to complete. This culminates at least 2 years of effort by that committee. [12:10]
We also have a new course withdrawal deadline for students; another accomplishment for the Academic Standards Committee and one that should further the goal of helping students succeed at Auburn.
One of our more visible actions this spring was the Senate resolution on campus carry brought forward by James Goldstein, our incoming chair. Shari Fulford, executive director of governmental affairs indicated that the legislator took notice of this resolution and it may have played a role in keeping the campus carry bill from coming out of committee. I don’t have to point out to many of you, I’m sure, given the events recently that would have been a really bad idea for most faculty.
In his role as chair of the Faculty Handbook Review Committee, I also want to thank James for bringing forward several key changes, particularly those related to P & T and faculty dismissal. It was very important that those changes were made and subsequently approved this year.
I also wanted to thank Don Andrea and the members of the Traffic and Parking Committee for working with the Executive Committee to secure faculty parking spaces in the evening for those faculty that have to come back to work after leaving campus once at 5 o’clock. Now you’ll find spaces marked throughout campus, it says here 7 a.m. to 6p.m., but I think it goes to 10 p.m. now. So specifically A parking in those spaces ’til 10 0’clock at night which at many parts of campus will be a welcome addition.
In addition to all of the action items were the information items on our agendas. I want to thank all of the individuals who invested their time to prepare and deliver the information that was presented at this year’s meetings. Your efforts are very much appreciated.
Finally, of course, I want to thank the Executive Committee, in particular Laura Plexico, our Senate secretary, for working with me this past year in the administration for its unwavering support of the concept of shared governance.
Are there any questions for me? Okay, we will move to our first action item of the day. The action item involves approval of nominees for Senate Committees for the academic year 2016–17 and will be presented by Laura Plexico, secretary of the Senate.
Laura Plexico, secretary: Okay, what you have before you is a lot of hard work by Rules to kind of finish filling a variety of slots on the different committees, and we are tying up some of the remaining slots that needed to be filled before August. I am sure there are a few more loose ends that may have to be tied up by Ping during the August meeting. You have a list of nominees before you and hopefully you’ve had a chance to review it. These nominees come from a Standing Senate Committee so it does not require a second. I will take any comments or questions if there are any.
Hearing none, if you approve of the slate of names please press A and if you do not approve press B. A=51, B=0.
Larry Teeter, chair: I don’t think that’s ever happened since I’ve been here, that’s terrific. (referring to unanimous vote)
We have 2 information items today. Our first information item is an update from Core Curriculum and General Education Committee and is presented by Constance Relihan, associate provost for undergraduate studies. [16:42]
Constance Relihan, chair, Core Curriculum and General Education: Thanks for letting me summarize for you what we’ve done this year. It’s been a busy year, this is a busy committee. One refrain that you are going to here is that if you know anybody who is on this committee, you should thank them frequently. This is one of the more important committees for the curriculum. It acts as the academic department, if you will, for the General Education Program.
It’s got, as the charge there describes, 2 primary functions; one to review the quality, the effectiveness of the committee and also to recommend any changes that might be needed in General Education. It’s a large committee and I’ve listed there the members. There are 7 individuals who represent the different core areas there are also representatives from all of the other colleges, except Graduate School and University College. Those are on the right, I apologize for the slides being a bit dark, but they are online as well. We also have a couple of individuals sitting in with us because it has seemed useful, Dr. Mellissa Baumann from the Honors College and also a rep from the SGA. One other change I would note is that, while in the charge it says the Office of Institutional Research and Assessment is a member of the committee, this past year, which is the first year that we’ve had a director of academic assessment, she filled that role. It seems to have gone well and we will be bringing forward a recommendation to make that change permanent.
So during this past year we had 12 full committee meetings, we had a number of focus group meetings during the fall which substituted for regular meetings we sent 3 people to a conference on general education and assessment and we hosted some presentations for the committee from national vendors of assessment instruments. Our work during the year was split into 2 main areas; one was this work on assessment and the other was other matters which really turns into review of possible courses for the core and approval of those courses.
