GEORGIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
SCHEDULED MEETING OF THE GENERAL FACULTY & GENERAL
FACULTY ASSEMBLY
COMBINED WITH A CALLED MEETING OF THE ACADEMIC SENATE
Tuesday, February 27, 2007, Global
MINUTES
1. The President opened the meeting at 3:05 P.M. and offered the following comments on matters of interest to the Georgia Tech community:
a. President Clough began by congratulating the Georgia Tech library for its selection for the Association of College and Research Libraries (ACRL) 2007 Excellence in Academic Libraries Award. This is remarkable recognition because the size of the Tech library measured in numbers of volumes is not as large as those of many universities having medical and law colleges. But Dean Rich Meyer and his staff have revolutionized the way a research library works in a university community. Notable achievements have included the development of the west and east commons areas.
b.
Construction will begin soon on renovation of the Old Civil Engineering
Building. It has been under-utilized in recent times because of air
quality problems. Over the years, it has served several schools and now
the legislature has granted Tech funds for its renewal. With an
additional $4 million in private funds, it will become a beautiful building
again and will be ready to be occupied by a unit of the
c.
Georgia Tech is renewing its assessments of needs and goals for the
d.
The
e. President Clough congratulated the Georgia Tech faculty for bringing in research funding at a record pace. This is remarkable because recent years were also strong. If the pace keeps up, the milestone of $400 million in research funding could be crossed this fiscal year.
f.
He also reported that discussions have continued with
g.
President Clough just returned from a meeting of the National Governor’s
Association. He serves on a task force for economic development, K-12
education, and higher education. There were meetings with all the
governors, as well as with the five assigned to the task force, three other
university presidents, and a group of CEOs. Governor Perdue was there and
expressed very positive feelings about
2. The President called for approval of the minutes of the previous meeting of the General Faculty, General Faculty Assembly, and Academic Senate held on February 6, 2007. He indicated that the minutes have been posted on the faculty governance web site and that a link was provided from this meeting’s agenda. The minutes were approved without dissent. See Attachment #1
3. The President called on Jim Fetig, Assistant Vice President for Institute Communications and Public Affairs. President Clough explained that Mr. Fetig has been at Tech for just under a year and one of his first assignments was to conduct a study of how well various constituencies outside the campus know Georgia Tech. This is particularly important given the changes to Georgia Tech over the past two decades, including broadening its offerings beyond the area of engineering where Tech is best known. Georgia Tech has taken steps to get word out about all that is going on, but one needs to test how well the message is getting through for a number of different audiences. This is important in building the reputation of the institution and in recruiting students, faculty and staff. Tech conducted two of these studies previously, one before the Olympics and one after. After this introduction, Mr. Fetig provided the faculty with a comprehensive description of the most recent study of the Georgia Tech brand identity. He particularly noted that he appreciates all the faculty has done in talking with the press and other media about their work as this helps build greater awareness of Georgia Tech.
4. The President then called on Dr. Jim McClellan for a report and proposals from the Student Computer Ownership Committee. Dr. McClellan used a presentation found in Attachment #2. He began by telling the faculty that the committee was bringing them a proposal that students be required to own a laptop computer beginning with the incoming class in the fall of 2008. He introduced and thanked the members of the committee shown on slide 2 of the attachment and explained that the contributions of Linda Cabot, Miles Edson, and Alex Taubman were particularly important as they are responsible for making the existing computer ownership program work and have a lot of expertise to offer. From this point on, he followed the text of the presentation closely and covered:
· The rationale for the policy change as well as some general concerns the committee has heard;
· Surveys of faculty and students and other data gathering, including data showing that 88% of incoming students already have laptops;
· How the laptops would be used to enhance teaching and learning;
· What peer institutions are doing;
· The extra load that will be placed on IT support and provisions needed to enhance support; and
· Finally the recommendation.
Given that 88% already have laptops, the point of the policy change is not so much to promote laptop use as it is for teachers to be sure they can count on each student having one in making plans for class usage.
There was a question from the audience about whether there would also be mandated software. Jim responded that there already is a core set of required software and he did not anticipate that to change. Of course, particular classes can have additional specialized requirements, analogous to textbook requirements. Linda Cabot from OIT commented that having global students carrying laptops out of the country can present additional challenges owing to license and export restrictions. Some student editions of software also have performance limitations relative to what the professor has. These issues will take a little while to address so the planned start in fall of 2008 allows enough time.
