Teaching Effectiveness Report - Much time has been devoted recently to bringing the Teaching Effectiveness Report to fruition. Many FAC members have helped with this task.

Board of Regents’ Meeting - The Board of Regents’ meeting had a very dedicated tone and this focused on diversity. This tone will continue into the future as diversity becomes a larger and larger issue. This will also be discussed as part of broadening admissions standards. This is of particular concern at the medical institutions. Minorities want opportunity, not special treatment.

Graglia Issue - The Graglia issue was also discussed at the Regents’ meeting. It heightened awareness of the diversity issue. Mr. Farabee made a presentation that indicated that professor Graglia’s rights to make such statements were protected by the Constitution and the issue had been upheld (by precedent) by the Supreme Court.

New Coordinating Board Advisory Committees - Samuel Freeman has been appointed to the Advisory Committee on Core Curriculum. Samuel gave a brief summary of the Committee’s activities to date. They have broken into five small groups to accomplish their task. There may be a module of subject matter with a variety of courses meeting the criteria for that module at various campuses.

Distance Learning - The issue of distance learning has come to the forefront and will be discussed by the Faculty Quality Committee during this meeting and by the whole FAC when Dr. Gonzalez joins us tomorrow.

UT Investments - There was some concern as to whether the UT investment organ (UTIMCO) is effective. Although this may not be of direct concern to the FAC, we should encourage the Board of Regents not to be pleased with its performance (10%) as presented at the Board meeting.

Regent Evans - Regent Evans was not able to join us for our meeting.

Non-reappointment - The issue of non-reappointment of faculty has been brought up and will be discussed by the Faculty Quality Committee.

Next Board of Regents’ Meeting - The next Board of Regents’ Meeting has been moved from Tyler to Austin.

Tenure vs Salary - An issue of national concern (New York Times article) is the connection between tenure and salary. The Faculty Quality Committee will also discuss this issue.

Peer Review - Peer review for clinical scientists will continue to be discussed by the Health Affairs Committee.

Insurance Program Audit - The Health Affairs Committee will also discuss the recent audit report on the UT health insurance system.

UTSA - The audit report has been completed for the UTSA campus and will be discussed under campus reports.

Merit Raises - The issue of how merit raises are determined is still of concern. Some campuses have given merit raises to everyone and others have been much more limited. There is also a good deal of variation from school to school within campuses. We need to determine if this is an issue the FAC needs to pursue. It was reported that UT Tyler Health Center has not received salary increases for several years.

PTR Policy - The PTR policy will be discussed by Governance Committee.

UT Arlington - Rod Hissong reported for his campus including: 1)they do have upward evaluation of administrators, but it is not currently a formal policy; 2) the Senate is working on a formal policy.

Thus far the evaluations have only occurred up to the dean level, but not above.

3) The president is committed to merit raises and is trying to streamline administration by reducing the number of vice presidents. He believes that the campus is over administered. Some faculty feel that it is better to hire more faculty rather than give merit raises. The president wants to reward current faculty. 4) There is now a uniform course evaluation on campus, but there is some question as to how much faculty input went into creating this instrument. 5) They are continuing to work on various faculty documents. 6) Searches for deans continue.

UT Austin - Jack Gilbert distributed a report for his campus and summarized the following: 1) they do have upward evaluation of administrators; 2) task forces have been formed to address diversity; 3) the search for a new president is still underway and the faculty are happy with the process used by the search committee which includes faculty input; 4) a committee has been formed to look into intercollegiate athletics and its role on campus; 5) the GRE is only given electronically now and there are no test sites in Austin; 6) UT Austin is trying to convince the population of the state that it brings value to the state and therefore deserves flagship funding; 7) construction funding has been received from an outside source and construction will be carried on outside the UT System, which is supposed to greatly speed up construction; 8) courses offered in the summer are being analyzed to determine if they are equivalent to other courses.

UT Brownsville - Lucy Willis distributed a report that included: 1) there is an ongoing process for the evaluation of administrators; 2) their self-study process continues.

UT Dallas - Jim Bartlett distributed a report and summarized the following: 1) there is a policy for review of administrators; 2) they are considering removing the GRE requirement; 3) the 100 semester credit hour limit for funding will greatly impact their campus because many students require well beyond the 100 hours.

4) Faculty will have some oversight on how money is spent on information resources. 5) A recent play created much concern because it called for full frontal nudity and led to the president prohibiting such behavior in the play. A committee has been formed to look into this issue and develop a policy.

UT El Paso - Mo Mahmood distributed a report and summarized the following: 1) a policy for the evaluation of administrators is in the final stages of adoption and includes faculty input and feedback; 2) a PTR policy has been approved by the faculty senate; 3) the faculty senate is working on a grievance procedure; 4) a new learning center was recently inaugurated.

