Our future is being created!
The word that comes to mind after our faculty meeting Wednesday is WOW.
Your thoughtful contributions regarding our response to the external review speak volumes about what we value and want to spend our time doing in the next couple of years. You were honest in your comments and your concerns, while also being positive about what we're committing to. You amaze me every time we get together and talk about the future of our department. We craft the document further each time we meet and have culled the critical elements that are most meaningful and reasonable to us as a department. I'm excited about forwarding this document to the Dean and Provost. Thank you.
IMPORTANT NOTE: I want to be sure that everyone's voices are heard. Some of you weren't able to be at the meeting, some left early, and some may not have provided their comments at all for whatever reason. So, please forward me any ideas you have to share and I will work to include those. This is YOUR document, your department, and your future, so you need to have a say in what is being forwarded. You may email me those, post them on the blog, or provide them in writing to me in the document directly
Minutes from the faculty meeting were forwarded to you in an email on 12/7/07.
Next steps
I have received some feedback from Dean Adams on the draft you got in advance of the faculty meeting. He's provided most editorial and wording suggestions. I met with him Friday Dec. 7 and shared with him the changes we agreed to Wednesday. We discussed some additional ways to craft the priority areas of change. I will incorporate those in the revision and highlight them for you to see. He is willing to review the next version still in advance of our Dec 17 deadline.
Additional News
Merit Applications and Annual Meetings
I plan to have your merit forms delivered via email by early next week. These are due January 9 via email back to me. I will also be emailing you over break with information about our annual review/workload negotiation meeting. These meetings between faculty and the dept head previously took place in May. Among other changes, the Provost has moved these meetings to January-February. At this meeting we will discuss the the work you will be doing in 2008 as well as what you intend to do in 2009. At that time you will also submit your request for teaching assignments and reassigned time (as relevant). ALL faculty will complete these meetings. Reviews are now ANNUAL for all faculty, no matter what rank or tenure status. More information will be provided before you come back to campus.
From COALbin
As the colleges have assumed control of their per course, online, and intersession budgets, discussions are occurring about how to prioritize program completion needs along with faculty interests in offering certain courses. In particular, because intersession courses have the potential to pay faculty additional money beyond a percentage of base salary based on enrollment, these types of courses are fairly costly for the college. In addition, how much a particular course will cost is unpredictable because enrollments fluctuate up to the day the course begins. In order to develop some criteria for how many and which courses to offer as a college, the dean has put a moratorium on new proposals for the August 2008 and the January 2009 intersessions. That means, no intersession proposals nor courses will be offered during those terms by the college. Other colleges may or may not take this action, so this affects only COAL courses. This is important in two ways: you need to know this for proposals you may have been considering AND you need to tell your advisees about this as they plan for fall 08 an spring 09.
Faculty Development Opportunities
The ADC (academic development center) has recently announced a number of upcoming development opportunity for faculty.
Scholarship in the community, Graduate Student Recruitment, Integrating research and teaching, Best practices in online education...and many more
- Go to the ADC website for other opportunities in the spring semester. Seminar topics in the spring include teaching large lecture courses, peer review, doing the scholarship of teaching and learning, professional development, and more.
Search Update
The search committee (Kelly, John, Char, Isabelle) have reviewed the applications for the two assistant professor positions and are completing the tiering process. We got a great pool from which to choose. We plan to bring 4 candidates in late January, early February for interviews.
That's it for now. Hope the rest of your semester wraps up smoothly. Good health, good cheer, and happy holidays to everyone!
Kelly