Present: J. Cummins, B. Ferguson, K. Jacobson, J. Meehan, R. Osgood, S. Rebelsky, J. Swartz, E. Willis

The meeting came to order at 1:15 p.m. in room 203 of the Rosenfield Student Center.

The minutes and excerpts from October 3, 2007 were approved.

President’s Remarks

The President briefly reported on the meeting of the Board of Trustees held in Grinnell last week. He noted that they had voted to approve the second phase of the Athletics Facilities and eventual demolition of the PEC in an environmentally responsible manner. He also said that they had reviewed the Carbon Policy and with no objection left the President to adopt it which he will. There was further discussion of physical facility development.

Dean’s Remarks

The Dean announced that the College had received a $200,000 grant from the Arthur Vining Davis Foundations to support construction and outfitting of the new Introductory Biology Laboratories in the Noyce Science Center.

He noted that the Curriculum Committee had met to further discussion of registration of first-year students next semester. There was discussion of the major issues brought forward in the division meetings, such as “gaming” the system, resource shortage questions, support for our advising system, course caps, mixed registration systems, software, etc. The Dean stated that whatever steps will be taken to address the major issues the process would be iterative.

He asked for Council input to the agenda of the next Faculty Meeting. It was decided to take this up at the end of the meeting.

Council Remarks

B. Ferguson reported that the Division discussed the proposal from the Curriculum Committee on pre-registration and was generally supportive, particularly of its ability to generate new data on courses individuals did not get into. They did, however, express some concern on how students might strategize. They also mentioned that there is a resource issue involved as well.

He further reported that the Division discussed the faculty vote to retain class visitation from chairs as a part of three-year merit reviews. Many in the Division believe that the faculty development potential of these visits should be encouraged. More generally, they urged more discussion of the College’s approach to faculty development.

Ferguson noted that the Political Science Department has requested that Council move quickly on bringing the matter of making appointments at the rank of associate professor to a close because they have a search closing date fast approaching and would benefit from having this flexibility as they consider the pool.

E. Willis noted that she received several questions from Trustees that indicated support of her desire to bring Grinnell faculty members’ salaries into parity with our colleagues and she would like to accomplish this objective.

Willis also noted that she has received numerous complaints from faculty about teaching classrooms in ARH and Carnegie which are inadequate to their current pedagogies. There was discussion.

S. Rebelsky entered the meeting at 1:50 p.m.

J. Meehan reported that she had been approached by faculty support persons regarding their need to have classroom schedule information online to facilitate locating appropriate teaching spaces for faculty. The Dean agreed that it is not currently available online.

B. Ferguson noted that he believes that the informal meetings he had with various Board members at dinner over the weekend were the most productive he had ever experienced.

Economics Department Staffing Request

This matter was brought to Council’s attention one day before their regularly scheduled meeting and so does not appear on the agenda.

B. Ferguson presented the case for the Economics Department’s request for a new tenure-track position and the rationale for bringing this request to Council out of the regular period of Council consideration of such requests in April each year. Basically, the Department is facing a prolonged period of uncertainty and leaves which threatens their ability to continue to regularly meet student demand in several key subfields. They would like to stabilize the situation now rather than annually face the task of recruiting for term replacements for the next five to eight years. There was a prolonged discussion revolving around established Council policies governing such position requests, including those that govern early consideration and affirmative action. Throughout the discussion there was clear tension between Council’s strong desire to move away from reliance on term appointments to address the need to cover leaves and principles behind established policies and treating departments equitably. In the end, Council declined to act on the proposal, but left open the possibility that the proposal could be resubmitted with some changes.

The meeting adjourned at 3:10 p.m.

Secretary
Karen Wiese