UT Pan American - Gerald Brazier distributed a report and summarized the following: 1) there are procedures in place for the evaluation of administrators in the HOP, but up till now, ad hoc evaluations have been carried out by the faculty (the administration intends to implement the HOP policy which would include faculty input and publishing of tabulated data); 2) the faculty grievance policy has resurfaced and has finally been submitted to the System and a disciplinary policy is now being developed; 3) there will be a local legislators’ day on campus in February.

UT Permian Basin - Corbet Gaulden distributed a report and summarized the following: 1) they do have a policy for evaluating administrators up through the VPAA, conducted by the Senate on a three year cycle; 2) the PTR process will be initiated by drawing names of faculty to determine who will be evaluated first (faculty can volunteer); 3) the Senate now has a Web page.

UT San Antonio - Rich Richardson reported for his campus and summarized the following: 1) their president has declared that administrators on his campus will not be evaluated; 2) the AAUP evaluated the administration and an audit has been completed by the UT System, but the interviews of faculty conducted by the auditors did not appear in the report. The report only includes an overview and not a lot of details. Some of the faculty have asked for a meeting with the Chancellor to discuss the audit report. 3) The wording of the faculty grievance policy has been changed by the System. These changes are of great concern to the faculty. Francie Frederick commented that the changes suggested by the System were not put in the correct place in the policy initially. 4) Equity raises are of concern because two faculty received raises much larger ($10,000) than anyone else and the model used to determine raises was not the one approved by the faculty. 5) Political fund raising on campus was to be reviewed by the Chancellor, but there is some misunderstanding as to what level of review would take place.

6) Performance based funding will be tried during the summer. 7) There seems to be apathy by many faculty regarding serving on committees.

UT Tyler - Vincent Falzone distributed a report and summarized the following: 1) there is a policy for evaluation of administrators with faculty input, but no feedback to the faculty; 2) the Faculty Senate has determined who will be evaluated first for PTR; 3) the Senate has approved a statement for Academic Program Review.

UT Southwestern - Tim Wolff distributed a report and summarized the following: 1) PTR will be implemented in January; 2) evaluation of administrators varies between schools at the dean level and does not include faculty input for some schools (Allied health Sciences in particular), but the VPAA is not evaluated.

UTMB Galveston - Richard Rahr distributed a report and summarized the following: 1) they have a new president and are in the final stages of developing faculty governance for the whole campus; 2) all administrators will be evaluated.

UTHSC Houston - Terese Verklan reported for her campus including the following: 1) there is an effective policy in place for evaluating administrators; 2) the PTR policies for each school are being evaluated for consistency; 3) the procedures for non-reappointment are being reviewed; 4) the use of multiyear contracts is being pursued (the president has asked for faculty input on this issue).

UT MD Anderson - Jim Klostergaard reported for his campus including: 1) there will be yearly evaluations of department chairs and evaluation of all administrators every three years; 2) they are searching for a chief academic officer; 3) they will be engaging in marketing through TV and newspaper using an approach to minimize negative impact on the local medical community. Some question the need for the marketing. 4) There is much concern about mid level administrators receiving very large raises at a time when faculty get very little.

UT HSC San Antonio - Jeff Ebersole distributed a report and summarized the following: 1) the implementation of the PTR policy is taking place; 2) an evaluation of Academic Leadership is being used to review chairs, deans and VPs, but there is no feedback to faculty; 3) they are still working on a faculty governance organization; 4) salary augmentation from grants, etc. is being initiated which will be productivity and incentive driven.

UT HC Tyler - Bob Klein and Jerry McLarty distributed a report and summarized the following: 1) there will be a search for a new director, since Dr. George Hurst is stepping down (there are currently a number of vacant positions); 2) faculty compensation has been a concern since the clinical faculty had a 5% withhold with reimbursement depending on productivity (administrators have not been included in this withhold to this date); 3) there is an incentive plan being developed for research faculty, but it has been put on hold until the interim director is on board; 4) a grievance policy has been developed by the faculty, but it is currently under review by the Office of General Counsel, it has been at this point for two months; 5) the search for a new Executive Associate Director for Academic Affairs is on hold; 6) the clinical and research faculty have developed a format for upward evaluation of administrators.

A summary of information about evaluation of administrators on the different campuses was developed by Alan Cline in the following table.

Evaluation of Administrators

7. Pending Board of Regents' Items/ Retention Committee / Broadened Admissions Criteria

Francie Frederick, Acting Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs asked the FAC to review the suggested changes to the Regents’ Rules (distributed with the packets). Several suggestions were made for wording changes and the Governance Committee was asked to review these proposed changes.

