Minutes of the Meeting of the Executive Council
November 6, 2002
Excerpts
The meeting came to order at 4:20 in the Nollen House Conference Room.
The minutes and excerpts from the meetings of October 30th were approved.
President's Remarks
The President noted that the Chair of the Board of Trustees has completed the process of selecting the ad hoc athletic facilities committee which will meet on December 8th in Chicago. He has asked Tom Moore and Dee Fairchild to attend.
Dean's Remarks
The Dean noted that his office has not received any departmental proposals for Mellon Postdoctoral Fellows. He urged Council members to speak with their respective department chairs and stated that he would be contacting those departments with built-up demand for teaching MAPs or where there were study leaves.
He circulated by email a note about the fact that the Committee on Academic Standing is currently discussing grade distribution and asked what further action Council would like to take. S. Barber asked to see any report which might be forthcoming from the Committee. D. Kaiser asked that Council be notified if the Committee does not plan to pursue issues which arise from the discussion. The Dean noted that since M. Montgomery also sits on the Committee in his role as Chair of the Faculty and can act at the Council liaison in this regard.
Council Member's Remarks
M. Schneider asked why the 2002 President's Report did not mention faculty accomplishments as usual. The President reminded Council that the format and schedule of College publications has changed this year. There is a separate publication which will be published shortly after the Faculty Activities Reports have been received in July which will chronicle faculty accomplishments for 2001-02 and 2002-03 and that this publication will be issued every other year from now on.
Music Department Proposal for Accompanist
Council considered a proposal from the Music Department to conduct a national search for a full-time, non-tenurable, renewable appointment for accompanist and ultimately approved a position description.
Faculty Salary Process
M. Montgomery noted that he perceives that the faculty have provided Council with a mandate to proceed to develop a reform of the faculty salary process. He is currently processing the information from the faculty ballots but is convinced at this stage that some form of a merit system is desired by the majority of the faculty. M. Schneider reported on the results of an email poll he conducted among the science faculty with 21 responding favoring merit as a reward with the inclusion of teaching as a factor of consideration.
There was discussion of the target of faculty salaries being pegged at 105% of those of faculty at our peer institutions. This discussion centered around a widely held belief that the College should be doing much better in compensating the junior faculty. The President stated that he believes that these should be the subjects of faculty discussion which inform the planning process.
The meeting adjourned at 6:07 p.m.
Secretary
Karen Wiese