In terms of assessment we have gathered 3 years of data through the hard work of everyone who’s been involved in the course embedded assessment data that we’ve been gathering. So we felt it was time to take what we call the year of reflection and instead of requiring everyone to submit the Gen Ed assessment reports as we had done, we instead asked people to come to focus groups to talk about their experience with assessment. To talk about what was going right, what wasn’t, and talk about how we might improve. [20:44]
So we had 10 focus groups, they were facilitated by Dr. Megan Good, director of academic assessment, members of the Gen Ed committee observed those meetings and we listened, took a lot of notes, and we reflected. Five main conclusions from those sessions. There’s a lot of variation on how familiar faculty and students were with different student learning outcomes. Some faculty didn’t seem to be terribly aware that they were supposed to be addressing them in their core classes, others were very well versed in the outcomes and the measures and were very focused on how they were assessing for them. There is general lack of confidence in the quality of the data that we were gathering even at the same time that people understood that we really need to be gathering data and there was some lack of confidence in its ability to either serve as information that would help people improve their classes or that would necessarily provide us with the overall assessment of how well our students were doing in the core outcomes. And there was some general frustration which maybe some of you have felt over the amount of time that the Gen Ed activities take faculty who are teaching in the core. So those were the main conclusions. [22:15]
So the committee then spent a lot of time talking about those conclusions. We decided that we wanted to try something different. We asked… part of why we sent some people to the assessment conference. We went to the assessment conference, we then invited in representatives from different assessment instrument firms to present what they could help us do, and ultimately what we decided, we wanted to try to do this summer was pilot the HEIghten Suite of assessment instruments. HEIghten is an ETS product. These are assessments in critical thinking, quantitative literacy, and writing. What we want to do because what SACS asks for us; what is the level of competency that our students have in these outcomes. We want to try to administer these assessments to students in their final semester before they graduate rather than within a class. This will give faculty back some time in their teaching. This will assess both students who are taking our courses and students who have taken those courses elsewhere, but it should give us a broader picture of how competent our students are in these outcomes. And give us the ability to benchmark student’s abilities against other individuals.
So we developed a group. Again another group of people you need to thank if you see them on campus. This is a group of people who is going to meet every week all summer long to figure out how to implement this pilot. The names that are highlighted there are the names of individuals who are not members of the core committee, who we added to this group. So we have a couple of individuals who are deeply involved in the teaching of core disciplines from biological sciences and English composition. We have a couple of associate deans, we have a couple of undergraduate students. When we added another assessment specialist from our Office of Academic Assessment so that we can figure out how to do this right. If we can do this, this will be quite an achievement.
So at the end of the summer I’ll come back and let you know what actions we might need to take based on that pilot and we’ll move forward with that.
The other focus of our work this past year was reviewing courses that different disciplines wanted to have included in the core. I will say that the committee is pretty strict about this. The committee did approve some new courses, but generally I would say things got sent back at least once for more information and there’s at least one course that was proposed that we voted not to include. There you can see the courses that will be added to the core; COUN 2000: Living and Communicating in a Diverse Society which will count as a Social Science course, assessing for a diversity outcome. PHIL 1110: Ethical and Conceptual Foundations of Science, a humanities core course assessing for the critical reading and argument construction outcomes. CSES 1010 and 1020, a new core science sequence, Soils and Lif and Crops and Life, counting for the science sequence and I would note as an addendum that we now have approved through the Curriculum Committee DE versions of courses in all of our core categories. So those of us who’ve been around a long time used to think it was not possible for a student to complete the core through DE. It actually would take a while, but there are options in all of the categories.
During the coming year I anticipate that we will be bringing forward some revisions to recommend to the charge and the composition of the committee, primarily to the membership of the committee. I suspect that as we work through this pilot of the new proposed assessment method we will potentially rethink some of our Gen Ed outcomes and we may be bringing back to this body, revisions whether for wholesale outcomes or measures within outcomes. I expect that because there aren’t assessment instruments for all of the outcomes that we currently have on the books, that come fall, we may be reaching out to certain groups of faculty for their help in developing an instrument in their area. For instance, a revised assessment strategy for the outcome that they assess for in order to help us gather data that we can have more confidence in. We will be working to expand and revise the pilot and, of course, we will consider any new core course proposals that come to us.
So that is the summary of our year. The committee meets generally every other week at 8:30 in the morning on Tuesday. This is a committee that requires effort, and early morning effort, so as I say, please, if you know anyone who is on the committee, thank them. Buy them a cup of coffee, be nice, they deserve it. And thanks for all you do.
If there are any comments or questions that anybody has for me, I will try to address them. Thank you. [29:18]
Larry Teeter, chair: Thanks, Constance.
Our final information item today is a report from the Teaching Effectiveness Committee and a resolution from that committee.
Don Mulvaney, chair, Teaching Effectiveness Committee: Good afternoon, Just want to give you a highlight of some aspects and details of the committee itself, how that operates and then talk a little bit about the accomplishments of the past year which actually overlays from previous years as well.
The outline that I want to try to accomplish is review a little bit about the front end, what this committee is composed of and how we receive our charges or plan of work and in the process mention some things that we’ll be doing probably in the next year in terms of agenda items.
