Present: C. Hunter, E. Marzluff, J. Meehan, R. Osgood, S. Rebelsky, T. Roberts, J. Swartz, E. Willis

The meeting came to order at 4:15 p.m. in room 226 of the Joe Rosenfield Center. The minutes and excerpts of 1-31-07 were approved.

President’s Remarks

The President noted that the College’s Board of Trustees will have its winter meeting in Grinnell on February 8-10.

He also noted that the College has several searches in progress including the Athletic Director, the Special Assistant to the President for Diversity and Achievement, Director of Career Development, and Dean of Admissions and Financial Aid.

The President noted that he will travel to New York City next Tuesday to meet the new Vice President for the Liberal Arts Program at the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. His travel schedule may preclude his attendance at the next Council meeting.

Finally, the President remarked that we have occupied the Joe Rosenfield Center for eight months now and it has provided a great resource for our campus. He expressed an enormous debt of gratitude to Joe Rosenfield, without whose continued support this would not have been possible. There was some discussion of faculty desire to have greater use of the building spaces for teaching during the middle of the day when it is now not allowed and whether the building is shifting campus life too much toward the center of campus.

Dean’s Remarks

The Dean updated Council on the status of faculty searches.

The Dean updated Council on the status of negotiations with the North Central Association regarding our Self Assessment for the reaccreditation process. In addition to the “standard” areas of self assessment we have reached agreement on a special focus assessment in the areas of service, social justice, and leadership as highlighted in Strategy 2 of the Strategic Plan.

Council Remarks

S. Rebelsky asked if we should be concerned with trademark law when planning to use the phrase “No Limits” within the framework of a public relations campaign. The President stated that he does not see this as a problem at this time.

Rebelsky noted that he has received faculty complaint that those on Senior Faculty Status cannot serve as department chair. E. Willis asked whether he is asking for Council consideration of this issue. He responded that he does not see this as productive until issues of faculty voting are settled.

E. Willis noted that Ana Martinez Aleman will speak on corporate forms of assessment in higher education. She suggested that Council might find this talk informative as it prepares for its discussion of Strategic Plan metrics.

T. Roberts commented on the media coverage of the tuition hike, particularly with regard to the emphasis on comparing our tuition with that of Carleton and Macalester Colleges. He asked whether we tried to emphasize instead the more generous aspects of our financial aid policy to the media and he wondered whether there should have been a more vigorous and timely effort to educate the campus about the hike. The President responded that the media has chosen the area of emphasis and that this has not been a part of any statements issued by the College—further noting that the College has no control of what the media chose to print.

E. Marzluff noted some faculty have suggested that the reason why more faculty are unwilling to be considered for promotion is more complex than the Dean’s hypothesis (excerpts, December 5, 2005) that the small number of candidates for promotion to full this year is due to a lack of depth of the “pool” of available candidates due to the many promotions in the past two years. She suggested that this is something we continue to monitor as we go forward with the new procedures for identifying candidates for promotion.

Marzluff took advantage of the President’s attendance at this meeting to again bring up the matter of term faculty appointments as he was absent at the last meeting when she first brought the subject for discussion. The President stated that he very much believes that term faculty appointments need to be reduced to the minimum number necessary. However, he noted that there are a number of variables which cannot be accurately predicted, including retirements and resignations. E. Willis noted that the addition of tenure-track faculty is unlikely to achieve this objective because we have a great many opportunities for leaves to be taken by regular faculty. There was further discussion of this issue with regard to departmental curricular linearity (or lack thereof) in the major, maintenance of appropriate class size, and planned growth of the student body. The Dean noted that there is an issue with regularizing courses where there is the potential for not having faculty available to teach them as this is one more element in the equation.

History Department Tenure-track Position Proposal

There was discussion of a proposal from the History Department.

Physics Department Proposal for a CFD Appointment

There was discussion of a proposal from the Physics Department.

Department Proposals for Faculty Appointments

There was discussion of proposals from the theatre, Japanese, and political science departments.

Faculty Meeting Agendas—Spring ‘07

There was discussion.

The meeting was adjourned at 6:00 p.m.

Secretary
Karen Wiese