Faculty Meeting Thursday, January 6, 2011

Date: 
Thursday, January 6, 2011 - 12:00am
Location: 
ATAC 5035
Agenda: 
MEMORANDUM

Date:  January 6, 2011

To: Members, Council of the Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities
      
From: Victor Smith, Chair, Social Sciences and Humanities Faculty Council

Subject:  COUNCIL MEETING   
    
There will be a meeting of the Council of the Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities
ON THURSDAY, JANUARY 6, 2011 AT 1:30 PM TO 3:00 PM IN ROOM 5035 (ATAC BUILDING).

     AGENDA 

 1. Approval of Agenda.

 2. Approval of the October 25, 2010 Minutes.  
 
 3. Business Arising from the Minutes.

 4. Registrar's Report.

 5. Dean's Report.

 6. Departmental/School Reports.
 i)  Sociology - Dr. Curtis Fogel - External Adjunct
 ii)  Languages - Calendar Changes - Italian;  French; Algonquian "A";  Algonquian "B";  Algonquian "C";  Algonquian "D"  (click on link to access document)
iii)  Visual Arts - Calendar Changes - New Course
iv)  Women's Studies - Calendar Changes - Third Year; Second Year (click on link to access document)
 v) Music - Calendar Change - New Course
  7. Orillia Report.
 8. Other Business. 
 
9. Adjournment. 
 
 
_________________________________
VICTOR SMITH, Chair, Social Sciences and Humanities Faculty Council.

 

 
Minutes: 
FACULTY OF SOCIAL SCIENCES AND HUMANITIES COUNCIL
 October 21, 2010


APPROVED
 
A meeting of the Faculty Council was held on October 21, 2010 at 10:00 am in the ATAC Board Room 5035.

1. a)
Approval of Agenda
 
It was moved by L. Chambers seconded by L. Paquette that the agenda be approved.
 
                                                                             Carried.

1. b)
Approval of Acting Chair

As V. Smith has been appointed Acting Chair of the Department of History, it was moved by J. Leggatt and seconded by G. Munro that A. Carastathis be appointed Acting Chair, Social Sciences and Humanities Faculty Council, for this meeting.  

                                                                             Carried.

1. c)
Announcement - Term Appointment in Sociology

S.D. Stone introduced Dr. Jennifer Jarman, Associate Professor, in the Department of Sociology.

2.
Approval of the Minutes
 
It was moved by S.D. Stone and seconded by L. Paquette that the minutes of April 26, 2010, be approved.
 
                                                                             Carried.

3.
Business Arising from Minutes

None.

4.
Registrar's Report

B. Winter stated that the Registrar's Office was now in the process of reviewing the November grads.  We should now be able to view minors and attach them to any degree.
The installation of the President is being held on November 5th at 11:00 am.  There will be limited seating.  A supply of black gowns will be available.  There will be a shuttle service leaving the university beginning at 10:00 am and every 10 minutes after that.  A get-together will be held after the ceremony on the 3rd floor of PACI.  The installation will be streamed live to the Agora and the Orillia Campus.  
Registrar's Report - continued

B. Winter informed council that there is now a Registrar's Advisory Group which has been formed to find out what is most important to the end users.  
There is also a pilot project underway to develop a degree audit online for students.  Hopefully, this will help students prepare for graduation.  Kelli Gray is the Orillia rep on this committee.  As we now have only one programmer, no timeframe was given for completion of this task.
Some discussion followed with regard to access to information.  B. Winter noted that the risk was to high to allow everyone access to over 200,000 files in the database.  There are also policies in place that cover who can have access and who cannot.
B. Winter addressed R. Berg's concern with regard to Incomplete Grades entered through My Info and will have the software checked.


 5.
Dean's Report for Faculty Council

October 21, 2010  ATAC 5035
1.    Organizational changes:  PPG (Priorities and Planning Group--meet every week), SMT (Senior Management Team) and Deans' Council.  The President has, on a number of occasions, articulated his commitment to transparency, consultation, and decentralization of the management of the university.  That means that we will be given more responsibility for the management of our own units, and that decisions that should be made at the departmental and Faculty level will be made there and not at the senior administrative level.  

2.    Hiring.  At this point we are being told that there should not be any cuts this year.  I don't yet have any information about hiring, but I don't anticipate much this year.  However, we will be asked to identify our hiring priorities.  I expect hiring decisions to be made on the basis of our priorities, which I will communicate to the VP, and strategic priorities that would be determined by the VP Academic and the President.

3.    Integrated planning and budgeting, and Faculty revenue allocation.  A committee has been struck to develop a formula for an equitable and rational allocation of revenue.  The committee has not yet met, and so I don't yet know what its work will look like, but my understanding is that it will take into account not only the number of majors in a Faculty but also the amount of service teaching (ie the idea that revenue would be returned to the Faculty in compensation for service teaching done for another Faculty), long-term discrepancies between enrollment and faculty growth, and using multi-year commitments to rectify significant long-term problems.

