Academic Council Minutes, April 18, 2007

 

I.                   Minutes

 

--Approved as circulated

 

II.        General

·        Data Collection

1.      Mrs. Trudy Wortham announced that the current summer enrollment count is 930 students.  There are 25 students more enrolled for summer this year than at this same time last summer.

 

2.      Mrs. Trudy Wortham provided a copy of the Admissions Application Status Report with changes that were discussed with Dr. Joneel Harris and the deans during Dr. Harris’s visit.  The changes to the report included adding a second report that has more specific information for the schools.  The report will include a complete listing of student who have applied contact information what information the students are missing.  The new report will be running list and access will be provided to someone within the school so that deans may have updated information to deans as needed.  Ms. Wortham will continue to bring the summary report to Academic Council for review.  Copies of the letters to the students will continue to be forwarded to the schools.

 

3.   Dr. Gunasekera asked about using student personal e-mail accounts to communicate with students.  A discussion was initiated regarding the use of personal or student e-mail accounts for the use of communicating with students.  The discussion was particularly pertinent due to the recent tragedy at Virginia Tech.  Dr. LaBrecque reminded Academic Council that one thing that came out of the Virginia Tech tragedy is the importance of maintaining confidentiality of all records including medical, counseling, and academic records.

 

As far as communicating with UHV students, Ms. Wortham stated that the University is trying to get students to use their student e-mail accounts.  Students must activate their e-mail accounts in order to receive certain services such as Financial Aid.

 

Mrs. Jane Mims stated that she believes that portals would alleviate the communication problem.  By using portals each time students log on, they would receive posted updates.  Dr. LaBrecque asked if the University had ever considered using portals.  Mr. Joe Ferguson mentioned that he has had made a budget request to fund moving to using portals in the past and has again requested funds.  However, moving to portals is expensive.  Mr. Ferguson will bring the request back to Cabinet.

 

·        Instructional Technology/Online Issues and Updates

1.      Ms. Chari Norgard provided Academic Council with copies of UHV’s Distance Education Report and the Coordinating Board response.  The general comment from the Coordinating Board was that the report required substantial changes as well as second review.  The second submission is currently due on June 1, 2007.  Ms. Norgard has contacted the Coordinating Board asking for clarification on the degree of detail requested and asking for an extension beyond June 1. 

 

A question was raised by Dr. Jeannette Hartshorn regarding what is considered distance education.  Dr. Hartshorn asked should classes taught at Sugar Land and Cinco Ranch be considered distance education courses?  Discussion continued regarding what are considered online or distance education courses.  Dr. Di Leo asked if the Coordinating Board considers UHSCR and UHSSL distance education.  Dr. Hartshorn stated that since our faculty are located in the Katy/Sugar Land area and teach at those campuses it should not be considered distance education.  Dr. LaBrecque agreed and mentioned that almost half of faculty live outside of Victoria County.  Ms. Norgard stated that UHV must define what distance education is and then defend that in the report to the Coordinating Board.

 

Ms. Norgard requested that she meet with Dr. LaBrecque, the deans and anyone else who may be involved in rewriting the report to discuss completing the report.  She provided a matrix that showed which departments were responsible for what areas of the report.  Much of the Coordinating Board report requirements have been modified to fit SACS requirements. 

 

Dr. LaBrecque asked that this report be examined in detail in the next deans meeting and that Ms. Norgard, Ms. Mims, and Dr. Linda Hayes also attend.  Dr. Hayes has been asked by the Provost to review online course development, services and procedures at the University and provide recommendations by July.

 

2.      Dr. LaBrecque asked that the agenda include a Faculty Senate update at every Academic Council meeting.  She asked that deans read the distance education report and any exemplary reports that can be found on the Coordinating Board website.

 

3.      Dr. Dahlstrom will forward a document from the Association of College and Research Libraries (a division of the American Library Association).  The document addresses Information Literacy which Academic Council will need to discuss.  In a recent survey that was completed by Dr. Dahlstrom, questions regarding how we have incorporated information literacy into UHV’s instructional program were raised.  He will discuss Information Literacy in detail at a later Academic Council meeting.

 

o       Other

 

1.      Dr. LaBrecque encouraged members to attend the groundbreaking ceremony in Sugar Land on Friday, April 20, 2007.

 

2.      Dr. Gunasekera announced that Faculty Council will be meeting on May 4th.   Dr. Don Birx, Vice Chancellor for Research will be speaking about research to Faculty Council. 

 

3.      Faculty Senate will meet on April 27 and will be reviewing all program changes.  After the meeting, Senate will meet with the Provost.  In addition, Faculty Executive Council will be meeting with the President and Provost on May 4th. 

 

4.      The Faculty Ad Hoc Committee for Research will be meeting to review the proposed changes to UHV Policy, C-29, regarding timekeeping efforts for sponsored programs.

 

III.       Specific

 

·        Faculty Development Grant Requests

1.      Dr. Sandy Venneman was awarded $1300 conference grant for the APS 19th Annual Convention in Washington D.C. on May 24-27.

 

2.      Dr. Qi Zhu was awarded $658.74 conference grant for the 2007 World Congress in Computer Science, Computer Engineering and Applied Computing in Las Vegas, Nevada on June 25-28, 2007.

 

3.      Accepted a grant funded conference travel report from Dr. Meledath Damodaran.

 

4.      Accepted a grant funded conference travel report from Dr. Chien-Ping Chen.

 

5.      Accepted a grant funded conference travel report from Dr. Linda Hayes.

 

6.      Accepted a grant funded conference travel report from Dr. Cindy Schnebly.

 

7.      Accepted a grant funded conference travel report from Dr. Ziad Swaidan.

 

8.      Accepted a grant funded conference travel report from Dr. Massoud Metghalchi.

 

9.      Accepted a grant funded conference travel report from Dr. Louie Ren.

 

10.  Accepted a grant funded conference travel report from Dr. Jifu Wang.

 

11.  Dr. Joe Dahlstrom presented changes to the Faculty Development Conference/Publication request form.  The form currently states “In case of a publication resulting from funded research, a copy should be sent to the Library for inclusion in the UHV Archives.”  A faculty member for clarification on what type of publication materials should be forwarded.  Some concern was mentioned regarding publishing sensitive information or information that is subject to royalties.  Dr. Dahlstrom stated he would add verbiage to his suggested changes and bring the suggested changes to the Academic Council.

 

12.  Dr. LaBrecque clarified that the Academic Council’s intent at their October 18th meeting was to change the Faculty Manual would in effect read that Faculty Development Grant reimbursements and reports should be submitted simultaneously within four weeks from returning from travel.  Members all agreed that Academic Council had approved making the change to the Faculty Development Grant section.  Ms. Boldt will make the changes to the Faculty Manual and Faculty Development Request form as recommended.

 

As recorded by,

Karen Boldt

4/5/07