D R A K E U N I V E R S I T Y
Minutes of the Faculty Senate meeting
February 19, 2003

The regular meeting of the 2002-2003 Faculty Senate was called to order at 3:30 p.m. by President Art Sanders. The following senators were present for all or part of the meeting: Cairns, Doughtery, Goldford, Klugman, Lovell, McKnight, Parsa, Reed, Reincke, Sanders, A, Sanders, B, Schaefer, Sheehy, Shulman, Simpson, Soltis, Vitha, Wade, Wright.
Absent: Esposito, Hunter

January 2003 minutes were accepted as presented.

Secretary’s note: Distributed for each Senator were the 2003 athletic schedules for: Women’s Soccer, Men’s Tennis, Volleyball, Football, Women’s Track & Field

Report of President Maxwell

• President Maxwell thanked those persons who participated in National Alumni Scholarship event this past weekend in spite of the weather. This is quite a testament to the character of the campus.
• Undergraduate admissions applications are up for the Fall 2003 semester to even an all time high and yet there is a smaller but recordable increase in the number of deposits which have been received.
• The President responded to a question from the body which was presented previously to this session. The topic concerned the level of alcohol abuse amongst the undergraduate population and more specifically what will Drake be doing about this increase usage. The Senior Advisory Council (SAC) is reviewing national data on the topic. The issue is larger than our campus and the national binge drinking incidents nation wide have brought this cultural issue to every one’s attention. The most consistent improvement must come from a collaborative effort between the local community and the University.
  Additional there is a concern which has been raised to the President of whether or not it is appropriate for the University’s Alumni office to sponsor events such as the Peggy’s Parties. He agrees that this is a concern.
• The Diversity Audit is out on the web site and Provost and I are beginning to receive comments on the report and the recommendations. He encouraged input and true, focused involvement from as wide a group as is possible.

Report from Provost Troyer

• The possibility of our country being at war has brought the need for certain policies to be in place. This is a need as deemed necessary by our insurance companies.
• The search committees for open Dean positions are drawing their work to closure. The faculty searches are progressing well and there has been some positive news as some of the first choice candidates have accepted positions.
• There will be two accreditation visits in the near future. The School of Education Department of Education visit is next week and the Pharmacy School visit is in early March. If anyone wishes to review the full report for either revisit, those reports are available from the Office of the Provost.

Report from President Sanders

• The Academic Freedom & Tenure Committee which selects its own chair has announced that Judith Allen is serving in that position for the 2003 calendar year.
• the Promotion &Tenure Task Force members from the Journalism & Mass Communication and School of Education have been selected. The deadline is the end of this month.
• The issue of whether Drake should move to plus/minus grading has been sent to the University Curriculum Committee.
• At last month’s Faculty Senate meeting there was interest in looking at the entire sabbatical policy which Drake current uses. The Faculty Senate Executive Committee will be hosting in early March or late February, a faculty forum to gather comments.

Unfinished Business:
Paul Morris, the Chief Information Officer, was invited to speak concerning the proposed Campus Mass E-Mass policy. The complaints concerning the frequency of mass emails have mostly come from students. The proposed policy was described in a handout. The new policy would allow for some email opting in by an interested person and some mechanism to opt out of an email type.

Mr. Morris was interested in knowing what the Senators thought about the proposed policy and invited comments. The solutions suggested included the creation and maintenance of locked lists and unlocked lists. Persons would choose to be on a list via a web site which would be maintained by Office of Information Technology (OIT).

Senator Klugman asked about the current web mail client and whether it will be changed to a higher capacity client. Mr. Morris did not expect a change in the near future. Senator Schaefer noted that the suggested lists of proposed information groups included only the basketball teams. He wondered why the other teams were not presented. The reply was that these were the only teams requested by the athletic department.

President Sanders indicated his stance that the President of the Faculty Senate should automatically have access to the Faculty list without having to request such access from the Provost. Mr. Morris reminded the group that the person designating who has access to the list is doing so without having direct knowledge or editing of the messages to be sent. The overall goal of separating out the main five email groups now in use is to decrease the number of message which are sent to the whole campus.
There was a discussion of the appropriateness of any message and who or which department would be making these decisions and based on which guidelines.

New Business:

President Sanders reminded the group that the University Benefits Committee (UBC) motion being presented again today had an amendment made to it which deleted the word ‘unmarried’ in the third part. The UBC has researched and determined that over the last five years, no married person has received this benefit. President Sanders continued that the Faculty Senate has three options today for this motion: a) the motion could be accepted, b) the motion could be amended and sent back to the committee or c) the motion could be amended and sent forward to President Maxwell. The motion was brought to the table.

Senator Goldford expressed comments from Senator Lovell, who could not continue to be in attendance at the meeting, spoke against the age cap. The ‘up to age 26’ is bad policy was the main point from Senator Lovell. He would suggest the Senate strike the age cap language. Ms Raylene Rospond, UBC chair, shared with the Senate that in the peer institution study, all institutions had used the IRS age or 24 or 25, thus from the perspective of the peer survey, the age is a normal benefit test and sits at a giving level.

Ms. Rospond indicated that the UBC was in strong agreement that motion as presented in October should be presented to central administration. They continued to see the three items as presenting a strong balanced package. She indicated that several committee members were present to attest to their views.

Senator Goldford moved and Cairns seconded to strike the age 26 cap language. Senator Klugman spoke against the amendment. With a show of hands vote, the amendment failed.

The main motion includes the word ‘unmarried’ and it was clarified that the IRS definition includes this word. There was a reminder that Drake has already several years ago, maintained that partners are included where ever spouse if specified.

Senator Klugman moved and Reincke seconded an amendment to:

strike ‘unmarried’ and send the motion directly to the President

There was a general discussion of the inclusion or exclusion of the word ‘unmarried’ from the third potion of the motion. There were speakers in favor of accepting the motion as presented by the committee and speakers against. Ms Rospond stated that as a broad based university committee, she felt that they had followed their charge with looking at policies for the entire campus and they believed that these three parts of a motion creates an enhanced benefit for Drake employees.

The amendment passed
The motion as amended passed.

The motion to extend the meeting for five minutes was made, seconded and approved.

David Wright presented the CAAD Council of Academic Administrative Departments Report. The group has spent some time discussion that they are as a unit and formalized their membership and voting procedures. Mr. Wright invited comments concerning the report which will also be shared with the Dean’s Council.

The meeting adjourned at 5:05p.m.
Submitted by Secretary, Nancy Geiger