University of Idaho FACULTY COUNCIL MINUTES

2000-2001 Meeting #20, Tuesday, February 20, 2001

Present: McKeever (chair), Smelser (vice-chair), Bitterwolf, Brunsfeld, Chun, Finnie, Fritz, Glen, Goble, Goodwin, Guilfoyle, Haggart (w/o vote), Hong, Kraut, McCaffrey, McClure, Nielsen, Olson, Norby, Thomas (w/o vote) Absent: Foltz, Meier, Nelson, Pitcher, Thompson, Trivedi Observers: 9

Call to Order. A quorum being present, Faculty Council Chair, Professor Kerry McKeever, called the meeting to order at 3:35 p.m. in the Brink Hall Faculty Lounge.

Minutes. The council, by voice vote, accepted the minutes of the February 13, 2001, meeting as distributed.

Chair’s Report. Chair McKeever reported that the salary package, including a 2% base salary equity adjustment, had cleared the Joint Appropriations Finance Committee in the state legislature. She encouraged the council to personally email or write letters to individual legislators, thanking them for their consideration of the higher education salary request. We need to build positive relationships with all members of the legislature. The Idaho government web page contains the email addresses for all of the members of the legislature.

McKeever said that flowers and a card had been sent from the Faculty Council to U of Idaho faculty members Alice and Erol Barbut. Their daughter died in an automobile accident last weekend.

Vice Provost’s Report. Vice Provost Dene Thomas noted that this week is the opening of the jazz festival at the U of Idaho. The Provost and other university personnel are in Coeur d’Alene for an opening gala, which is actually a scholarship fund raising event for the U of Idaho. She encouraged faculty members to interact with the young people who will be visiting our campus this week – remembering that these people are potential future U of Idaho students.

FC-01-021 – Report and Recommendations on Tenure Review and Development. The council had been provided, during the past week, with a number of documents and memorandums that reviewed what had transpired so far and discussed a variety of options that reflected the viewpoints of Provost Pitcher and Faculty Council Chair McKeever. Chair McKeever also reviewed documents relating to the faculty review process at Washington State University (WSU). She explained that the major difference in their policy from ours was the fact that WSU faculty members were provided with the opportunity to sign-off and comment on their reviews. This procedure puts an added emphasis on the acceptance or rejection of the review. It also makes administrators pay more attention to the way reviews are written – keeping in mind how they will be received. She also told the council that annual performance reviews at WSU allowed refereed materials to be considered as a “peer review” of that faculty member’s work. McKeever said that during the next visit of the accreditation team from the National Association of Schools and Colleges (NASC) the faculty needs to make sure that NASC fully understands the faculty review process. A report needs to be presented to the accreditation team by members of the faculty.

Chair McKeever outlined the process that should take place at this meeting regarding today’s agenda item. The first part of the meeting would be used for further discussion of the report recommendations. The council would then provide specific directives to the Faculty Affairs Committee. The Faculty Affairs Committee would then work with these directives and report back to the council at a later date with specific recommended changes to the Faculty-Staff Handbook. The council then continued the discussion it began last week regarding the issues raised by the Tenure Review and Development Task Force in its report and recommendations to the council.

While most of the discussion points raised at this meeting had been discussed earlier, Councilor Kraut raised the issue of from what source the funds would come from to allow the proposed reward system to be funded. McKeever indicated that the funding could come from the Campaign for Idaho fundraising, which does have money ear-marked for faculty development and salaries. Professor Mark Anderson, from the College of Law, warned the council to be wary of funding promises made by any administration. Administrators do not have the longevity of faculty members and their successors are not obliged to keep those promises made earlier. He said it is difficult to build a reward structure on promises. Accept the fact that promised rewards may never materialize. He reminded the council that if the money is not ear-marked new funds, it must come out of existing funds, which means that the reallocation is being taken from other parts of the salary budget. Vice Provost Thomas said that if it did not involve new funding then the reward funds would have to come off the top of the salary budget. Councilor Brunsfeld said that he was not willing to give up the rewards part of the proposal just because it might not be funded. He indicated that because the administration was anxious to see the faculty solve the tenure review issue, that it might be more easily convinced to keep a promise of funding rewards. McKeever told the council that she has received draft wording from the provost for a Regents’ Distinguished Professorship and from the Development Office a variety of 2000-2001 Faculty Council Minutes – Meeting #20 – February 20, 2001 Page 2 endowed professorships. Both of these draft proposals show that the university is actively seeking funding to reward members of the faculty whose work is exemplary. Professor Nicholas Gier, speaking as the state representative for the American Federation of Teachers, told the council that he favored the removal of the five-year review from the Faculty-Staff Handbook. He thought that the policy would not stand up to a test in a court of law. He favored the strengthening of the annual review process and the approval of a faculty-friendly “trigger” that allowed under- performing faculty members to be identified and helped.