So if you read the standing charge of the Teaching Effectiveness Committee it has to do with a lot of aspects of teaching assignments, the evaluation of one particular grant-in-aid program the Breeden Endowment for Teaching Grants. This committee then evaluates those proposals. Then more recently the departmental award for Educational Excellence, which is a department wide award of $10,000 a year for 3 years, and we will talk about that in a minute.
So our composition presently is 18 members, we have13 faculty, and then some ex-officio representatives from the Instructional Technology Council, the Biggio Center, Constance’s Office, the Provost’s Office, then we have a representative from the undergraduate population and the graduate school. There’s the names which are easily found on the Senate Web site and I might note that we have a turnover this year of about 5 people; there might be one of those coming back.
One of the big items in terms of charges for this year is a complex one and we have wrestled with this for maybe 2 years, but it has to do with a question around; does the current approach for our student evaluation of teaching serve us well? I would just say quickly and briefly that the committee had sub-components, sub-groups, we did a through search of literature this year and found some troubling items. Some of the recent literature about teaching effectiveness or using student evaluation of teaching and began to ask the kind of question, was this what our students are qualified to evaluate? Do they evaluate teaching or some aspects of the actual classroom experience that they had? So I want to talk about those in a little bit as well, some fine So on that first charge it has to do with basically looking at what are some ways that we can improve teaching. One of these has to do with a lot of the conversation about our current process of student evaluation of teaching, the course eval, and what are the problems or conundrums around that. One is we have low participation rate, a lot of evaluation fatigue with a large number of classes that a student might have, they just don’t evaluate them, so we are looking at under 50% participation in many situations. They you get the dynamics of small class numbers and the influence that that might have on the overall numerical score of the global questions from the evaluation.
So we evaluated this and we thought one area that we can address is maybe some areas to enhance the participation rate, try to encourage the best practices which are well rounded in the literature. Things that faculty can do, faculty courses can do to enhance and raise the participation rate and completion rate of those evaluations. We want to continue to do that.
The other component was to take some steps back and ask some questions; are the questions that we have meeting the needs for at least a formative evaluation to give feedback to instructors or the class. We are not proposing this today this will go on into the next year, but we have had enough discussions that we have draft of some questions, which I will have in a subsequent slide, that has to do with some alignment with a body of work by Gamson and Chickering, there is a very well know and established piece of work on 7 core practices for effective undergraduate education.
So those are 6 questions at the present-time that we have in a pilot phase that we would put forth that we would have to do with a little different approach to asking about the classroom experience. [34:48] What did the student experience in terms of class organization, their learning environments-was it conducive to learning, those kinds of things? I encourage you to look at those and welcome feedback on those questions as we move forward with continued conversation and discussion about some possible changes.
As a reference these are the 4 global changes that are used and this is part of the conundrum that we have, you may have a difference of opinions, the literature has a complexity and diversity of observations of these kinds of questions, but basically you say, well those sound pretty good. Question 4 was the only question that was basically pulled out, extracted and used for faculty appraisal this year in my college. So, those are the kind of problems that we have with maybe overuse. The desire to make comparisons, which are really not valid or legitimate kinds of comparisons between different courses and different disciplines and so forth.
We’re into phases, phase I, we want to work on those questions a little bit more and move that forward, also have deeper conversations about a mid-term kind of approach. Pilot this sometime this fall with some departments and see if this would make more sense, the literature supports some of these practices. Or if we had a midterm evaluation that would give some informative, constructive feedback to the instructor, there is still time for that instructor to come back, make a reference or comment to the students and say I appreciate that input. This is why we can’t really do that very effectively, give some insight into that or, thank you for the input and we are going to make some efforts to make those kind of changes. The data on the literature around midterm evaluations to end of semester evaluations of a class is very high and very positive related.
So we’re going to work on that also peer review kinds of things with the Biggio Center. We want to work on constructs that will help departments become more functional and able to carry that practice out perhaps.
Phase III is ongoing this fall this coming year. Depending on what happens with Phase II we might create a little stronger language about the completion of the evaluation forms. Right now, we are just not getting the job done in terms of getting that percentage completion rate any higher.
So, we’ve got some other ideas, we are working with Constance and the Provost’s Office to do encouragement kinds of activities. Concourse presence at different times, actual specific inclusion of the AU Evaluate link in the CANVAS, to encourage that, just anything we can do to help faculty learn or become aware of the best practices to improve that response rate and that completion rate.
