Academic Council Minutes, February 2, 2005

 Academic Council met on Wednesday, February 02, 2005, from 9:30-10:50 am.  Attending were Dick Phillips, Trudy Wortham, Margaret Rice, Charles Bullock, Mary Natividad, Chari Norgard, Gail Harrington, Joe Dahlstrom, and Dan Jaeckle.  Guests in attendance for the first agenda item were Liz Branch and Cassandra Heavrin-Hamrick. 

I.  Guests 

--Liz and Cassandra distributed a handout on the timeline for implementing Admissions, Student Records, and Student Finance in PeopleSoft.  The target for designing and data entry is October 2006 for implementation in spring 2007.  Financial aid is targeted for implementation in fall 2007.  Advising will be added in a later stage.  Prerequisite checking will be part of this first stage. 

--We discussed the issue of whether the schools or OAR should load programs.  Costs were a concern.  We agreed to postpone the decision a month so that we can have more information to make the decision. 

--We approved moving the last day to drop or withdraw without a grade to the 12^th class day. 

II.  Minutes 

--Minutes of the last meeting were approved. 

III.  General Agenda 

• Data Collection

--Data Collection.  Trudy noted that we currently have 2,475 enrolled students, but the number may increase.

• Instructional Technology/Online Issues and Updates

 --Chari noted that fall online classes will remain loaded until the AACSB accreditation visit has been completed, approximately February 20.

IV.  Specific Agenda 

• Student Appeals

-- Denied a student appeal to be admitted owing to three suspensions and low GRE score. 

-- Two student appeals for waiving the TOEFL were approved. 

--Denied student request to continue until all required core classes are completed in the School of Education and Human Development.

--Approved a student appeal to substitute a grade due to the change of the MBA program. 

• Faculty Development Requests and Reports

--Approved a development grant for conference presentation ($600) to Dr. Margaret Dorsey to the 26^th Annual Southwest/Texas Popular and American Culture Associations meeting, in Albuquerque, NM, in February.   SEQ CHAPTER \h \r 1Also approved a request for a research grant ($800) to conduct ethnographic field-based research on the contribution of a Tejano musician, focusing on issues of gender and power, to see why this individual is not more widely known outside of the upper-echelon of Tejano music performers. 

--Approved a research grant ($1,000) for Dr. Jianjun Du to conduct an empirical test to see whether regionalization is prevalent or globalization has been the trend of contemporary international trade.

--Approved a development grant for conference presentation ($1,000) to Dr. Massoud Metghalchi to the 2005 International Applied Business Research Conference, in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, in March. 

--Approved a research grant ($1,000) for Dr. Nagarajan Ramamoorthy to compare “knowledge” employee attitudes and behavioral intentions across Individualistic (Ireland, USA) and Collectivist cultures (India). 

--Accepted grant funded conference travel reports from Drs. Barba Patton and Yong Glasure. 

• Other

--The deans requested that the matter of research dollars be discussed at the next Deans’ meeting, since the fund is down to under $100.   

--We discussed the date of the next meeting—many of the members will not be available on February 16.  We agreed to ask Kathy Walton to look at rescheduling.  

--The Council requested a discussion at the next meeting about routing student appeals to school deans prior to Academic Council.  

--We thanked Dick Phillips for his participation on the Council.  His interim position means he will not be attending.  He requested that he stay on the distribution list for agendas and minutes.  Finally, we welcomed Margaret Rice, who is joining the Council in her new interim position. 

DJ/kw
2/2/05