Minutes, Truman State University Chapter of AAUP
October 24, 2003 4:30 p.m.
University Club
Meetings are open to all University faculty members.
Faculty present: Natalie Alexander, Martha Bartter, Marc Becker, Roger Festa,
David Gruber, Wolfgang Hoeschele, Sylvia Macauley, Tom Marshall, Arnold
Preussner, Alanna Preussner, David Robinson, Peter Rolnick, Jan Saffir.
1) Minutes. The minutes of the September 23 were read and approved.
2) Dixon meeting. We had a pleasant and fruitful lunch meeting with President
Dixon yesterday. We engaged in an extensive discussion of our optimistic outlook
for her tenure with us and her desire to document transparent procedures. We
would like to have more meetings with her again in the future. Pictures from the
presentation of the Redbook is on our webpage at https://aaup.truman.edu.
3) Faculty Senate restructuring. The vote on restructuring Faculty Senate will
happen next week. We are sending out a document from Peter Rolnick with
information to encourage our colleagues to support this plan, and will also post
this on our webpage (https://aaup.truman.edu).
4) Summer School. We discussed changes to the Summer School program, Interim
classes, and the new on-line courses. If the main motivation for these concerns
are budgetary, we should receive more information on that process. Faculty
Senate will establish a standing faculty budgetary committee to help oversee
this process.
5) Administrator evaluations and assessment data. We discussed what is the
purpose for evaluation and assessment data, and if this data could be used more
effectively.
6) Membership drive. We cleaned up our AAUP email list. David Gruber has the
Footnotes in his office and they are ready for distribution. We need personal
contact with potential members in order to encourage them to join.
7) Concealed-gun law. This law is currently held up in the courts, but some AAUP
members are concerned for the potential impact of this law on our institution.
Perhaps we need a forum to discuss the issues that this raises for the
university community. We could arrange for presentations from different local
groups that are involved with firearms (DPS, ROTC, hunters, etc.) and from other
groups who represent programs for gun control. A general discussion would allow
people to gather information and voice their concerns about policy. The issue
might also be raised in Faculty Senate.
8) Course load. There are continuing rumors that in some divisions the course
load may go from a 3-3 to a 3-4 in 2005. We will discuss this topic more in our
next meeting (Thursday, November 20, at 9:00 a.m. in the University Club).
Meeting adjourned at 6:00 p.m.
Respectfully submitted by Marc Becker, Secretary