Charge number 2, another charge is the Breeden Grant activity. Year-in and year-out, we have about 20 some proposals, which the committee evaluates. We do have a conflict of interest exercise so we try to accommodate all of that. There’re 2 categories for that program that applicants can try for: a travel grant that would enhance their professional development and ability to come back on campus and teach more effectively and execute some of the things that they would learn at a conference or travel, short-term study with travel. The other categories are research where a proposal is put together to ask questions, design approaches, and then assessments in a way that would enhance the scholarship around the practice of teaching and effectiveness. So this year we again reach about $30,000 across 10 proposals. So the funding rate is pretty good on those.
I might mention that this committee, basically, did that process, the previous process twice because we moved it from the spring to the fall so that we could do the departmental award in the spring. So, If you are not aware of the departmental award for educational excellence, it’s in its 3rd year and will be coming into its 4th year. This year we will be doing a lot more analysis of its mission and its potential impact and how we do it better continually trying to improve that process of this award program. Those funds are made available by the Provost’s Office, it is $30,000, and somebody asked, it may not be enough money to incentivize departments but we have had 20 departments over the period that have participated and we have made 3 awardees and those are listed on another slide. This time it goes to Geosciences for this past year. [40:34]
Then a lot of the things membership gets involved in in a variety of ways in terms of related to teaching and the conversations of teaching activity, iTeach programs and other things. I will pause with that and ask if there are any comments, questions, suggestions, ideas. (looks like everybody is ready to go.)
Let’s go to the next thing. I’m sure you cannot read that. If you have read it, it is a non-complicated resolution from the committee that has to do with changing the composition. We are just in the first reading of this and at some juncture in the future it could be brought forward for a vote because it does require a two-thirds vote to change the composition of the committee. But in essence something that we haven’t had in the past is an office or director of assessment, so what this proposal, what this resolution relates to is changing our composition of the committee to by adding one member, a representative or the Director of Assessment to serve on the committee in an ex-officio way. There is a lot of strategic common sense about this, that office is going to be doing a lot of assessing and the Teaching Effectiveness Committee is all about evaluating the effectiveness of teaching and learning, so this is a good match up. That’s basically what it is Larry, we were going to suggest that we add another member to this committee. [42:56]
Larry Teeter, chair: Thank you Don. As Don mentioned this would have to have a two-thirds approval of the Senate. It will come back to the Senate sometime next fall for consideration.
Okay that concludes our formal agenda for today’s meeting. Is there any new or unfinished business? I think there is.
David Held, senator, Entomology and Plant Pathology: I apologize for having to read some of this but I developed this draft working with some colleagues in my department and I want to make sure that their views come through in this. Again, sorry to read it.
I am here presenting an issue brought to me by my faculty in our department; and this likely impacts faculty in many other departments on campus.
The issue is the unfair levying of the full benefit rate, currently at 32% on campus, on summer salary used by 9 month faculty. According to HR Benefits, faculty with a 9-month appointment paid bi-monthly are paying their benefits basically in 18 installments. Faculty on a 9-month appointment that choose to supplement their salary over summer are also funding that salary through grants, contracts, etc., and within the context of those budgets are bringing in an additional 32% full fringe rate when we write those budgets for our grants. During the summer when 9-month faculty use those fringe benefits it’s roughly about 10% that go toward retirement contributions with non of the remaining approximately 22% of that fringe coming back to the faculty or the department. It’s basically just paying into a system that many of my faculty have no idea where that money goes.
This has been a point of frustration for our faculty and a decreased faculty morale. One of my colleagues expressed this frustration when he told me that, “If administrators had to fund their own summer salary-this situation would NEVER have been considered.”
So why are faculty seemingly suddenly upset and seeking action?
First, many have only realized this situation. When I came to Auburn in Aug 2008, summer salary was not assessed a fringe rate. There was no fringe benefit that you had to pay. The first reference to a policy change that I could find was in the Financial Liaison meeting presentation dated Aug 31, 2009. In that place is the first reference to fringe rate on summer salary for 9-month faculty. Those rates are all available online. In some departments it’s possible that the initial fringe rate was brought upon summer salary may have been covered departmentally which also may have displaced this grievance to a little bit later when departmental funds could have been exhausted and they were unable to cover those anymore. That would basically put most of that burden back on the faculty. Many faculty are only recently aware of this change, it was not well publicized and many times, particularly in our college, when we fill out our summer salary form there is no line on there that reiterates or publicizes how much fringe would actually pay our of our accounts in addition to what we pay in summer salary. That may be different in other colleges.
