Bloomington Faculty Council met Oct. 15 to vote on internal structural changes and discuss new measures for reviewing lecturer position advancements.
A majority of discussion time was devoted to reviewing a proposal to amend the College of Arts and Sciences' electoral subunit divisions. The proposal was introduced at a previous meeting Oct. 1. It involved adjusting the allocation of seats by department to align with the College of Arts and Sciences Policy Committee standards.
The proposal was presented by Heather Akou, director of the College of Arts and Sciences Policy Committee. It suggested dividing the departments into six categories rather than 10. The amount of faculty seats allocated to each of the six categories was based on the number of faculty members falling within each one. For every 50 faculty members, each subunit is given one representative.
The proposal passed unanimously, giving four seats to Arts and Humanities faculty, five seats to Natural and Mathematical Sciences faculty, five seats to Social and Historical Sciences Faculty, and one seat each to The Media School, Hamilton Lugar School of Global and International Studiesand Eskenazi School of Art, Architecture + Design faculty. The proposal goes into effect Spring 2020.
Akou’s proposal initially included a seventh category for an at-large seat representative, leading to debate prior to the vote. The council voted last year to eliminate at-large representatives, and a motion passed to ignore the at-large seat. There was a motion to rescind this vote due to concerns about the implications of changing the amount of seats allocated to the College of Arts and Sciences from 17 to 16. The faculty went on to discuss that according to the Constitution of the Bloomington Faculty, each school should allocate one representative for every 50 faculty members. Since the College of Arts and Sciences has 803 current members, the council determined 16 seats was appropriate. The motion to rescind the previous vote did not pass, and the proposal was voted on and passed.
The council also discussed previous changes made to the process for promotion review in lecturer ranks. In March, the council voted to change the promotion process for lecturers and senior lecturers so it follows similar standards to other existing faculty promotion procedures. The change goes into effect Fall 2020.
Professors advancing from lecturer to senior lecturer and senior lecturer to teaching professor will now be reviewed by the Campus Promotion Action Committee, presenter Eliza Pavalko said. She said the committee will also include two senior lecturers and additional clinical professors in order to follow existing precedent.
There was also a first-reading of policy to define the process for granting prior learning credit to students with applicable experience outside the college environment. The faculty council passed a motion last year to give college credit based on applicable experience, such as IU edX online classes. The policy read today by J Duncan, co-chair of the Educational Policies Committee, requires each unit and department to create a policy outlining the criteria for obtaining credit for prior learning experience.
The next Bloomington Faculty Council meeting will be 2:30 p.m., Nov. 5, in Presidents Hall.
