Quick Hits & Short Bits

Workshops Offered for IDS/UHC 110 Teachers and Others Interested in the "First-Year Experience"
This Thursday, Writing Center Director Mike Frizell will lead a discussion titled, "Writing in the IDS 110 Classroom: Writing for Learning," from noon-1:00 p.m. in PSU 313.   Author and first-year expert Dr. Constance Staley will be on campus next week to lead several workshops, one especially for individuals teaching IDS/UHC 110 this fall.  Information on all of these opportunities is available on the Provost's web site: http://www.missouristate.edu/provost/43813.htm.

Nominations Due for Foundation Awards in Teaching, Research, and Service
Nominations for Foundation Awards are due to the Foundation Awards Committee Chair and the Provost's Office by April 14.  May 16 is the deadline for submitting all applications to department heads’ offices.  For more information see the Provost's web site: http://www.missouristate.edu/provost/default.asp.

Dunk the Dean Next Friday
Next Friday is your chance to deep-six the Dean while helping to raise money for cancer research through Relay for Life.  The COAL Relay for Life Team will host a "carnival" of sorts on the Craig Hall patio Friday, April 11, from noon-2:00 p.m., featuring a dunk tank with yours truly poised a death-defying two feet above the no doubt quite chilly water.  Rumor has it that other COAL administrators may be offering themselves up for the cause, as well. 

Please see the Provost's web site (http://www.missouristate.edu/provost/default.asp) for information about more campus events and development opportunities.

Short Bits

College Seeks New Associate Dean
Associate Dean Carol Anne Costabile-Heming has resigned to accept a position as founding Head of the new Department of World Languages and Literatures at Northern Kentucky University.  Applications for the Associate Dean position now are being accepted.  Date of first consideration is April 14, 2008.  A complete position announcement is available on the college web site (http://coal.missouristate.edu/).  Primary responsibilities include overseeing undergraduate recruitment, advising, and scholastic actions, and serving as the coordinator of student success efforts.  Typically the Associate Dean supervises course funding budgets (per course, evening, graduate assistants, etc.).  Other specific duties may be negotiated, and overall the Associate Dean assists the Dean in providing leadership and decision making for the college.

Carol Anne has done simply an outstanding job as Associate Dean for the past three years (and for three different Deans, no less!).  When I accepted the Dean's position last year it was only after assuring that she was willing to continue in her role.  Clearly, I should have gotten a multi-year agreement in writing!  I cannot overestimate the positive role that Carol Anne has played in any success I may have enjoyed as Dean this year.  However, when she asked me to write recommendation letters for the handful of administrative positions for which she had applied, I did not hesitate to give her my strongest support.  She will be an excellent department head and we all wish her the very best in meeting the new challenges she will meet.

Applicants Sought For New Dean's Fellow For Research and Graduate Education Role
As part of our efforts to promote and enhance graduate education and scholarship across the college, I am looking for a committed individual interested in taking on a leadership role in these areas.  This is an assignment, not an administrative appointment, for the 2008-09 academic year with the possibility of renewal.  This Dean's Fellow will receive three hours of reassigned time per semester and receive a stipend.

We have taken some steps this year to increase the college's emphasis on graduate education and research.  Some individual departments have undertaken significant reviews of their graduate programs, for example, and I have created a new college committee for graduate education.  Also, this year each of the colleges were asked by the Provost to designate a "research coordinator" to facilitate the pursuit of external funding opportunities and other scholarship initiatives (this year Carol Anne served in this capacity, on top of her many other duties).  I am hoping to identify an individual with experience and passion in these areas to help us build both visibility for current efforts and capacity for new accomplishments.  2008-09 will be a trial year for this position.

Recently you received a flyer in the mail about reserving rented regalia for spring commencement. (The form is available online if you unintentionally threw that piece of paper away …)  A number of you are faithful about turning out for commencement each semester, but in my 16 years here my observation is that attending commencement is not exactly a tradition for the university’s faculty and staff.  As students most of us probably can remember appreciating seeing our professors at commencement.  I would like to see the College of Arts and Letters develop a tradition of attending commencement ceremonies.  Toward that end, I’m announcing the first-ever COAL Commencement Competition.  The rules are simple: Whichever of the seven COAL departments has the highest percentage of faculty/staff attending the May commencement (minimum 50%), will receive from the Dean’s Office funds to feed the whole department at a time in the fall semester to be determined by the department.  For example, perhaps you’d like a catered lunch for your beginning of the semester meeting, or a buffet for the department’s fall retreat.  So, drag your regalia out of mothballs, or fill out the online form and reserve your FREE regalia from the university.  We can make a really impressive showing at the May commencement and communicate to the whole university that we are proud of our students and proud to be part of Missouri State University.

