Present: C. Hunter, D. Lopatto, E. Marzluff, W. Moyer, R. Osgood, T. Roberts, J. Swartz, E. Willis

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

The minutes and excerpts of 4/19/06 were approved.

President’s Remarks

The President noted that he will be discussing the implementation of the strategic plan with the Trustees during their meeting in Grinnell this week.

Dean’s Remarks

He updated Council on the status of faculty searches.

He distributed a list of nominees for the positions of Director of the Center for the Humanities and the Center for International Studies. T. Roberts noted that he has experienced difficulties with the procedures for consideration of new Center Directors. Specifically, it is not sufficient for the Advisory Boards to simply receive a list of names. He would like additional information provided to these Boards such as indication that the persons being nominated are actually interested in assuming the position if offered as well as a statement of what approach those persons would take to directing the Center. He asked the Dean’s Office to request this information and to indicate that the individuals could provide different statements to the Advisory Boards and the Executive Council. This would allow the Advisory Boards to make informed decisions when making recommendations to Council.

Council Remarks

E. Willis noted that the Diversity Steering Committee will be meeting to consider the new Diversity Policy and Diversity Statement documents.

She also noted that she met with early career faculty recently in her capacity as incoming Chair of the Faculty. They have presented several proposals which she believes should be given consideration. For example, they believe that a new faculty member should be given a four course load to allow them to visit other faculty classrooms in an effort to help them develop effective classroom pedagogies. She noted that the group is especially focused on development of teaching skills and would appreciate stronger mentoring in their first years. There was some discussion of the balance between encouraging more attention to teaching in relation to scholarship.

Personnel Committee Information and Salary Merit Score Determination

W. Moyer noted that the Budget Committee has woefully less information than the Personnel Committee has regarding faculty performance as results from review for promotion to full professor. He believes that the Personnel Committee could summarize the salient points from the review in a few bulleted lists and pass this information to the Budget Committee to help them make their salary merit score decisions. This will be discussed later.

Position Proposals

Council discussed several position proposals.

The meeting was adjourned at 6:10 p.m.

Secretary
Karen Wiese