Academic Council:  Minutes, March 29, 2006 

I.  Minutes

--Approved 

II. General Agenda 

• Data Collection

--Trudy Wortham reported 121 course enrollments for the intra-session for 347 SCHs in 11 courses, 4 of which are graduate.   

She indicated that mixed petitions had become a question for PeopleSoft implementation and wanted to know if UHV remained committed to that option.  The Council supported such commitment. 

• Instructional Technology/Online Issues and Updates

--ISS

Chari Norgard indicated that about 40 managers took part in a SkillSoft demo recently.

She said we that have 200 concurrent licenses for Breeze and that a number of faculty, staff, and student organizations are using it.  A demo for the cabinet was suggested and accepted.

She also agreed to look into Matlab licensing at UH and take up the question with the FACT.

--ITT

   Joe Ferguson had nothing to report but responded to several   
   questions.   

·           Fort Bend Issues and Updates 

--The provost indicated that he will be initiating a process and time table for addressing leadership, recruitment, and other issues related to the centers—following discussion with the AAS group and approval of the Provosts’ Council. 

III. Specific Agenda

·         Student Appeals

-- There were two requests to participate in commencement prior to completion of graduation requirements.  One was approved, owing to university error in communicating requirements; the other was denied.

·        Faculty Development Requests and Reports

--Approved a research grant ($1,000) for Dr. Li Chao to research developing on-line lab management methods.   

--Approved a development grant for conference presentation ($200) for Dr. Horace Fairlamb to present at the Washington Evolutionary Systems Society and National Academy of Science Symposium, in Arlington, VA, in March. 

--Approved a development grant for conference presentation ($560) for Dr. Linda Hayes to present at the Academy of Business Education, in San Antonio, TX, in April. 

--Approved a research grant ($1,000), pending receipt of a FY 05 conference report, for Dr. Nagarajan Ramamoorthy to allow for the continuation of research work on international comparisons of knowledge workers. 

--Approved a development grant for conference presentation ($919) for Dr. Ron Sardessai to present at the 18^th Annual Conference of the International Academy of Business Disciplines, in San Diego, CA, in April. 

--Approved a development grant for conference presentation ($600) for Dr. Sandy Venneman to present at the Association for Psychological Science 18^th Annual Convention, in New York, NY, in May. 

--Approved a development grant for conference presentation ($1,000) for Dr. Jifu Wang to present at the 2006 Hawaii International Conference on Business, in Honolulu, HI, in May.  

--Approved a development grant for conference presentation ($1,000) for Dr. Qi Zhu to present at the International Association of Science and Technology for Development International Conference, in Montreal, Canada, in May. 

-- Accepted grant funded conference travel reports from Drs. Barba Patton (2), Marie Stern Plemons, Ron Sardessai, and David Satava.   

--Accepted a grant funded research report from Dr. Siva Somasundaram. 

·        Other 

--Issues and implications of using + and – for final grades were discussed, especially with regard to calculation of the GPA.  Trudy Wortham agreed to check and report on what some other institutions were doing.   

DNS/kw
3/30/06