February 2022
February 2022
FACULTY REPRESENTATIVE ASSEMBLY MEETING
February 11, 2022
Attendance: Kelli Klebe, Suzanne Scott, David Moon, Minette Church, Norah Mazel, David Weiss, Andrea Hutchins, Henriikka Weir, Lynn Gates, Margaret Hunt, Deborah Kenny, Assma Sawani, Martin Key, Cortny Stark, Elisa Thompson, Curtis Turner, John Lindsey, Craig Bubeck, Suzanne Cook, David Diamond, Solveig Olsen, Kristi McCann, Kathrin Spendier, Claire Rau, Erica Allgood, Wendy Haggren, Lei Zhang, Ilaheva Tuaone, Matthew Jabaily, Kate Angulski, Farida Khan, Thomas Aicher, Glen Whitehead, Laura Eurich, Scott van Ness, Larry Eames, Dave Anderson, Joel Tonyan
Call to Order / Approval of Minutes:
Motion to approve the minutes from December 10, 2021 meeting by Larry Eames
Seconded by Claire Rau
Motion passed with 23 in favor, 0 opposed and 0 abstentions
Reports of Visitors:
Kelli Klebe, Interim Provost:
(Interim Provost Klebe presented a combined report to include information from Chancellor Reddy since he was unable to attend today’s meeting).
Chancellor Reddy thanked the faculty for their help in starting the Spring 2022 semester in-person as scheduled. This support of our students in continuing on their academic success path is appreciated. The chancellor also thanked the Covid Impact Task Force for their work in compiling and presenting the Faculty Assembly Covid survey results last month. Their information and recommendations are being reviewed for support. The governor’s budget proposal increase is not sufficient to meet our funding needs and there are several people in the CU system working with legislators. Our new VCDEI, Rame Hanna, will be starting on March 1, 2022 and we are excited to welcome them to our campus. We also want to thank AVCDEI Stephany Spaulding for her work in this role until the end of February. CU system will delay hiring a new DEI head until the new CU President is hired. We will be honoring Regent Chair Emeritus Kyle Hybl with an Honorary degree at the May Commencement ceremony. The Cabinet is evaluating the Future of Work Taskforce report recommendations. We are pleased with the decline of Covid cases and we’re working on next steps with the transition in rolling back Covid restrictions and mask regulations. Please feel free to share your comments and concerns. We have two new faculty fellows in the provost office for this semester. David Weiss will be working on policy development and Pat McGuire will be assessing faculty development needs. The campus Online Initiative is starting up and the system online activities are scaling down. Harper Johnson, AVCTHR, is leading the online initiative and Seth Porter, Dean of the Library, has been appointed to serve as the Academic Online Lead. CU Next, the proposal from system for teaching innovation, which requires collaboration with another CU campus and a campus commitment to support the proposal, is calling for proposals and the form to submit can be found here: https://www.cu.edu/oaa/academic-innovation-programs/cu-next-award. The deadline to notify the Office of Research that you are applying is February 14. The proposals are due by March 14 for campus review vetting and need to be submitted by April 2 to the CU Next portal. Please be sure to let us know about your opinions and concerns regarding the possibility of easing the mask mandates.
Suzanne Scott, Budget Director:
Spring enrollment update reveals a shortage on SCH compared to original projections, but a stronger non-residential section helps. The February Board of Regents meeting is when we get an initial look at tuition rates, fees and compensation. We have 3 scenario models for planning. All scenarios include a 3% rate increase for non-resident and graduate students, and a 3% increase in compensation pool for faculty and university staff. They also include an increase for health care and a slight increase for targeted investments. The BOR should vote in April. The Primary Unit Governance Group and others are working on the new budget model and how procedures will be done. We are bringing the Lunch & Learn training sessions back as well as other trainings, which will be offered to help understand the new budget model.
Officer Reports:
President-Elect’s Report
Minette asked for input on what campus facilities faculty would like to see – please send her an email.
Past President’s Report
This will be covered in New Business.
Reports from Standing Committees:
Personnel & Benefits
No report
Faculty Advisory Committee on the Budget
Faculty Minority Affairs Committee
Intercollegiate Athletics
No report
Committee on Disability
No report
Misconduct in Research, Scholarship & Creative Activities
No report
Reports from Representatives:
General questions were discussed concerning the waitlist issues in Canvas. Dave Anderson explained that there were bugs in the system and they are working on them. Please contact the FRC for help with any issues.
UNFINISHED BUSINESS
None
NEW BUSINESS
Motion 1 – The Faculty Representative Assembly Executive Committee moves that the Representative Assembly adopt the following resolution based on the work of the Faculty Assembly Teaching Task Force:
(Motion passed with 21 in favor, 1 opposed and 1 abstention)
Discussion 1 – Research Workload Task Force Report
Faculty member Rex Welshon and AVCR Jessi Smith presented their report and thanked the task force for their work on this topic. There were some questions and discussion of the report with the assembly representatives. Rex explained that the next steps would be to outline three different models on how to support research for faculty and submit a final draft to the provost on May 18th.
Discussion 2 – Weather Closures/Delays and Teaching
Interim Provost Klebe reminded everyone about the current policy, which states that if the campus is closed, then all classes except asynchronous online courses are canceled. This includes in-person, hybrid, and hyflex courses. Due to time constraints, further discussion of this item was postponed until the March meeting.
Adjournment:
Motion to adjourn the Faculty Assembly Meeting by Larry Eames
Seconded by Kristi McCann
Motion passed unanimously
Meeting adjourned at 2:02 p.m.