Aloha Colleagues,
I am attaching two items that will be of interest to faculty:
1) A draft “Vision” for the UH System by President David Lassner, which importantly differentiates the campuses of the University.
2) Regents Policy 9.214 “Teaching Assignments for Instructional Faculty” — a proposal from System with a plan to expand to other faculty designations
Further info is appended below. I encourage all faculty to participate and provide input on these important proposals. Interim Chancellor Lassner will address the Manoa Faculty Congress in the first half of the meeting:
Manoa Faculty Congress
Wednesday October 19 2016 3-5pm
Architecture Auditorium (ARCH 205)
He is also planning a “Campus Conversation” in early October and will hopefully announce the date soon.
The Manoa Faculty Senate is reviewing these documents, so please feel free to give your input to your senators as well. You can find them here for your constituency by (college or unit) click on the “constituency” column: http://hawaii.edu/uhmfs/senators/rosters/2016_17.html You can send comments on the Framework to the Committee on Administration and Budget. If you are unsure where to send it, please send it to uhmfs@hawaii.edu or to myself.
There are a large number of major proposals coming from System administration (moving Manoa Facilities, CIP, HR, and Communications to System), a MIRO analysis of SSH taught by faculty, and other documents listed on the agenda for the September MFS Meeting: http://hawaii.edu/uhmfs/minutes/2016_17/sen_agenda_20160921.html
The interim Chancellor is furthermore organizing many brainstorming sessions and retreats with deans, directors, upper admin, and MFS SEC regarding implementation of the Strategic Plans. Most of these discussions involve potential mergers. We do not consider this sufficient faculty consolation and he has assured me that discussions with faculty would occur prior to any decision making. We will hold him to that. I also note that these strategic plans are not fully fleshed out and none were approved by the Faculty Senate.
Senate Chair Webpage: It is going to be a busy year. I have created a web page to track my correspondence as chair and info items that would be of general interest. I will allow comments on these pages — Please feel free to engage in discussion there. Or you can reply to me and I will try to post it (if I can find the time). http://butlerlab.org/mfs-chair-2016-2017/
Sincerely,
Marguerite Butler
Chair, Manoa Faculty Senate
Some further information on the items 1 and 2 above:
1) A draft “Vision” for the UH System From President Lassner: DRAFT framework for the Integrated Systemwide Academic and Facilities Plan that the Board of Regents requested. This DRAFT represents primarily the work over the summer of the UH Officers (VPs and university chancellors) with some additional conversations. The document also has some aggregate data (sorry about the small print!) about the student profiles in our major units, and the text of the BOR Resolution requesting the Integrated Academic and Facilities Plan.
2) Regents Policy 9.214 “Teaching Assignments for Instructional Faculty” — with a plan to expand to other faculty designations
The policy change entails two somewhat separate items, the first is a requirement to have
(a) a workload equivalency policy published for each unit in a central location on the
campus website. The determination of workload equivalencies (how we meet the 24 credit hr annual workload via our activities in teaching, research, and service) will remain determined by departments. The BOR is expecting a report from Administration by the Nov. BOR meeting.
(b) “biobib”s or CV’s updated and posted annually on the department website.
VPAA Dickson says that these items will not be used to evaluate faculty workload.
This policy is being reviewed by the MFS committee on Academic Policy and Planning, please send any comments you may have to CAPP chair Willie Gosnell — CAPP members are listed here http://hawaii.edu/uhmfs/committee/standing/capp.html