February 12, 2010
Posted by Gail Roy (ngroy) on [PUBL_DATE]
Faculty Management Committee >>

Meeting agenda and facilitation – President Crowley suggested a meeting agenda guideline (he distributed a handout) be established for future meetings.  Chuck Kelley also re-affirmed that the facilitation of the meetings will be rotated between faculty and management with the next meeting be facilitated by management. 

Discussion of minutes from Dec. 7, 2009 - Change in paragraph 6 referencing the teaching of large classes to read “instructors who teach these large classes” not students.  Last paragraph, first sentence changed to read “the lecture is limited to the number of students accepted into the program”; replacing “have no student limits.”  

President Crowley noted that the list of equipment purchases mentioned in the meeting has since been distributed to faculty on January 7, 2010 during Administration Day. 

Minutes were approved with these changes. 

Three items from the agenda were tabled for future discussion.  They were:  Overload pay, lecture/lab TLCs, and use of personal/sick time in less than full day increments. 

Faculty Compensation Proposal – Chuck Kelley stated he felt that the proposal had come to an impasse.  There are concerns from faculty regarding the proposal compensation starting at 31 students which would only address extreme cases, concerns about class capacity agreements, and the wording “consult” which they feel does not equate to “agreed”.  He also stated that the notion that combined lectures is not a fair practice and that inequities currently in place should be addressed by management, suggesting that the practice be stopped altogether.  Chuck also mentioned that there should be a documentation system in place to document the agreement to teach above class capacity. 

Greg Thompson stated that the TLC guideline was not being used appropriately by the A & S Department to calculate overloads.  He also felt that the contract formula was not applied correctly to him because he replaced adjunct faculty.  President Crowley acknowledged that the formula doesn’t recognize the number of students being taught and asked if Greg preferred to teach separate lectures for multiple sections that are currently combined for the lecture portion.  Greg responded that he would teach a combined lecture if he were compensated fairly as there is currently no compensation for extra students.  Greg also wanted it noted that the original proposal came from management (Alan Punches).  The work of the faculty document doesn’t speak to numbers but a reference point.  President Crowley expressed the need to address the current situation with extreme loads but wants to be sure that any alleviation of the situation not be seen as past practice and would be noted as being a temporary approach until such time that a full blown proposal is drafted and approved.  He would like something in writing from the association that any compensation for current situations at this time will not become “past practice”. 

The faculty compensation proposal in its present form was tabled until a new proposal can be drafted with a new language and new formula for calculating compensation that addresses all cases. 

Class Capacities - As stated in the Faculty Association contract, class caps need to be reviewed and set by the Faculty/Management Committee.  President Crowley distributed the 2005 F/M document pertaining to establishing class capacities with the current capacities of courses being offered at that time.  He also distributed the current class capacities and asked that they be reviewed prior to the next meeting so that they can be discussed at that time. 

Video Surveillance Cameras in Trade & Technology area – President Crowley stated that since the Virginia Tech incident, upgrading security has been a priority for NMCC (i.e. Instant Alert, cameras, etc.)  President Crowley also noted that he was aware that Trade & Technology faculty has some reservations about video surveillance in their areas.   This awareness came from system communication instead of Faculty Association and he would like to be apprised of concerns first before the faculty going directly to the system office.   Chuck agreed that there were faculty concerns that the surveillance would be an intrusion on their teaching, more of a “big brother” looking over their shoulder or “being set up” and not about monitoring safety and security.   Because of these concerns it was noted that Trade & Tech should be involved in writing a policy for NMCC.   

It was agreed by all the members that a policy needs to be created regarding appropriate use of surveillance and that we all need a better understanding of what’s out there for policies regarding public areas.  Location, what is being recorded, and what it is used for is what is important.  President Crowley distributed sample policies for the committee and asked that they be reviewed before the next meeting where a policy will be discussed.  President Crowley will bring a proposed policy to the next meeting.  Once a policy is agreed upon by faculty and management then all employees will be informed. 

Academic Calendar – The Jenzabar implementation may influence the start date of the fall semester.  Since President Crowley anticipates this happening, he would like us to discuss and create an academic calendar for 2010/2011.  The department chairs have already discussed and agreed upon an August 30^th start date if necessary. 

Some discussion as to how the August 30^th start date would affect the calendar ensued.  There was mention of moving the administrative days back as far as possible (closer to the start date so that training of Jenzabar could be implemented on those days).  Nancy Cowett suggested the possible use of the normal spring administrative day being used in the fall.  It was agreed that a “sub-committee” would draft a proposed calendar to present to the F/M committee at a later date.  Nancy volunteered to serve on this subcommittee with Bill Egeler and President Crowley.  President Crowley will contact those members regarding a meeting. 

Other items – Betty Kent-Conant stated that Kim Esquibel has volunteered to serve on the committee in Betty’s place after her retirement.  She asked if there was any objection to Kim attending meetings prior to Betty’s retirement.  There was no opposal to her serving or attending the meetings. 

Meeting adjourned 12:58 pm. 

Next Meeting - Friday, March 5^th, 2010 at 12 noon in the 3^rd floor conference room. 

Respectfully submitted by Nancy Cowett

Last changed: Apr 13 2011 at 3:20 PM