Academic Delivery Group Meeting
October 12, 2010
1:00 p.m.
Cleveland Hall Conference Room
(Revised 10/26/10)
Members Present: Susan Allen, Tim Bowen, Katy Goforth, Scott Harvey, Lynn Lewis, Gwen Owens
Members Absent: Jackie Blakley, Eugene Grant
Others Present: Suzanne Konieczny, Lee Tennent
Length of Meeting: 2.25 hours
Topics Discussed:
Scott Harvey discussed the Fall 2011 calendar. He noted the following:
- Transient student registration has been moved to later in the semester. This gives our new students time to register before the transient students.
- The Session C application deadline is on the calendar.
- The exam schedule includes a Friday, which has been dedicated for hybrid classes. Scott noted that a few students, who take multiple hybrid classes, will have conflicts on that Friday. Students and faculty should work together to resolve those conflicts. The group discussed the need to avoid conflicts, if possible. Scott proposed extending the exam period by one day to avoid conflicts. He stressed that grades need to be in on time, so that end of term can be completed. He will take the proposal to extend the exam period to the Calendar Committee. Scott will report on this item at the next meeting.
Lee Tennent discussed several IT-related issues.
Password security – Passwords can be relatively easy to crack. Lee suggested that employees use a nonsensical password of fourteen characters or more for better protection. Hard-to-crack passwords can be difficult to remember. Lee suggested passwords of length at least fourteen characters. He also suggested a combination of capital letters, lower case letters, and digits. Finally, he suggested making up a phrase that is easy to remember, and then selecting, for example, the third letter in each word in the phrase to be part of the password. Never leave your computer unattended. Always lock it, if you leave it, to avoid password security issues.
Blackboard integration with Banner issues must be resolved. Those issues should be addressed by the end of the fall term.
Lee noted that only ISIS reports 223 and 922 have PIN-related information. Only full-time and part-time employees have access to these reports. Student workers do not have access. After research, it was determined that the security breach with a faculty member’s account happened at an open, un-manned session.
The number of calls to the Service Desk in the evenings is minimal. To better use our employees, the student workers will be moved to the busiest time of the day, and the Service Desk evening hours will be shortened.
The Library issues deal with printer and network problems. The Service Desk cannot help with these issues.
The IT-maintenance windows are geared around key academic dates and take place on Friday afternoons after 2:00 p.m. The IT employees will not interrupt a teaching moment, but if someone is using a room to check e-mail or for some other non-teaching activity, IT may ask them to move. Since the IT maintenance schedule is based on the information in Banner, all schedules need to be in Banner.
Lee discussed Lightspeed and noted that we are considering other products that may do a better job as a filter. We are looking for a product that has better reporting features.
The minutes of the September 28, 2010 meeting were approved with minor changes.
Gwen Owens revisited the maximum number of credit hours a student can take in the summer. All the department heads in the Arts & Sciences Division are in favor of limiting the maximum number of credit hours in the summer to 15. From the Arts & Sciences perspective, a request for an exception would be an opportunity for further advising, and exceptions must be approved by the dean and department head. Lynn noted that the Health Education Division will not limit the number of summer credit hours to 15. Jackie and Eugene were not able to attend this meeting, so Dr. Buckhiester will get their input at a later time.
Katy Goforth reported on Faculty Senate issues.
Faculty Senate is in favor of the shortened drop/add period, and would like to implement it in Fall 2011. This issue will be on the agenda for the next ADG meeting.
Faculty Senate proposed a change in the attendance statement. The Senate would like to change the wording “may drop” to “will drop”. It was noted that “may” gives faculty flexibility. The senators will take this back to their divisions for input.
Katy reported on the Faculty Senate’s discussion about the November 2 professional development day. Katy noted that the negative reaction may be related to other issues. She and Dr. Buckhiester will meet to discuss these issues. Dr. Buckhiester will ask Sharon Colcolough to clarify several issues related to the day. These issues include the dress code, the fact that attendance is not mandatory, the wording in the first e-mail that notes that state law mandates that the college is closed on election day, and the question about how to record annual leave for the day.
Dr. Buckhiester discussed reorganization. Several workshops will be scheduled to discuss which processes can be done more effectively, and he gave examples of areas that are linked and have activities that could be regrouped. He asked the members of the ADG to consider which processes should be included in these discussions. The idea is to gather a relatively small group of individuals who would have the information and experience to participate in these discussions.
Lynn Lewis announced that the Nursing site visit went very well. The Vet Tech site visit will take place in two weeks.
Susan Allen reported that new full-time faculty orientation will take place on Monday, January 3 from 1:00 – 5:00. New adjunct faculty orientation will take place on Tuesday, January 4 from 5:00 – 8:00. She noted that she and Deborah are strengthening the advising piece of orientation. Susan briefly discussed faculty development and reported that Harriette Dudley will have a session on incivility on campus. Susan also noted that the Learning College Lecture series will continue in the spring.
Suzanne Konieczny reported that the ACBSP site team is currently on campus.
With no further business, the meeting was adjourned.
Recorded by: Anne Bryan
Next Meeting: Tuesday, October 26, at 1:00, in the Personnel Conference Room, RH 102.