Dr. McClellan then moved that Georgia Tech change the requirement for
student computer ownership so that students entering in the fall of 2008 will
be required to own laptops. The motion was seconded. Dr. Clough
asked for discussion and Tanah Barchichat asked why this should start in 2008
and not, say, 2009. Dr. McClellan responded that 2008 provides enough
time to get ready but then it is prudent to proceed expeditiously. The whole
transition will take until 2011 at which time all students will have
laptops. If the start of the program were delayed, attention to
preparation might be diffused and less effective. Dr. Clough asked about
lessons that could be learned from other universities that have made this
transition, and he specifically asked about
5 Dr. Clough turned to the matter
of proposed changes in the Georgia Tech Statutes that would add new members of
the Georgia Tech campus community to the ranks of the General Faculty.
These groups include Post Doctoral Fellows and selected Athletic Affairs
Professionals who will be coming to Georgia Tech employment from the Georgia
Tech Athletic Association (GTAA). This issue has been discussed by the
Georgia Tech Executive Board and they asked the Statutes Committee to draw up
the proposed changes to the Statutes that are to be considered today.
There was also considerable discussion of the underlying issues at the February
6, 2007 meeting of the faculty.
Dr. Clough stated that adding Post Doctoral Fellows and Athletics Affairs
Professional to the General Faculty would not ordinarily be considered.
The reason this is being proposed now is that General Faculty membership is
required under present
Dr. Clough also noted that GTAA was founded as a separate but affiliated
501(c)3 corporation. They employed the coaches and other athletic affairs
professionals as employees of the corporation. The trend in universities
participating in NCAA, however, is to bring these professionals into the
university and better integrate intercollegiate athletics with the rest of the
campus. Georgia Tech is presently going through re-certification with
NCAA and one of the things the NCAA looks at is whether the university is
firmly in control of the intercollegiate athletics program. Tech’s
Director of Athletics, Dan Radakovich, is a big supporter of better integration
of athletics with the Institute as a whole. Already today the Registrar’s
Office works closely with the athletics program to accomplish NCAA required
certifications of the financial aid offered and of the progress made by student
athletes toward completion of their degree requirements. Preparations are
being made to support athletics operations in the GIT HR and accounting
systems. Thus Tech feels it is appropriate at this time to move its
athletics affairs professionals from GTAA to regular university employment.
The proposed Statutes modifications are seen as an important step in this and
at the February 6, 2007 meeting, the faculty voted to support the concept and
send the matter to the Statutes Committee for detailed wording.
Similarly, the majority of the faculty at that meeting felt that it would be a
disservice to Tech’s Post Doctoral Fellows to saddle them with the ten-year
vesting of the TRS program and essentially lock them into a program with
unfavorable returns. Not only is this a matter of fairness but it is also
smart for recruiting talent. Accordingly, the recommendation to add them
to the General Faculty was part of the charge to the Statutes Committee.
There are no financial impacts on Georgia Tech from this proposal because Tech
would be contributing to TRS anyway and the difference between the formula for
TRS and ORP is negligible.
The
Dr. Clough reminded the faculty that it would take a 2/3 majority vote of the
General Faculty present to pass any proposed Statutes changes to expand
membership in the General Faculty. He then called on Dr. Paul Griffin,
chair of the Statutes Committee, to present the committee’s proposals.
Dr. Griffin made his presentation with the slides shown in Attachment #3b. Attachment
#3a contains background material previously presented at the February 6,
2007 meeting. Detailed wording of the proposed changes in the Statutes is
contained in Attachment #3c. In going
through the material in Attachment #3b, Dr.