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January 15, 2008

·      Please sign up for one of the weekly FREE Lunches with the Dean.  Beginning January 23 and concluding on May 5 I’ll be hosting a table at the Union Club once a week for informal conversation and ideas exchange.  To sign up, go to http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=nq3duOD8PXbhrYgFR2eVWw_3d_3d and indicate your preferred dates.  Soon after, my office will be in touch to confirm your lunch date.

·      Beginning January 28 faculty will be asked to respond to an online administrator evaluation survey created and hosted by the IDEA Center at Kansas State University.  This is Missouri State’s new tool for soliciting feedback on the performance of our academic administrators.  The IDEA survey is designed to gather information from individuals in teaching roles, so only a handful of professional staff who have teaching responsibilities will be asked to respond to this survey.  Other staff in the college will be asked to provide feedback on administrator performance using another survey developed here within the college.  Most likely we will administer that survey at the same time as the IDEA survey.

·      I am planning an all-college meeting for sometime early in the spring semester, most likely mid- to late-February.  Please be watching for an announcement and plan to put this date on your calendar.

·      Also this spring I intend to host a forum on distance education aimed especially at those faculty and staff who have been active in teaching online, via telecourse, through ITV, and in other alternate formats.  Our strategic use of distance education depends on choices about both pedagogy and financial resources, and I need input from everyone, especially from those who know the areas best firsthand.

·      A new college committee on graduate education will be convened this spring.  In the fall I met once with directors from the four COAL departments that have master’s programs and this group, along with appointees from the three departments who do not have their own graduate programs, will comprise the new committee.  Some areas in which I will be asking this group for input include: long-range planning for graduate programs in the college; support for graduate education; graduate student recruitment, retention, and success; workload issues associated with graduate programs; and the role of distance formats in graduate education.

·      The COAL Lecture Series this spring will host author Daniel Woodrell, whose latest novel Winter’s Bone is being adapted for a film to be shot in Missouri.  Mr. Woodrell’s public lecture will be the evening of Friday, March 14.

·      Screenwriter and author Chris Vogler will be on campus February 4-6, during which time he will give a public lecture and conduct workshops for English and film classes.

·      The latest Provost’s Communique (http://www.missouristate.edu/provost/43813.htm) is full of professional development opportunities.  One of those is a workshop this week on peer review of teaching.  The same one-hour workshop is being offered on Wednesday and then again on Thursday from 12-12:50 in the Library Room 204.  Registration is requested.

·      The Provost’s Office is seeking recommendations for a common reading to be used in IDS 110 and UHC 110 next year in conjunction with the public affairs conference theme of sustainability.  They are looking for “a relatively inexpensive book that would be timely, interesting to students, and could be used as the basis for widespread classroom discussion. Hopefully, in addition to its use in IDS 110 and UHC 110, the book could be used in other classes so other students can also become engaged with the theme.”  If you have ideas, please email them to Dr. John Catau, Associate Provost, by January 25.

·      Speaking of the public affairs conference, be sure you have the dates of this year’s conference on your calendar, April 15-18.  COAL’s own Dr. Diane Strickland is the conference chair.  This year’s conference theme is, Seeking Solutions: Conflict, Violence and the Courage to Change.  A preview of the conference program can be viewed online at http://publicaffairs.missouristate.edu/conference/.

Kudos

·      To Director Jerry Hoover and the Pride Bands for a fantastic showing in southern California over the New Year’s holiday.  They were great in the Rose Parade, but they also wowed them at Disneyland, the Crystal Cathedral, and at the Bands Fest event held the day before the Tournament of Roses Parade.

·      To Mara Cohen Ioannides, English Department, whose novel A Shout in the Sunshine was selected as a runner-up for the 2007 National Jewish Book Award in Children’s and Young Adult Literature

·      To Art & Design alumna Timmera Allred, whose painting just won a $10,000 prize in a Kansas City competition put on by Harrah’s Casinos and will be on display for eight months, 90 feet by 90 feet on the side of a building in downtown Kansas City.  Timmera painted the work as a student in Eric Pervukhin’s Painting for Illustration class in Spring 2007.  Director Julie Bloodworth also points out that Timmera is an alumna of the Missouri Fine Arts Academy.