So faculty that are only very up to date in their accounting of their accounts would be aware of what’s being removed. So at the current fringe rate 9-month faculty have to essentially budget a whole additional month of summer salary in order to cover benefits for one full summer, or 3 months. Since many grants only allow 1 or 2 months salary or non at all, this means that 9-month faculty typically are managing 4 or more research projects in order to cover their salary and fringe for one particular summer.
It could be argued by the administration that this should motivate 9-month faculty to be proactive in grant writing–I can see that– but we have to acknowledge that most federal grant programs now have a 90% or greater rejection rate for initial submissions. Practically, these rejection rates create a type of inconsistent cash flow into programs such that faculty may have summer salary in some years but not others. Since virtually all faculty hires on campus are now 9-month appointments, this adds stress for personal finances and family and professional relationships. It may also be an impediment to retaining new faculty we are bringing in to our department. We don’t want to loose new faculty that we are bringing in.
So What now? My faculty have asked me to bring this issue before the Senate and I have the support of other 9-month colleagues in our college and some of the senators who I have asked for feedback on this before bringing it to your attention today.
Like many of you, I don’t like to bring grievances so there are some possible solutions that I would also like to offer toward the end as I conclude.
In this case, there are precedents at other institutions that could be applied here. For example, the University of MD Eastern Shore has a 32% fringe rate, just like we have, for faculty on 9- and 12-month appointments, but over summer they only have an 8% fringe rate, on summer salary and grants. So a difference of 24% where PI can potentially put those funds into the other part of the grant proposal. Another solution may also be feasible in the RCM budget model, allowing benefit costs to be handled at the college level versus centrally. As we transition to RCM, why can’t fringe benefits be treated similarly to indirect costs which are proposed to flow back to college and departments generate good revenue. Under RCM the real benefits cost would be deducted from the grant budget and any unused portion could flow back to the unit that generated that funding providing somewhat of an incentive. Faculty and department then realize true incentives to become more productive in grant writing rather than penalized for bringing in grant funding over summer. Colleges and department could then decide to reward their faculty with research allocations from these funds.
In conclusion, this problem demands attention and needs a solution to maintain faculty morale. I make a motion that we as the Senate direct this to an appropriate existing committee, as Dr. Teeter has suggested, or form an ad hoc committee to research this issue and outline solutions. Thank you, Dr. Teeter and colleagues for your time, attention, and hopefully your support in this effort. [49:56]
Larry Teeter, chair: We have a motion on the floor, do I have a second? (second) Okay, is there any discussion on the motion?
Mike Stern, substitute senator, economics: I’m not an expert on the benefits but it was my understanding that benefits rates are set on average cost pricing. If that is the case then if you exempt summer income from it then the rate must rise on the 9-month. Hence, you would be proposing an increase in cost for those who do not participate in summer income at Auburn University that work during the regular 9-months. That’s if we are using average cost pricing, so if our benefits pool is costing this much, if we put all income on it, including summer we will have to have the following go to 32% rate if we exempt some of them from it then on the remaining income you are going to have a higher number than the 32% rate. So that would be something to consider if that is the case (could not make out the last words).
David Held, senator, Entomology and Plant Pathology: What I assume what the faculty brought to my attention was that we are already exempting some 9-month faculty. So it was brought to my attention that 9-month faculty that teach during the summer to generate their summer salary are already exempt from paying fringe on that summer salary. So, we don’t have many folks in our department that do that but it’s primarily a graduate department but most of our summer salary is paid through grants. But that was brought to my attention when we were bringing up this issue.
Mike Stern, substitute senator, economics: I do the budget for our department and all of our instructors during the summer, faculty otherwise we have to pay benefits. We have to set money aside for it and they are all instruction.
Larry Teeter, chair: Just a comment while Rusty works his way down to the microphone. I have discussed this with a number of people since last Thursday in the administration and we came to the conclusion that it is a complex problem and probably does deserve or could deserve an ad hoc committee and investigation to our Faculty Salaries and Welfare Committee.
Rusty Wright, senator, Fisheries: That’s all I was asking. What is the resolution?
Larry Teeter, chair: To refer this to either an ad hoc committee or to our standing committee on Faculty Salaries and Welfare. Okay, any other discussion?
If that sounds like a good idea to folks, I guess we have clickers. Press A for agreeing to the motion and B if you are opposed. A=42, B=6. The motion does pass, so we will refer it to, the executive committee will determine whether it goes to an ad hoc committee or to our standing committee on Faculty Salaries and Welfare.
Any other business? Okay, then I’d like to call up James Goldstein to formally end this session of the Senate. James will become chair, July 1.
James Goldstein, chair-elect: All right then, this meeting is adjourned. [55:12]