Minutes of the SAP meeting of November 17, 2006
Approved 12/7/06
DeMarco, Brill, Poe,
1) Previous two meeting’s minutes passed
2) Discussion on the P & T document. Positive discussion regarding Tom Lasley’s email. His was in response to Pat Johnson’s comments. The P & T document was mainly established for oversight, and consistency.
a. Discussion was pursued in the event a quorum was not reached in future meetings. With important documents coming across the table in the future, would it be possible to state a question and vote via the email?
b. Student input was discussed the document. Their voices were discussed—to what extent are they being given a voice in the matter of tenure right now? Discussion elaborated on their input, as well as the point that the Academic Senate was trying to make the process more fair with the document as well as trying to make the student evaluations less important. Discussion on the biases of the student evaluation. Is there a better way?
c. Positive discussion regarding mid-course evaluations.
3) HIR document concerns were discussed. Internal and external (to UD) concerns were heard over the use of the word ‘Sacrementality.’ Discussion was pursued to the end that hiring would be affected by that word. Some people not of the Catholic faith might feel like they were outsiders. Other words were offered instead of that particular one—‘sacred,’ ‘enlightened’ among others.
a. As for this specific committee’s charge, there was ample confusion with three questions:
i. Was this committee really charged?
ii. What’s the procedural path for this document? What does ECAS say?
iii. There were numerous problems with the first 8 pages.
iv. Should a document with so much confusion and concern be passed wholesale?
v. Should the first 8 pages be allowed to be amended?
This committee felt the question to be too broad to vote at all—let alone endorse a document with such concerns surrounding it. Further, even those within the committee felt that there should be consensus building for this document—given its importance.
4) Mark Brill’s document regarding the Honor Board was discussed. The amount of people on the board, its composition, and abilities were discussed. Dr. Brill agreed to make changes before the next meeting.