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The U.M.K.C. Faculty Senate

Report

 

The Voice of the U.M.K.C. Faculty

October 5, 1999

Organizational Changes Discussed

Kathy Loncar resigned as chair of the Senate. In the wake of that resignation the Senate proceeded to reorganize itself. The By-Laws specify that the Vice-Chair will fill out the remainder of a Chair’s term if s/he resigns with less than a year remaining in their term. Ed Mills, Vice-Chair, therefore automatically became Chair. The By-Laws also specify that there will be a mail ballot to fill other open officer positions. When Mills became Chair the Vice-Chair position became open; thus the mail ballot attached to this Report. There was some discussion of whether it was necessary to have a mail ballot or whether the Senate should simply appoint an Acting Vice-Chair. On one side were arguments about the inconvenience of a mail ballot, given the short amount of time until the regular elections. However the By-Laws clearly called for a mail ballot, and one Senator pointed out that we consistently objected when others bypassed clear rules because they were inconvenient. Why have By-Laws if we disregard them when they are inconvenient? That argument easily carried the day, and the resolution calling for the appointment of an Acting Vice-Chair was withdrawn. The By-Laws call for the faculty to elect a Vice Chair from among the members of the Senate. We did not think it was a violation of the rules if the ballot indicated which Senators were willing to serve if elected, since that would keep people from throwing away their vote.

Thanks, Kathy
The Senate accepted Kathy Loncar’s resignation and unanimously voted to thank her for her dedicated service and hard work. We also unanimously expressed our support for Ed Mills (Education) as new Chair.

Chancellor Search
The Committee is getting near the point where it will make its recommendations to Pacheco. The top candidates will then visit the campus -- probably in about 1 month

.

As Chair of the Senate Kathy Loncar sat on an enormous number of committees, and was simultaneously Chair of the Chancellor Search Committee and of the IFC (Intercampus Faculty Council). Senators thought that this was an unreasonable work-load, and we discussed the distribution of many of these tasks among Senators and the chairs of standing committees. It was mandated that the Senate Chair sit on the IFC, and it seemed important that s/he sit on a few others. Most of the committee jobs could be distributed. Other organizational changes were also contemplated. The Administrative Affairs Committee is in charge of Dean and Director evaluations, and almost all deans are up for evaluation next year. This is an enormous workload, and yet there is no course load relief for the Chair. The Senate Budget Committee might also need some relief if it was to do its job well. The Chair’s load has been reduced by one course, but given the large work-load and the amount of time that is spent traveling to Columbia, that might not be sufficient. The Administrative Affairs Committee agreed to examine these issues and make recommendations back to the Senate. We unanimously passed a resolution to include the Director of Libraries among those Deans and Directors that were to be evaluated, and discussed the addition of the Dean of Graduate Studies.

All units are supposed to have elected Budget Committees, though many do not. We agreed that the Chair should contact the units to see if they did have a budget committee. We also agreed that the chairs of the unit budget committees should be members of the Senate Budget Committee.

We briefly discussed the role of the Budget Committee. The Provost had agreed to meet with the Senate Budget Committee in the process of setting policy. Somehow that had slipped through the cracks and former Chair Loncar had assumed that role. We agreed that the new Chair should relinquish the budget role and should let the Provost know that a Senate Budget Committee had been appointed. Similarly, the Senate had suggested that a small committee of knowledgeable faculty meet with the Chancellor to discuss whether mission enhancement money had been given to endowed chairs in various hospitals. We were not sure if the Chancellor had ever been told this, and requested that Mills meet with the Chancellor about this issue.

There was some discussion of the role of the relationship between the administration and the Senate. We agreed that the new Chair should meet with the Chancellor and Provost at the earliest opportunity to discuss changes in committee appointments, to see if there were any problems and to express a desire to continue meeting with the administration.

At the beginning of the meeting the Senate standing committees met. Some of you might want to volunteer for a committee -- service is not limited to Senators. To volunteer call the Senate Chair or the Chair of the committee.

Administrative Issues

Barbara Glesner Fines (Law) Chair
Kathleen Schweitzberger (Library)

Academic Issues

Jakob Waterborg (BLS) Chair
Karen Bame (BLS)
Linda Collier (A&S)
Ashok Gumbhir (Pharmacy)
Steve Krantz (Nursing)
Kit Smith (Nursing)<\br>
Bruce Wenner (A&S)


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