4.    Strategic Planning.  The President has said that he will use the strategic plan that was passed in Senate last year, but it is becoming quite clear that the way in which he plans to implement it is quite different from the way it would have been implemented under the former administration.  Gerry Munt, Special Advisor to the President, is overseeing the implementation, and he clearly has a lot of experience with this and knows what he is doing.  He pointed out that strategic plans wouldn't normally have the level of detail that ours has, and he has gone through the plan and identified 15 goals plus one that was not in the plan, and that is "A Great Place to Work."  The other goals
Dean's Report for Faculty Council - continued


5.    are things like increasing enrollment, enhancing revenue, increasing research productivity and funding, increasing the number of Aboriginal students.  

6.    Potential Re-organizing of university structure.  The President has hired external consultants to consult with various stakeholders on campus in order to review our organizational structure and make recommendations to the President.  They are looking at both governance and management structures--Faculty organization, Senate and Senate committees, the governance and management relationships between Orillia and Thunder Bay.  I expect there to be considerable consultation about any recommended changes coming forward.

7.    We will be having a day with the President as a Faculty on November 15 and are working on identifying a second day for that. Your Chairs will give you more information about that as we get closer to the date.  I had a discussion with the Chairs about this last week, and we agreed that there are really two key points we want to get across to him that day.  One is the tremendous value we bring to the university and the other is the tremendous need we have for resources that will allow us to do our jobs in the way that we believe we need to do them--for us, that means first and foremost new full-time faculty positions.

8.    Faculty Strategic Planning.  The Faculty Strategic Planning Committee is now working with Gerry Munt, who is facilitating our planning process.  We have met with him twice, and are finding him very helpful in helping us articulate what our current situation is in terms of what we believe we should be doing as a Faculty and what we are able to do with our current resource allocation--and what our priorities are in terms of addressing the gap that exists between those two things, and in terms of articulating our strategic goals with the university's strategic plan.  We are not yet ready to make a presentation to Faculty Council, but you should be looking for that perhaps by the end of the fall term.

Respectfully submitted by Dr. Gillian Siddall, Dean, Social Sciences and Humanities.

6.
Departmental/School Reports

i) Women's Studies - Calendar Changes

It was moved by L. Chambers and seconded by J. Roth that the amended Graduate calendar change be approved.
                                                                            Carried.

ii) Philosophy - Calendar Changes

It was moved by R. Berg and seconded by V. Smith that the calendar changes be approved.

                                                                            Carried.
 
Departmental/School Reports - continued


iii) Outdoor Recreation, Parks and Tourism -  Calendar Changes

It was moved by B. Cuthbertson and seconded by R. Berg that the calendar changes be approved.
                                                                            Carried.
 
iv) Outdoor Recreation, Parks and Tourism - Renewal External Adjunct Professor - Dr. L.
     Hunt

It was moved by B. Cuthbertson and J. Roth the Dr. L. Hunt be renewed as an External Adjunct Professor.

                                                                           Carried.


v) a. Sociology - External Adjunct Professor - Dr. R. Ariss    

It was moved by S.D. Stone and seconded by G. Munro that Dr. R. Ariss be appointed as External Adjunct Professor.
                                                                           Carried.


   b. Sociology - Calendar Changes

It was moved by S.D. Stone and seconded by J. Leggatt that the calendar change be approved.

                                                                           Carried.


vi) English-  Calendar Changes

It was moved by J. Leggatt and seconded by S.D. Stone that the calendar changes be approved.
                                                                            Carried.


viii) History-  Calendar Changes

It was moved by V. Smith and seconded by R. Berg that the third year calendar change be approved.
                                                                            Carried.

It was moved by V. Smith and seconded by R. Berg that the second year calendar change be approved.
                                                                            Carried.





8.
Orillia Report

A. den Otter thanked everyone involved in the hiring process.  Orillia hired 5 full time joint appointments:  Dr. Valerie Hebert, History; Dr. Cheryl Lousely, English; Dr. Paul Carr, Sociology; Dr. J. Munro, English; and, Dr. S.S. Islam, Political Science.  She also commented on how nice the new building was and that although they had some problems with technology, they were now fixed.  Plans are underway for programming Criminology and Media Studies.  They will be set up as minors, and will start in September.  A. den Otter thanked all the Thunder Bay participants.  The spring/summer course planning was now getting underway and it was hoped to coordinate efforts this year.  A. den Otter stated that at most, they would offer 3.5 FCE's. G. Siddall suggested that the Chairs/Director send their course offerings to A. den Otter for spring/summer on electronic forms.

9.
Other Business

i) My Info - Incomplete Grades - R. Berg

This matter was discussed with B. Winter during her report.

ii) Research Week

D. Jobin-Bevans has asked that faculty members get their ideas for research week in soon.  The deadline is late January and Wednesday is the usual day for displays in the Agora.

10.
Adjournment
 
The meeting adjourned at 11:00 am.


 ATTENDANCE
 
Thunder Bay Campus
V. Smith
V. Schonberger
A. Carastathis
B. Cuthbertson
J. Leggatt
J. Roth
K. Holmes
G. Munro
S.D. Stone
J. Jarman
L. Paquette
J.M. Richardson
A. Nabarra
B. Winter
L. Chambers
G. Siddall
R. Berg
T. Potter
D. Jobin-Bevans


Orillia Campus
A. den Otter


REGRETS
P. Wakewich
T. Dufresne
D. West
M. Beaulieu
R. Holmes
P. Das
M. Johnston
M. MacLean
G. Colton