Another issue addressed is the ability to be tenured at more than one institution at the same time, which is currently prohibited by the Regents; Rules. There were several comments made about the pros and cons of changing this policy. The Governance Committee will be asked to review this issue.

Admissions procedures and the implementation of House Bill 588 was also discussed.

Francie reported that she and Jim Guckian will look into possible partnerships between professional schools and undergraduate schools.

Francie also mentioned several other issues including: the Appropriations Act; Collection Enhancement Program to Strengthen University of Texas Libraries; a Web site for Travelers Aid (http://www.utexas.edu/business/accounting/pr/tr/travelersaid.pdf); and a Student Retention Committee which she is chairing. There were a number of questions regarding retention and what problem is occurring. The objective is to graduate the highest percentage of students possible.

The Regents have taken an active interest in Women and Minorities and in Telecommunications. They expect the numbers of women and minorities to go up.

8. Committee Meetings

9. Adjourn

Q - Are video tapes produced under distance education discoverable by the Open Records Act?

A - There are protections for that and the faculty member generally has control over those tapes, but they probably would be subject to the Open Records Act.

Q - What types of talents, skills and abilities are required to put on distance learning courses and are there some faculty who can’t handle it?

A - There are more than one type of distance education (other than real time interactive video) and probably 98% of us don’t really know how to do this now, but most could learn fairly easily if there is institutional commitment, time and resources devoted to the effort.

C - We really need to expand our capabilities and be creative in this process and not just have a bunch of talking heads on the video screen.

C - We received 68 proposals for an RFP for educational initiatives, but only 15 could be funded. This indicates there is interest out there to create innovative programs.

Q- Some faculty might find these changes uncomfortable, how do we face these changes?

C - The real pay off to this process will be a cost reduction and ability to teach more students. The concern would be when administrators take the faculty out of the teaching loop and just run the tapes, etc.

C - Dr. Gonzalez pointed out that faculty aren’t powerless, but we should also remember that this process may provide access to a whole new population of students. Ultimately, it will be the students who decide what type of education they are willing to accept.

C - Faculty may not have control over the method of delivery.

C - UT HSC San Antonio is digitizing their curriculum to make it accessible to a select group of students by computer. We have to copyright the material we create.

C- Distance learning will not work in most educational areas, but many of the technological advances used in distance learning can be of benefit in traditional classes. Critical thinking skills can’t be developed using distance learning. We need to be extremely careful how and where we apply distance education.

C - It is the faculty’s responsibility to make these decisions.

C - Through e-mail and other internet communications these types of critical thinking interactions are possible.

C - I agree with those comments, but a professor can’t work with large numbers of students out in cyberspace.

C - The guidelines address the concerns about the number of sites or number of students.

C - No one is suggesting that distance learning replace all of our traditional educational programs.

C - We should encourage local campuses to develop policies and procedures that are innovative but realistic. This type of education can end up taking much more faculty time and resources.

C - Administrators will have to address these issues because it is different from what we have done in the past. We need to make sure our concerns are expressed.

C - Some times we forget that universities are seats of learning and if we can improve the educational process it will provide more time for new discoveries. Our job today is to agree on a set of principles by which this process can occur.

C - Faculty must be given time, expertise and resources if they are expected to produce a quality product.

C - Dr. Gonzalez pointed out that unless we truly integrate the technological advances into our campus procedures we won’t accomplish the task.

C - Technology will allow us to do things today that will make this process easier.

C - The prospects of distance learning are exciting, but there are many pitfalls and this shouldn’t be approached as an experiment unless it is done correctly. How do we measure the outcomes?

C - Ms. Harper pointed out that the measure should be how this process promotes or improves learning from a faculty perspective.

C - Dr. Gonzalez noted that cost is not the measure of success but rather the learning outcomes.

C - I’m most concerned that there is no money to under right this process. Are there any plans to get some money for the process.

C - Dr. Gonzalez responded that we should not expect any new sources of state revenues, but there are opportunities for marketing and funding these programs.

C - There are creative ways for raising money. We are faced with the same dilemma that people faced 50 years ago with television.

Ms. Hajdar is relatively new to the System and has been dealing with the Hopwood decision. She provided a brief overview of the current status of the Hopwood decision. The bottom line is that you can’t make decisions based on race. At the same time we are expected to improve diversity. We need to make sure that our criteria have a good sound educational basis. The Federal government is under the same constraints that we are. The only compelling reasons (compelling governmental interests) for using race as a criteria is if you are trying to remove the effects of previous discrimination. Ms. Hajdar encouraged us to call her if we had individual questions (512-499-4505).

