Academic Council Minutes, August 17, 2005

I.  Minutes 

     --Approved as written 

II.  General Agenda 

• Data Collection

--2,358 students have registered, which lags the 2,418 registered at this time last year.  830 still haven’t paid.  We have received the draft common calendar for review. 

• Instructional Technology/Online Issues and Updates

--ISS

• UHV’s WebCT courses have all been loaded except for a couple of critical ones.  UH courses are now being loaded, and there is a big backlog.
• Students will be unable to access courses till the first day of class.
• Jody Gillit will go to UH to create UHV courses for spring and will afterwards do that here, enabling us to complete the job in a more timely way.
• Deans should let Chari Norgard know if FACT members are to continue or change for their school.  First meeting will be in September.

--IT

• Stanley Lester will fill the vacancy left by Jody Gillit but in turn will have to be replaced.
• An ITV technician will now be available evenings and weekends.
• An issue was discussed concerning continuing access to Vista and email for terminating faculty members who have I’s or other matters to complete.   The deans (or supervisors in the case of staff) will make the call, imposing such limitations as need apply (in general, access should be limited to that minimally necessary to complete the tasks).
   
• Fort Bend Issues and Updates

--Proposed dates for advising/open house nights at the Sugar Land center were discussed.  Each dean will respond individually to Susan Reynolds on what will work best for their school. 

III.  Specific Agenda 

• Student Appeals

--Referred a suspension appeal to the SoBA.

--Approved waiver of the TOEFL for a student who is a permanent resident.

--Approved waiver of the TOEFL for another student who has achieved teacher certification in Texas. 

• Faculty Development Requests and Reports

--Approved a FY 06 development grant for conference presentation ($1,000) pending receipt of a FY 05 report, to Dr. Peggy Cloninger to present at the International Academy of Business and Economics 2005 Annual Conference, in Las Vegas, NV, in October. 

--Approved a FY 06 development grant for conference presentation ($1,000) pending receipts of FY 05 reports, to Dr. Nagarajan Ramamoorthy to present at the 4^th Dutch Human Resource Management Conference, in Twente, Netherlands, in November. 

--Accepted grant funded conference travel reports from Drs. June Lu, Ron Sardessai, David Satava, T. T. Selvarajan (2), and Chun-Sheng Yu. 

--Accepted grant funded research reports from Drs. Margaret Dorsey, June Lu, T. T. Selvarajan, and Chun-Sheng Yu. 

DNS/kw
8/17/05