·      Ruth Barnes and Rebecca Bryant, Theatre & Dance, are two of 11 regional choreographers whose works will be showcased January 19 in A Modern Night at the Folly Theatre in Kansas City.

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November 1, 2007

Downtown location for Art & Design.  Today the university issued a press release announcing plans to begin relocating the Art & Design Department downtown.  Many people have worked for many years to make new facilities for Art & Design a reality, and I am incredibly fortunate to happen to be the Dean when those labors at last are bearing fruit.  Many thanks to Dr. Nietzel, Dr. McCarthy, and other members of central administration who have put their shoulders to the wheel over the past two years, and congratulations to the entire department.  You will be hearing much more about this project in the months to come and, believe me, we are going to have one heckuva party to celebrate.

Budget allocations and reallocations: Last month I mentioned I would be sharing more information regarding college priorities and budget decisions.  Let me first provide a little context and then share at least some preliminary plans.

As I have told the college previously and as you may have heard from other sources, each of the colleges finished the last fiscal year with sizeable carry forward amounts from salary savings and unspent operations monies.  While a good portion of our salary savings has been committed to filling replacement positions this year and filling permanent lines next year, COAL still had about $237,000 in one-time salary savings from FY07 and we anticipate salary savings of about $350,000 in FY08 from unfilled positions.  (For perspective, the total salaries budget for COAL is over $10.7 million.)  Because the colleges each has salary savings on hand, this year the Provost is not making additional allocations to the colleges for faculty travel, recruitment, or consultant fees.  The amount of money that in the past has been distributed to colleges on an annual basis for these purposes, along with some additional money the Provost has received as a result of enrollment growth, will be reallocated to the colleges next year as part of our permanent budgets.  The deans and the Provost's Office are working now to devise the specific criteria and distribution formula fo those funds.  In addition to funding travel, recruitment, and consultants from our salary savings, there are a number of ongoing commitments to departments and programs as well as some new initiatives that will be paid from that pool.  There also are several unknown variables that make firm commitments for every dollar difficult at this point, including undetermined costs associated with building moves and renovations, selection of Futures Initiatives requiring college commitments, and likely reallocations of resources within the college as well as allocations of funds received from the Provost's Office.  With that list of caveats in mind, I do want to share with you some of the major funding commitments from the college for the current year.

• Faculty development.  The college is allocating to each department an amount equal to $750 per full-time faculty member, or just short of $132,000.  This is a 25% increase in travel funding over last year's allocation from the college.  We are setting aside an additional $5,000 to support international travel.
• Faculty & staff recruitment.  COAL is conducting 18 searches this fall, and the college will fund up to $2,000 per search.
• Equipment.  The college has committed at least $61,500 of salary savings toward major equipment purchases this year, which does not include another $20,000 allocated from operations carry forward for faculty and staff computer upgrades.
• Program support.  Approximately $56,000 will go to support specific programs, including Ozarks Studies Institute, National Writing Project, Moon City Press, the Center for Dispute Resolution, and band instrument purchases.
• Personnel.  Each of the colleges will be hiring its own budget officer as well as create a professional staff or academic administrative position to oversee student success initiatives.  In a cost sharing arrangement with the Provost's and President's Offices, these positions will cost our college a little over $15,000 this year.

In addition to salary savings, the college had approximately $327,000 in total operations carry forward for FY07.  All but $30,000 of that amount has been returned to departments and programs based on the amounts contributed to the total carry forward.

The college also now is responsible for administering its own budget for online, intersession, and evening courses, which previously had been handled in the College of Continuing Education and the Extended University.  We are working closely with department heads to make the most efficient use of these funds through careful planning of semester schedules.

In the coming months I will know more about the longer-term budget picture for the college, and I will work closely with the heads and your departments to craft the most effective strategies for using our collective resources wisely and positioning our college well to argue for increased support.  If you ever have questions or suggestions in this regard, please do not hesitate to contact me.

Graduate education: I am creating a new college-level committee to advise the Dean's Office regarding graduate education.  We will publish a formal charge for the committee soon, but my intent is for its membership to consist of graduate directors and, in the case of departments without graduate directors, a faculty member appointed by the department head.  This committee will meet monthly to address present issues and to develop strategic priorities for graduate education in COAL.