The Chancellor commented on a number of items including:

UT investments through UTIMCO have given us a reasonable return considering the amount of exposure in the stock market that we have. We are trying to pay out a minimum of 4 ½ % and grow the funds at a rate at least equal to inflation.

14. Committee Meetings

The FAC recessed to committee meetings at 11:15 am.

15. Tribute to Alan Abedor

The following resolution was proposed to recognize Alan Abedor on the occasion of his retirement:

The resolution passed unanimously.

16. Committee Reports

Faculty Quality Committee - Jim Bartlett reported for his committee. The Committee reviewed the Distance Learning Guidelines and presented a motion to approve the guidelines.

The motion passed unanimously.

The Committee met with Joe Stafford and learned that there may be exceptions developed to the 100 hour limit. This will be considered by the Academic Affairs Committee.

The Committee considered changes to the Regents’ Rules regarding program closure for bona fide academic reasons. Considered adding: 1) a committee of faculty early in the process; 2) tenured faculty in the effected program would contribute to the process; and 3) a hearing will be granted to every effected faculty member.

The Committee will consider the current campus policies as it continues to address this issue.

There are a number of other issues that the Committee is considering including: non-reappointment, tenure vs salary, etc.

Academic Affairs Committee - Corbet Gauldin reported for his committee. The Committee recommends in the form of a motion that the Teaching Evaluation document be accepted subject final editing to be completed by February 1, 1998. The report consists of: Table of Contents; Executive Summary; Key Findings; Recommendations; Discussion of Findings; Guidelines; Annotated Bibliography; and Technical Appendices.

The motion passed unanimously.

The Committee also considered the Guidelines for a Student Exchange Program Among Component Institutions. The Committee feels that the rights of faculty at the home campuses are not well protected and proposes some additional language as item IIIc as follows:

"Each institution will designate individuals to coordinate student exchanges at home and exchange institutions. Coordinators will facilitate communication between the student and appropriate major advisors at both home and exchange institutions. All advising will be the responsibility of the advisors on both campuses. Advisors on both campuses, particularly the home campus, are the final authority on courses to be exchanged." A motion was made on behalf of the Committee to submit the proposed language change for inclusion in the document and endorsement of the amended document.

The motion passed unanimously.

The Committee is also working on the 100 hour limit and will continue to do so.

Health Affairs Committee - Tim Wolff reported for his committee. The Committee met with Mr. J.B. Pace and Mr. Bob Molloy and discussed several issues including the audit of the UT insurance program. Several control weaknesses were identified in the audit and Mr. Molloy indicated that a major problem at the System level is understaffing. The Chancellor has indicated that more staff would be added. Mr. Molloy indicated that UTMB Galveston has had particular problems and that UTHSC Houston had made significant strides in solving problems. They are trying to address the problems identified in the report. Mr. Molloy is willing to visit the components and discuss these problems and possible solutions. Mr. Burck has set up a System committee to help address these problems.

Anthem will be sold and the new contract for insurance will go out for bid in January. It is likely that the triple option will not be available to any campus next year. There is a goal to give employees at all campuses the ability to utilize providers at the health campuses.

The Committee met with Budge Mabry from the Medical/Dental Application Service to discuss admissions and recruiting efforts, particularly in the wake of the Hopwood decision. A System committee is being appointed to look into partnerships between the professional schools and undergraduate institutions. A table (from Mr. Mabry) showing applicants and matriculants to Texas medical schools was distributed to the FAC.

Governance Committee - Jack Gilbert reported for the Committee. The Committee considered the issue of holding tenure at more than one institution. The Committee recommended in the form of a motion a change to the proposed language being submitted to the Regents as follows: In paragraph 6.26, after the new language "unless the initial appointment at the component institution of the System specifically authorizes the holding of such position." add "Compensation issues under such circumstances are subject to negotiation at the time of the initial appointment."

The motion passed.

The Committee reviewed the proposed changes to the Regents’ Rules regarding Evaluation. Several changes were recommended in the form of a motion including:

A motion was made to amend the original motion by adding the sentence The substance of the review will be provided in a written report." And remove the words" in writing".

The amendment passed so 37.431 would read:

Each academic administrator below the level of chief administrative officer [President] (or its equivalent should be reviewed at least every six years. The substance of the review will be provided in a written report.

The amended motion passed.

The Committee also discussed the suspension of a faculty member with pay by the chief administrative officer. The Committee suggested adding some language to the policy that governs this issue that would require the governance body be consulted. Several pros and cons to this addition were discussed.

The Committee will continue to explore this issue.

There was no old or new business.

18. Adjourn

The meeting adjourned at 3:05 pm.