Councilor McClure provided the council with a written report of her reactions to and concerns with the proposed policy. While indicating that the recommendations were notable aspirations that would certainly benefit the U of Idaho, she outlined a number of concerns with the proposed policy. She urged the council to seek a streamlined, yet effective process, that emphasized faculty development and a system to reward accomplishments, in addition to the normal review of past accomplishments.

Councilor Goble noted that the process really involves several areas that are under review – job descriptions, annual evaluations, and post-tenure review are all parts of the same process. Something needs to be done to bring all of these parts together into one interrelated package.

Chair McKeever asked the council to issue specific directives, by way of adopted motions, to the Faculty Affairs Committee.

It was moved and seconded (Goble, McClure) that the content (what is submitted) of faculty evaluations (regardless of whether they are annual, three-year, or five-year) consist of the following items: an updated curriculum vitae, student evaluations, a brief narrative description of scholarship, teaching, service, and professional activities for the preceding year – all related and relative to the faculty member’s job description. The motion was adopted by unanimous vote. During the discussion of this motion the question was asked as to the possibility of posting the curriculum vitae of all faculty members on the web. The response of the Faculty Secretary’s Office was that, according to a ruling by the university counsel, it was illegal to make this information public without the consent of the faculty member.

It was moved and seconded (Kraut, Bitterwolf) that faculty evaluations be conducted on an annual basis. The motion was adopted by unanimous vote.

It was moved and seconded (Smelser, Fritz) that faculty members have the right to “sign-off” and add comments to their annual evaluations. This sign-off would occur on the final draft of the evaluation document as submitted to the faculty member by his or her evaluator and before the evaluation document went forward to the next higher administrative or review authority. That final evaluation document would be retained throughout the evaluation process and become a part of the faculty member’s permanent file. The motion was adopted by unanimous vote.

It was moved and seconded (Goble, Chun) that the discussion/evaluation of a faculty member’s job description, development materials, and annual evaluations occur concurrently. Professor Harkins pointed out that the position description and annual evaluations are already tied together by current Faculty-Staff Handbook policy. There are also timing issues involved because the position descriptions are usually written and finalized in the fall and performance evaluations take place in early spring. Linking by time will create an impossible situation. However, he said the Faculty Affairs Committee does understand the concerns raised in this particular discussion. The motion failed on a vote of 4 in favor and 14 against.

It was moved and seconded (Bitterwolf, Smelser) that a more intensive peer review be triggered when a faculty member receives a numerical evaluation score in a major area of responsibility of less than 2 (unsatisfactory) in two consecutive years. After considerable discussion on the finer points of the use of evaluation numbers and the issue of whether to use the individual position description area scores or the overall evaluation score as a trigger mechanism, the motion was amended to read: the Faculty Council directs the Faculty Affairs Committee to come up with a “trigger” system based on the points raised in the discussion of the original motion. The motion as amended was adopted by majority vote with one abstention.

Chair McKeever said that the Faculty Affairs Committee (FAC) would return recommendations to the Faculty Council in time for its meeting of March 6th. Professor Harkins asked council members to provide him with ideas that they would like the FAC to consider in their deliberations. He said that he may also ask members of the council to appear before the FAC to provide additional testimony on this issue. McKeever reminded the council members to make use of the discussion web site set aside on the Faculty Council web page as a way of expressing their viewpoints. All of this information will be used by the Faculty Affairs Committee in their deliberations.

Adjournment. Chair McKeever adjourned the meeting at 5:05 pm.

Respectfully submitted,

Peter A. Haggart Secretary of the Faculty Council