An anonymous reader makes the following observation and asks some questions:
"There are many unresolved issues, open positions, and unanswered questions that remain at this time. Since we have not heard anything more about these and we are at the end of our semester, it looks like it will all happen during the summer when faculty are gone. It would seem that our faculty-driven process and full transparency isn’t much of a priority at this point if it existed at all. Will the Faculty Senate meet over the summer or the Board of Regents meet during the summer? Will you be around to check on these issues over the summer?"
Yesterday (Wednesday, 29 April) I met with the President to address these very issues. The Provost also joined us for much of the meeting.
Overall, I was very pleased with the meeting, and I am convinced that both the President and the Provost understand the concerns of the faculty. Not every question can be answered right away, since the whole process of implementing the audit recommendations is tremendously complicated, but both the President and the Provost agree that general statements on the most pressing subjects need to be sent out before the end of this term. I know the Provost is working on a memo to faculty, and I am hopeful you will receive it very soon.
To answer the other questions, the Faculty Senate always meets on an "as needed" basis over the summer. Most Senate Chairs have not favored meeting over the summer since it is often hard to obtain a quorum and because they have believed important matters should wait until the fall semester. But it is possible the leadership of the Senate may find it necessary to meet in June and/or July. Your departmental senators should keep you informed.
The Board of Regents will indeed meet over the summer. The BOR will have a special called meeting on 21 May, while the quarterly meeting will be held on 11 June. I have not seen an agenda for either meeting, but the reason we are having a special called meeting in May (instead of the usual work session) is because of a very full agenda for the quarterly meeting, including a ribbon-cutting ceremony for the Space Science Center. As soon as I receive an agenda for either meeting, I will post it here or post a link to the BOR page.
Finally, yes, I will be around all summer. I'm teaching during Summer I. Other than a few day trips, I should be in Morehead.
Stay strong,
Ron
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2 comments:
Let's hope we hear something of substance before the semester is over. Your positive tone regarding your meeting with President Andrews was encouraging in spite of the lateness of the hour.
In talking to colleagues across campus, there seems to be a common thread and a common conclusion to the Audit situation. The deans of the colleges of Humanities and S&T have met with various departments over various issues. The reports are that the deans don't have a lot of answers. They seem to be going through the motions working in the same darkness as the rest of us, looking a bit stupid in the process for not knowing anything.
Education seems to not have the urgent problems as others so the dean does not have to illustrate the same uninformed appearance. It wouldn't be that Business alone has a lot of issues that would delay any work of the Audit report and the dean there has had little to report on. It was a small college until the Audit issues came around.
This leaves us with the IRAPP program and its affiliated issues to be the root of all the problems with the Curriculum Audit delay. Sheer logic and by the process of elimination has drawn the focus on the University's Program of Distinction as the hold up for the implementation of the Audit report. Nobody has heard a word from that dean. Maybe with their situation nobody wants to hear from him. Isn't this a bit ironic, program of distinction and all?
The evidence is starting to bear out those fun stories in your blog's "Audit Chronicles" about the devil in the details and just who it may be that is holding up the process. Perhaps the chronicler could shed some wisdom on the next phase of this saga unless the stress of uncertainty has become too overwhelming!
I'll be waiting for that report from the Provost or the next audit chronicle episode. It is hard to predict which one will have more substance to them.
With all the issues flying around with the audit report there has been few voices about the positive side of many of these changes. My program is affected by the changes but hopefully in the end the program will be better off than before. We hope to have a stronger program with a better position for the future.
The audit report was designed to bring out the problems with programs and focus on addressing them. Faculty may not always want to focus on the problems or admit that the changes could end up being better for the program. It would seem that the only faculty that are complaining about the audit are those with problems with their programs that don't want to see those problems addressed.
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