Date:
March
27, 2013
Location: Fulp 400Time: 1:30 p.m.
Members Present: Todd Crisp-Simons, Marla Roberson, Cheryln Brown, Penny Edwards, Jason Poole, Marilyn Vickery, Ashley Brady, Tom Lawrence
Members Absent: Amoena Norcross, Chris McFarlin, Sue Andrus, Tony Logan, Corey Evans, Steven Mathena, Tony Young, Lisa Walton,
Presider: Todd Crisp-Simons
Approval of Minutes: With several editing corrections, it was
motioned that the February 2013 minutes be approved. The motion was
seconded. The minutes, with changes,
were approved unanimously.
Old Business:
1. Issue discussed and major points of
discussion:
Nomination of Faculty Senate
President
The nomination has to come from
current faculty senate members, and the email was sent out reiterating what
would be involved with the position. The
Senate create a list of nominees today and forward that to Amoena, enabling her
to create a survey monkey so we can have a new president elected by April 8th. The present Faculty Senate members nominated
Chris McFarley and Todd Crisp-Simons.
Action to be taken as a result of
discussion, person(s) responsible, and timeline:
Faculty Senate president nominees
are Chris McFarley and Todd Crisp-Simons.
Amoena will present their names for a vote through survey monkey.
2. Issue discussed and major points of
discussion:
Faculty Choice scholarship Award
The Faculty Senate are
responsible for choosing who wins the Faculty Choice Award, so we created a
committee of three who will review the five candidates. Marla, Cherlyn, and Tom will serve on this
committee. Amoena will e-mail the
needed information by Friday.
Action to be taken as a result of
discussion, person(s) responsible, and timeline:
The committee will meet and
determine the scholarship winner by April 8th.
3. Issue discussed and major points of
discussion:
October Fall Break and Extra
Days
Todd explained we are still
waiting to see what the Calendar Committee will do.
Action to be taken as a result of
discussion, person(s) responsible, and timeline:
No action taken.
4. Issue discussed and major points of
discussion:
Faculty Contact of students on
Financial Aid Warning
Two sets of letters are sent out,
one by FA and one by Records, and Amoena and Todd will serve on a committee to
both simplify this process and to streamline the procedure. The financial aid warning letter which we
will review and there is also a financial aid suspension letter. Amoena and Todd recognized some problems with
the current procedures: 1) The comment at the end of the letter says to contact
Financial Aid if you have questions, but they do not accept calls or e-mails;
2) Why should advisors be the first person they contact when the letter
specifically tells them to contact Financial Aid?; 3) This letter goes out to every student who
falls under the criteria regardless of whether they are actually on financial
aid or not; and 4) This process of sending out e-mails to everyone can confuse
students, waste money, make the college look disorganized, etc. Tom comments that advisors are supposed to be
available to talk to the student about this by phone or e-mail when financial
aid is not available except in person?
We don’t even know what types of financial aid the students are
receiving. They must be able to track
this. Why can’t they filter this? How many people are there in the Financial Aid
office? Can they not see these students
because they don’t have enough people?
Is this why they are delegating it to advisors? How many students are actually being put on
warning at the end of fall semester, receive the letter at Christmas break, and
cannot talk to anyone by phone or e-mail, so they just don’t return spring
semester?
Action to be taken as a result of
discussion, person(s) responsible, and timeline:
The Senate feels that changes
should be made. Rob Massey planned to
come today to discuss this matter, but Amoena requested that Rob wait until
next month so we could take a look at the letter first, and discuss it further
before he joined us.
Comments/Concerns:
The Culture of College survey
Penny explained that the survey
was sent forward to executive staff; they came back with concerns and questions,
pointing out that it had already been determined what the desired culture of
the college was, one paralleling the ten year vision plan. Thus, the survey should just reflect whether
or not we are reaching that desired culture or not. The version that was sent out to faculty and
staff by email reflects these changes.
The gathered information will be used to determine if there are gaps in
the desired culture being created and if so how we may fill those gaps.
Norman’s Retirement
Marla’s commented Norman is
retiring and his last day is Friday.
There will be a Come and Go scheduled.
The new person will be starting on the 15th of April. Also, the remodeling of the library was
approved in Executive Staff Meeting yesterday.
It should be done by August 1, 2013.
The color boards and the rendering are available to be seen in the
library.
Next meeting: Thursday,
April 11th, 2:30-4:00 p.m., Fulp 400.
Adjournment at 2:14 p.m.
Name of Recorder: Marilyn
Vickery
