School of Arts and Sciences

Department Chair Meeting

September 14, 2006

BCP Conference Room

11am – Noon

 

 

Those in Attendance: Alan Gabrielli, Andrew McMorran, Julie Newell, Phil Patterson, and Laina Pond.

 

  1. Alan brought the meeting to order with a few quick notes:
    1. UPS will no longer deliver to individual departments, instead the packages will be delivered to Central Receiving.
    2. Alan suggests that Department Chairs check over the P&T Master List, as there are some errors that have already been noted.
    3. Mark Nunes is in China visiting NENU for the 2 + 2 program.
  2. Each Department Chair provided department updates:
    1. Math – Recent Department meeting uncovered some faculty concerns with the absence of Calculus I from the Bachelor of Applied Science concentrations. Another concern mentioned during the last department meeting, was the change of offering upper-level elective courses from once per year, to once every two years.
    2. BCP – In response to Andy’s issue of course elective offerings, Phil explained that he allows his Biologist to make course elective recommendations. Phil is working on arranging a visit from a local professional to speak with BCP students on what to expect after graduating, and to help them realize the value of their degree.
    3. SIS – There is a required Math course, Sociology Methodology Statistics, that has not been offered in a while and needs to be taught next semester for Spring 2006 graduates. There will be more discussion of this course in future meetings.  SIS Department considering offering a 1-credit hour introductory course that will focus on finding sources, citing sources and career opportunities. During the last SIS department meeting, faculty discussed faculty web page development and a seminar series, “Unexpected Outcomes”.  SIS is adopting Macromedia (Adobe) Contribute web publishing software.  Jonathan Gilliam will provide a “How to get started in Contribute” seminar on September 27th for all SIS faculty. Julie passed out copies of the SACS required file list compiled by Becky Rutherfoord. 
  1. Alan noted that everyone should be working on Department websites. These sites should contain department information, list of majors, curriculum details, department contact information, a department directory, and syllabi. Alan gave examples of mismanagement of websites, suggested providing document viewing options, and converting Word documents to HTML or pdf. Andy, Julie and Phil discussed providing course descriptions, providing syllabi in PDF format and displaying department meeting minutes.
  2. Alan announced that equipment proposals are due in his office by October 9th. This equipment money is different from Tech Fee money and Lab money, in that it has fewer purchase limitations. There is $350,000 that is to be distributed among all departments and programs that report to Academic Affairs. Alan will submit a prioritized list for the School of A & S on October 16th.
  3. Alan gave a review of the September 13th Deans’ meeting:
    1. Enrollment is up, at over 4,000 students.
    2. Steve Hamrick has proposed centralizing the Banner Data-entry process, in response to the schedule entry problems. Alan asked that everyone brainstorm the pros and cons of this new process. Phil and Julie gave suggestions and spoke on the problems with the current process.
    3. Block scheduling is on the agenda for the next Deans’ Meeting. Alan and Julie discussed the block scheduling in detail.
    4. Alan suggested that Department Chairs look at the Reappointment Information that Debbie Patrick sent out, and remind those faculty that are up for reappointment.
  1. Next Department Chair meeting will be on Friday, September 29th at noon in J-334.