HAPPY SNOW DAY! This ice storm is initiation for Heather and Stephanie—Welcome to the winters in Missouri.
Congratulations to Sandra and Cliff House for 45 years of marital bliss! Happy 45th anniversary Sandra.
Budget Update: Dr. Nietzel spoke at dept heads meeting yesterday and echoed what Carey has put in his dean’s blog and emails: we are cautiously optimist about this and next year’s budget because of Governor Nixon’s deal with the state universities. In the meantime, we are not to go back to “business as usual” with our budgets. We are not going full tilt on faculty/staff searches at this point and Carey has yet to give his decision about current college searches. Further, Dr. Nietzel is continuing his policy to restrict international travel and unnecessary in-country travel. Carey has not put a limitation on requests for travel funds this semester, so I anticipate honoring the Central States and Sooners travel requests. There are a few of you with international travel requests and we should meet soon to review those.
I am in the process of reviewing our current budget and as long as we get our expected transfers IN to the budget, we should be fine. At this time we have spent half of our typical budget (allocated budget + carry forward from ‘08 online, course and honors payments). So we are on track to have small carry forward for next year…which, is what we planned on. The president indicated yesterday that he is not going to withhold a portion of each college’s carry forward monies, indicating that salary and other savings should remain in colleges. So, I feel positive that we won’t be “taxed” for carry forward money by the president. What is still unclear is if the dean will do this. I’ll keep you posted on Carey’s budget plans, as I know them. I am happy to report that thus far we have been able to honor most of our budget priorities this year (new faculty initiatives, travel requests, equipment funds, and part-time work for the graduate college and debate team).
Reminders
ADVISEMENT UPDATE: With fall registration we will be using the new Banner registration system. As such because all pre-reqs will be enforced at the time of registration for students, we want as many students who are in progress with their admission requirements not to be encumbered (registration block) due to not being admitted.
As you may recall from our last faculty meeting, we agreed to admit all students who were currently IN PROGRESS with a core course or completing 59 hours. At this time we are not including those who are below the 2.5 gpa and those who are on probation. I will consider exceptions for those who are very close to the gpa. Realize that if a student who is admitted now does not meet those requirements by the end of the semester, his/her registration will be dropped will require a registration override from the dept office in order to re-register for classes. We want to have as few of these as possible, but of course it’s up to the students to complete their requirements.
What to do: Check your advisee list and identify those who are currently in progress with meeting admission requirements (unless they do not have the overall gpa met). Contact them and make an appointment to begin the admission paperwork as soon as possible, preferably in February. The sooner we get this done, the less hassle students will face when it comes time to register. Not only is this a student friendly policy, it also allows us to have as many eligible students as possible to register for our upper division courses this fall. As a reminder, ALL pre-reqs are now being enforced at the point of registration. So there is much at stake here in getting as many undergraduate students admitted as possible. Let me know if you have any questions.
May Commencement: Please plan to attend. You should have already received information about reserving regalia. Please submit this or if you have your own regalia then RSVP by March 13. Our students always enjoy having faculty at graduation to celebrate with them and in many cases they want to introduce you to their family. As before, the dean’s office will award the dept with the most faculty in attendance at commencement with money for food at a future departmental faculty meeting. COAL will walk at the 10:00am ceremony.
Faculty Meeting Agenda: 3:15 in Craig 337 (
slight time and room change from previous semesters).
1. General announcements
2. Com 115 mass lecture discussion
3. COM Scholarships 2009-2010 update
3. Banner policy changes review
4. Handouts
General Education revisions
Digital Measures (electronic vita) update
Faculty Meeting Items:
COM 115 and large lecture sections. Discussion have been going on with myself, John and Carey about moving a number of Com 115 sections into a mass lecture format with break out sections for giving speeches. Initially we were concerned with some student satisfaction data that John received recently. One option that emerged was to have a full time faculty member give a lecture one or two days a week and then have graduate students grade speeches in smaller breakout sections. We need a 250 seat lecture hall and also discovered those are few and far between on campus. We have been able to secure Carrington Auditorium and others are becoming more available as administration is working to release more space. Now we’re looking for faculty to provide their input. So, one main issue for discussion on Wednesday is to get your impressions of this format change and the implication of it for the basic course and instruction generally. We look forward to your input.
Other banner reminders/policies:
Beginning the fall 2009 semester, you must declare your grading policy in your syllabus. This deals with the new plus/minus grading option that will be available this fall. You need to inform you students in the syllabus what you grading scale is.
Beginning the spring 2010 semester, MWF classes will begin at 7:30, and have 15 minutes between classes.
