HeadsUp

SNOW DAY Updates

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. 

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