Department compensation guidelines: I have endorsed and forwarded all department guidelines revisions for evaluation year 2007.  I do not anticipate any request for changes coming from the Provost's Office.  Thanks to everyone for their diligent work in reviewing your criteria and procedures.

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October 1, 2007 

As you have been hearing for a while now, colleges are gaining more control over their own budgets while also being asked to take more direct responsibility for prioritizing and optimizing the funds with which they operate.  As the college looks to utilize our one-time salary savings accumulated last year and plans ahead to generate salary savings strategically to fund needs and initiatives, I have set several priorities, including:

• Recruitment and retention of excellent faculty and staff.
• Support for faculty scholarship/creativity and development.
• Technology and infrastructure support.
• Adequate support for existing academic programs.
• Student recruitment, retention, and success.

In upcoming communications I will be sharing in greater detail how specific budgetary decisions are being directed toward these priorities.

Everyone already should know about the University Calendar and how important it is to post your events to this master calendar.  Now there also is an easy-to-use form for submitting news items for distribution through the COAL web site as well as alerting University Communications.  Whereas the University Calendar primarily is to post information about events (location, time, etc.), the news submission form is for communicating stories about student or faculty accomplishments, or newsworthy aspects of events.  For example, Theatre & Dance posted a story about using A Lie of the Mind and two discussion panels as ways of drawing attention to National Domestic Violence Awareness Month.  There are two really cool things about using this news submission form.  First, the item you submit will be posted on the COAL web page.  Second, your item becomes part of the college's RSS (really simple syndication) feed, and that is sent directly to University Communications.  Many thanks to Angela Barker for creating this tool.

The Provost has issued a request for proposals for "curriculum innovation and enrichment." I encourage all faculty to look at the RFP and consider applying.  These proposals are due to the Dean's Office by November 26; consult with your department heads about their departmental deadlines.

Work on space and renovation issues continues behind the scenes.  Representatives from the English, Modern & Classical Languages, and Media, Journalism & Film departments met with architects last week to begin preliminary discussions regarding plans for Siceluff Hall.  Central administration is negotiating with several property owners to secure leased space downtown to accommodate current Siceluff occupants and potentially others.  We are hopeful that an announcement regarding a new downtown location for the Art & Design department may come soon.  Good things are coming the college's way eventually, we just have to wait patiently for them to develop.

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Here are some mid-summer new items.  For more information please contact the person or office named in each item.

• Salary notifications from Human Resources have been distributed via department mailboxes.  Contact your departmental office if you have not received your notification. Contact your department head or immediate supervisor if you have questions about the information on your salary notification.
• Decisions about searchesto be conducted this fall for positions beginning August 2008 have been made.  Department heads will begin this summer to plan and initiate these searches.  Contact your department head for more information.
• The Provost has issued calls for several categories of funding proposals, including:
• Futures initiatives -- Same process as last year, with one-page initial proposals due to the Dean's Office by August 23.  Check wih your department head for his/her departmental deadline. 
• Distance education programs -- The Provost has some one-time funds set aside to support development of online programs, specifically: (1) putting fully online programs that now are partially online; (2) putting programs online for the first time; or (3) putting general education courses online to expand the possibilities for students to complete the general education program online.  Department heads' deadline to the Dean's Office for intitial proposals is July 26.
• Innovative curriculum formats -- The Provost also has set aside funds to support innovative course delivery, such as through blended courses, weekend and short courses, October 18 is the deadline for proposals to reach the Dean's Office.  Contact your department head for more information.
• Student retention and success -- Particularly with respect to introductory general education courses and the freshman experience, the Provost is looking to support ideas for removing obstacles to student success.  The Dean's Office deadline is October 18.  Contact your department head for more information.
• Ozarks Studies and Asian Studies initiatives: You will be hearing more about new initiatives and opportunities in these areas, which are receiving some start-up support from the Provost's Office.
• Provost's Fellows: Congratulations to Diane Strickland and Dwaine Crigger, recently named Provost Fellows for Public Affairs and the Arts, respectively.
• The Missouri Fine Arts Academy concluded its 2007 session with closing convocation ceremonies on Saturday, June 30.  Congratulations to Director Julie Bloodworth and her entire MFAA faculty and staff.
• Tent Theatre continues with Blithe Spirit through this weekend before concluding with A Funny Thing Happened On the Way to the Forum.
• It isn't too soon to begin thinking about applications for 2008-09 sabbatical leaves (due in the Dean's Office no later than November 5).  See the Provost's web site for more information on this and other faculty development opportunities.