A few changes have been discussed relative to the basic skills component of the general education program. IDS 110 has seen the most changes as it is being proposed to become a 2 credit hour course. Additionally, the CIS 101 course may go away for the majority of students who test out of it (likely during SOAR). And financial and information literacy components are being sought as additional elements of the basic skills. GEP 397 is still under review but currently it is unlikely to return to the program and instead replaced with the additional components noted above. I have this information in a table format from faculty senate, but it’s not here at home with me to attach. I will have it for tomorrow’s faculty meeting.
Have a great rest of the day, stay safe, and hopefully we’ll see you tomorrow for our faculty meeting.
Kelly
Another spring semester has begun and this time without an ice storm! So far we've had a mild winter, but I'm not banking on it being that way for much longer. We've gotten 14 inches of snow in March before. I'm hoping for a mild winter this year since I'm now officially a commuter from Fair Grove. Yep, Jay and I officially moved into our cabin on New Year's Eve! There are some hilly areas I have to drive now to get here to work. After moving in, we stayed there for 3 nights and then packed again and took off last week to Colorado. I thought the trip was poorly timed, but once we got there, I forgot about the dissary of the house and all the boxes. We enjoyed great skiing conditions (powder) while there and so it was worth it to get a break from the move and remodeling. Since returning, we've gotten the kitchen, living room, and dining rooms fully set up. The rest can be done on weekends. I feel good about it all and look forward to having an open house next month sometime for everyone. Later this week, I'll get some pictures on my family blog and I'll send the link to you so you can see a few home movies and still pictures of the new place. I appreciate all the well wishes you've given me recently on getting moved in, I can't wait to share the new place with you all.
I hope your classes have started out nicely. I am teaching COM 300: Careers in Communication in the first block and have a great group of juniors and seniors who are eager to work on their resumes and learn about great jobs for COM majors. I hope you have great students as well. So, a few business items to take care of:
Faculty Meetings Schedule for Spring 2009
Wednesdays, 3:15-5:00pm, Craig 337: January 28, February 18, March 18, April 15, and May 6 (CGEIP and Grad Council overlap)
Additional Items of Notes
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Craig Hall roof installation. Word from the dean is that the roof installation should be completed by first of next week. Weather delays prevented them from meeting the January 9 deadline. Many of you have complained and shared grave health concerns and those have been duly noted by the dean and Bob Eckles. They've made some adjustments to the vents on the roof and yesterday was better, but we'll have to go day by day. If your room is Craig is unbearable due to fumes, you should get with Karen immediately and schedule a temporary room change. You may want to adjust offifce hours as well while the work is being completed. Let me know how things are working for you in that matter.
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Beginning of semester notes: For liability reasons, if a student’s name is not on your class list, please do not allow that student to attend unless he or she can provide verification of enrollment.
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The class schedule for Summer 2009 and Fall 2009 will be published on the web February 17. We will have time before then to make adjustments, but for now, everything is set. If you have any questions about your schedule for either semester, let me or Karen know.
3. I'd like to get the facutly profiles on the webpage updated. So, please review your bio and send me a word document with any revisions. I'd like these done before our first faculty meeting, January 28. 4. The provost and president have been talking a lot recently about the budget relative to enrollments. In particular they are requesting that we work doubly hard in recruitment and retention of new and returning students. This will be a brief discussion item for our January faculty meeting. The dean has identified a number of ways for us to consider pursuing ramping up recruitment efforts. Here are a few:
o Responding promptly and enthusiastically to inquiries from prospective students.
o Having faculty available to meet with students on campus visits, which includes being prompt for appointments, engaging with students and parents, and excited about your programs.
o Having clear information and advisement for students. Make it easy and satisfying for them to access the information they need.
o Consider ways of welcoming students during the first week of classes. For example, as department heads you might visit some of your introductory or gen ed classes to say hello and welcome. Make a point of being in the hallways and greeting students. Send an email out to all your students welcoming them back and sharing any pertinent beginning-of-the-semester information.
o Reach out to area high school teachers and counselors and dual credit instructors.
5. Don't forget, BANNER is coming online soon with fall 2009 registration. There are a number of BANNER info sessions that are available for you to attend to find out about new and revised policies. I am doing some beta training next week on the student portal and will have some things to share with you at the faculty meeting about how it's working. As the system becomes more and more available to faculty, I'll share screen shots of it at our faculty meetings this semester.
6. Thanks to Randy, Char, and Janis who will be reviewing the merit documents over the next couple of weeks. We appreciate all the work you are doing here. Their recommendations are due to me by January 30. My deadline is February 28, along with the annual reviews and meetings with each of you separately. At the faculty meeting I'll share with you how that process is going to go given that we'll likely have no or minimal salary increases next year.
HAVE A GREAT SEMESTER. More to come before our January 28 faculty meeting.
Kelly