Present: S. Barber, V. Brown, L. Gregg-Jolly, M. Montgomery, R. Osgood, M. Schneider, J. Swartz, R. Vetter

The meeting came to order a 4:20 p.m. in the Nollen House Conference Room.

The 12/3/03 minutes and excerpts were amended and approved.

President's Remarks

The President noted that he would be hosting the mid-year graduation dinner this evening and that he would be leaving the meeting at 5:30 p.m.

Dean's Remarks

The Dean asked Council to meet at 3:30 p.m. on December 17th.

He updated Council on the various departmental staffing issues and the status of faculty searches.

Council Remarks

V. Brown noted that she had received (and was sharing with Council) an email from a faculty member expressing very strong reservations about taking the Bookstore off-campus. There was extensive discussion. M. Schneider asked for the establishment of a committee to take in the views of all stakeholders. The President noted that, in fact, John Kalkbrenner had asked for a mission statement should the College go forward with the relocation downtown.

V. Brown noted that she has had a series of communications with a faculty member about the calendar for applying for trips. The Dean responded that he intends to have the Committee for the Support of Faculty Scholarship review the matter.

The Dean reported on pre-registration. There were a total of over 500 courses on the spring schedule. Sixty four courses closed. There were 6,118 registrations. Three hundred fifty eight students were removed for closings and 261 were switched from one section to another. Fifteen students were removed for lack of prerequisites. There are 44 classes with five or fewer students. The Dean noted that we do very little to manage our enrollments.

The President left the meeting at 5:25 p.m.

L. Gregg-Jolly noted that if faculty were to get reports on enrollments it would be helpful for advising. V. Brown asked about College policy regarding the number of courses with low enrollments. This led into lengthy discussion of teaching load, Mentored Advanced Projects, contact hours, loss of course offerings, and the flexible fifth. V. Brown stated that she continues to be concerned with the possibility of diminution of course offerings resulting from faculty cashing in Mentored Advanced Project credits. L. Gregg Jolly asked the Dean if the number of credits/student for independent work had increased significantly over the past five years. The Dean responded that it had not been the case, noting that there has been an average of one independent course credit per faculty member per year. He also noted that he has asked the Curriculum Committee to discuss the role of independent study in our curriculum by engaging the faculty in such discussions in order to inform a planning discussion of faculty workload. He stated that, ultimately, if we are to think about decreasing course load then we must consider what must give.

Faculty Salary Process

The Dean noted that, given the agenda for the next meeting, he does not think that this item can also be discussed at that time. M. Schneider then asked what, if any, red flags were raised by the faculty responses to the Council memorandum to the faculty on this issue that need to be considered between now and January when the Budget Committee meets. The discussion turned to subject of the use of end-of-course evaluations by the Budget Committee in determining merit increases for the remainder of the meeting.

The meeting adjourned at 6:20 p.m.

Secretary
Karen Wiese