MSU FACULTY COUNCIL MEETING MINUTES
                          February 21, 2001
                                   
PRESENT:  Young, Weaver for Morrill, Sherwood, McDermott, Kommers,
          Peed, Linker, Leech, Benham, Howard, Stewart, Larsen,
          Nehrir, Mooney, Jacobs for Lefcort, Weaver, Amend for
          McClure, Locke, Levy, Bogar, Bond, Jelinski, Francis, Lynch,
          Butterfield, Scott, Griffith.

ABSENT:   Hatfield, White, Anderson, Jost, Harkin, Lansverk, McKinsey,
          Prawdzienski, Fisher, Carlstrom.

The regularly scheduled meeting was called to order by Chair Ron
Larsen at 4:10 PM.  A quorum was present.  The minutes of the February
7, 2001, Faculty Council meeting were approved as distributed.

Chair's report - Ron Larsen.
     - A draft of the proposed Board of Regents policy, Ownership of
     Electronic Course Material, was distributed (attached for members
     absent), and there was brief discussion.  Comments about the
     draft may be e-mailed to Ron (ronl@coe.montana.edu).
     - Administrators have received letters requesting they prepare
     statements of responsibilities, accomplishments and goals by
     March 2.   The statements will be posted at the Faculty Council
     web site.  Tenure-track faculty may review administrators between
     March 5 and March 21.
     - Some concern has been expressed that the list of faculty
     incentives from last week's meeting do not necessarily apply to
     all faculty.
     - A draft resolution on instituting FY2001 faculty salary
     increases at the end of this academic year will be discussed at
     tomorrow's UGC Steering Committee meeting.

UGC Nominating Committee report.
     - Linda Simonsen, Mathematics, has been nominated to fill a
     faculty vacancy on the Athletics Committee.  As there were no
     additional nominees from the floor, it was decided by consensus
     that her name should be forwarded to President Gamble for
     approval.

Faculty Affairs Committee report.
     - The committee did not meet this week.
     - Sabbaticals were funded at the level included in this year's
     budget.  Names of faculty receiving sabbaticals will be announced
     next week.

Hewlett Committee report on the new core - David Cherry, Jeff Adams,
Adele Pittendrigh (members of the Hewlett Executive Committee).
     - Two years ago, a grant was received from the Hewlett Foundation
     to improve MSU's general education (core) requirement.  A second
     grant was received to fund the project an additional two years.
     - The current goal is to pilot a new core for about 300 students,
     beginning Fall Semester 2001.  Five foundation courses (Seminar,
     Quantitative Reasoning, College Writing, Inquiry, Diversity,
     Research and Creative Experience) are part of the core, and there
     are additional core electives.  The course material will vary in
     some of the foundation courses, depending upon the instructor.
     - The minimum number of credits in the new core is 28 (The
     current core credit minimum is 32).
     - Assessment will be part of the pilot project.
     - There is a notion that the new core will help retention.
     - During discussion, it was noted that if the new core is fully
     implemented, there will be campus-wide impacts, because large
     core lecture classes will no longer be as appropriate.  In the
     short term, faculty  advisors of students will need to be
     familiar with the requirements of the new core so they can advise
     students participating in it.

Proposed Workload policy (MSU-Bozeman: Faculty Expectations and
Institutional Accountability) - Provost David Dooley  (Proposed policy
attached for members absent).
     - A task force including faculty and the Provost has been working
     on the policy since the task force was set up by then-President
     Roark.  The task force is now soliciting feedback on the
     proposal.
     - Key elements of the new document include:
          - It is no longer a workload document but addresses faculty
          expectations and institutional accountability.  Faculty
          expectations are built into P&T documents.
          - Definitions of teaching, research and creative work,
          outreach and service have been expanded.
          - There is no numerical standard or even a range of
          numerical measures.
     - A goal of the policy is to help MSU explain to outside
     constituents how faculty use their time.
     - President Gamble was consulted about his views, and he
     recommended accountability measures and a measure of outputs be
     used, not inputs.
     - During discussion, it was pointed out that the original intent
     of Faculty Council in proposing a task force to develop a policy
     was to address inequities in teaching load across campus that
     give some faculty less time for scholarly activity while
     expecting all faculty to meet uniform UPT standards.
     - According to the Provost, the task force agreed assignments
     need to be consistent with the role and scope of their unit and
     the way in which their work is reviewed.  Deans and department
     heads must ensure consistency between role and scope and
     evaluations.  If necessary, either standards or assignments must
     be adjusted so they are compatible with each other.  This should
     be left in the hands of the units.
     - It was pointed out there is a perception that there needs to be
     equity in faculty workloads across the university and this
     document doesn't address it.
     - The Provost responded that this policy isn't the mechanism to
     address the issue.  That must be done through resource
     allocation, and different inputs are needed to address resource
     allocation.  Diversity in expectations and assignments needs to
     be recognized.  There needs to be differentiation in expectations
     between units and over time, perhaps with an individual.
     - Concern was expressed for the way money is currently allocated
     to colleges which is based on history.
          - The Provost said this will change for the coming biennium.
          The Budget Analysis Committee, Long Range Planning
          Committee, Strategic Planning and Budget Committee, deans,
          department heads and faculty will develop principles by
          which budget decisions should be made.  The process will be
          more data driven than in the past.
          - MSU can now provide both incentives and rewards for
          faculty and units participating in reaching the university's
          goals.
     - The point was made that any statement of work expectations
     should apply to non-academic units, also.  The Provost stated
     that there will be accountability measures across campus.
     - There will be further discussion of the statement.

The meeting adjourned at 5:25 PM.


Joann Amend, Secretary                              Ron Larsen, Chair