Faculty Senate Meeting Minutes

November 28^th, 2007

Senate members present:  Ruth Frickle, Glen Avantaggio, Gloria Rose Koepping, Chris Gan, Jack Harton, John Dunn, Dusty Wilson, and Darryl Brice.

Guests:  Ruth Windhover, Kate Bligh, and Gwen Spencer

The meeting was called to order at 3:05 in room 411 of the Library.

As a quorum was not present, approval of the minutes was tabled till the next meeting on Dec. 5^th 2007.

Ruth Windhover, the President of the Faculty Union, HCEA, came to discuss the distance learning caps for classes.  Ruth referenced the faculty contract section 304.4.2.  In that section, the cap for a distance learning class is set at 20 for the first time the class is taught.  There is also a provision for 1/3 release time to develop the class and additional technical support for faculty.  This topic is not mentioned anywhere else in the contract.

Ruth further delineated two different views of determining class caps.  The Instuctional/Academic view is that class caps have historically been driven by many outside forces such as the demand for the course, nature of the discipline, available facilities or lab space, etc.  The other way to view class caps is as a Labor issue.  Does it take more labor or work to teach a distance learning class than a class on campus?  How much more?   This may be a difficult way to look at courses since each faculty position does not call for exactly the same amount of work (labor).  Some faculty spend more time in the classroom, library ,office, or lab than other faculty just to do their assigned job.  

Some faculty feel that a distance learning class takes more time and they would like the caps relaxed, to compensate them for the additional work.  Other faculty reported that in looking at the research on DL courses the results are mixed, with some reporting that DL teaching takes more time, and others, less time.  If the workload is so variable, what does it really mean? 

Some suggestions were for departments to ask Division chairs to take this issue to Jeff Wagnitz and Marie Zimmermann to see what possible solutions might be workable.  It was also suggested to just type in two caps (one for on campus, one for DL delivery) on the CAF and submit it to Jeff and Marie for their discussion and approval.  Faculty stated that there needs to be an Institutional plan for how to support DL instruction, including class caps, testing, and the impact on advising and other campus departments.  This is a systemic problem with impact felt in many areas on campus.  If we want DL teaching to grow in the future, these concerns need to be addressed.

It was suggested that some faculty come together as a Task Force and write a white paper about the problem and make some recommendations.  Or perhaps the DL committee is looking at these issues already?  It was also noted that with the uncertainty of the Presidential Search outcome, not much may happen until our administrative leadership is in place.

Our next meeting is Dec. 5, 2007.  Allison Green and Kathy Oberg will be our guests to discuss the Faculty Resource Center.

Meeting Adjourned at 3:58 p.m.

Minutes submitted by Gloria Rose Koepping,  Faculty Senate Secretary