Griffin began by reviewing the history of previous discussions and the
preparation of the proposals. The proposed changes that add Post Doctoral
Fellows and Athletic Affairs Professionals to the General faculty are found in
Section 5.1.1. Post Doctoral Fellows are simply added to the existing
list of members of the Corps of Instruction. Athletic Affairs
Professionals are then added by defining a new class of member of the General
Faculty, analogous to the existing group called Professional Classified
Staff. The definition of Athletic Affairs Professional refers to a list
of specific titles that make up this group as will be found in Section 13 of
the Faculty Handbook. Dr. Griffin explained that Section 5.1.1 is part of
the Statutes and thus changes to this Section require two readings for final
approval. In contrast, Section 13 is just policy and needs only one
reading. A draft form of Section 13 is provided in Attachment #3c but work will continue on it and will
be formally proposed in conjunction with the second reading of the changes to
Section 5.1.1.
Dr. Griffin asked if there were any questions or comments. Dr. Clough
noted that none of those proposed to be added to the General Faculty would be
eligible to vote on academic matters such as curriculum changes or anything
else reserved for the Academic Faculty. A question was asked if any of
this would have any effect on Tech’s overhead rates and Chuck Donbaugh answered
no.
Dr. Clough then called on Dr. Ron Bohlander, Secretary of the Faculty, to
present a resolution for the faculty to consider that relates to the proposals
Dr. Griffin presented. He used Attachment #3d
to present the proposed supplemental resolution. He noted that several
had commented, at the February 6, 2007 meeting of the faculty, that it would it
would be nice to provide for the sunset of those memberships in the General
Faculty that have been made just for access to ORP. While it is
understood that the Chancellor may put in place a change to allow access to ORP
for all salaried employees, it is not possible to be sure that is just how it
will come out. Therefore it is difficult to build detailed sunset
provisions directly into the Statutes. Nevertheless, there was clearly
strong interest in doing something about sunset provisions at the last faculty
meeting as well as at the Executive Board meetings in January and
February. Thus, the Executive Board (through electronic ballot) decided
to recommend a resolution for the faculty to consider as shown in Attachment #3d. Dr. Bohlander went through the
wording of the resolution which indicates that, at such time as the rules for
ORP participation are substantially changed, the Executive Board will initiate
a process of review of classes of membership in the General Faculty with an
emphasis on continuing membership for those involved in the core missions of
the university as defined by the Board of Regents; namely, teaching, research,
extension, and library & archival services. The resolution further
provides that “Professionals recommended for discontinued membership in the
General Faculty should not lose fringe benefits, retirement or vacation
privileges as a result of such an action.”
Dr. Griffin then made a motion that the General Faculty adopt the proposed
changes to Section 5.1.1 of the Statutes (as shown in Attachment #3c).
The motion was seconded and passed by more than the necessary 2/3 majority.
Dr. Bohlander moved that the General Faculty adopt the sunset resolution
just presented (in Attachment #3d). The motion was seconded and passed
unanimously.
Dr. Clough asked about the second reading of the Statutes change just
passed. Dr. Bohlander indicated that the next planned meeting of the
faculty is on April 17, 2007. However, to comply with the requirement to
wait 60 days before a second reading, this meeting may be postponed until after
60 days have elapsed.
6. The President addressed the need for the Academic Senate to approve minutes of Standing Committees of the Academic Faculty. He indicated that these minutes were published on the faculty governance web site and that a link was provided from the formal agenda for this meeting. (See Attachment #4).
a. The first set of minutes was from February 7, 2007 of the Undergraduate Curriculum Committee. There were no action items. The minutes were approved without dissent.
b. Bill Green, Chair of the Graduate
Curriculum Committee, indicated that there was one set of minutes to be
approved, from the February 8, 2007 meeting. Highlights of the action
items included: There were a number of routine curricular housekeeping
matters involving new courses and deactivated courses. There was one
information item concerning a new area of specialization for the Ph.D. in
psychology. The
7. The President called for approval of the minutes of Standing Committees of the General Faculty, which do not contain any action items, all of which have been posted on the web (see Attachment #4). This applied to only one committee, the Faculty Benefits Committee meetings of 11/15/06 and 12/13/06.
All minutes were approved without dissent.
8. The
President called for any other business. He mentioned, for information
only, that Vice President Al Gore would be speaking on campus in late afternoon
on April 18, 2007 under the auspices of the IMPACT Speaker Series from the
Hearing no further business, the President adjourned the meeting at 4:37 P.M.
Respectfully submitted,
Ronald A. Bohlander
Secretary of the Faculty
April 25, 2007
Attachments to be included with archival copy of the minutes: