The Citadel Faculty Council
Minutes of the Special Meeting of March 9, 2000
Second-Floor Conference and Lunch Room, Faculty House

1. Prof. Julie Lipovsky, Faculty Council chairperson, called the meeting to order at 11:23 a.m.; a quorum was then achieved at 11:27.

2. Members attending: Professors Bishop, Chen, Dunlop, H. Ezell, Feurtado, Foster, Lipovsky, Maynard, Pages, Pilcher, Silver, Thompson, Toubiana, B. White, G. Williams, Zuraw, and Hilleke for Hurren.

3. Members absent: Professors Brown, Emanuel, Kelley, McDowell, Wolf and Woo.

4. The minutes for the Feb. 24th meeting were almost but not quite finished, so they were not submitted for approval.

5. Prof. Lipovsky made some general announcements: she would still like some more data from the faculty on how we inculcate leadership in the students so we are not just seen as complainers, and future tasks for Faculty Council include appointing representatives for the Strategic Planning self-study and the Committee on Committees, and participating in the discussion of the schools structure issue and perhaps the session on recruitment of new cadets.

6. The Council finished going over General Order 12 and the proposed changes on tenure and promotion procedures. Prof. Thompson moved and Prof. Pages seconded that we accept General Carter's 5th recommendation (Section E) to allow two years credit toward tenure instead of just one for teaching two or more years fulltime somewhere else; this was passed unanimously.

Prof. Silver moved and Prof. Foster seconded that we ask Gen. Carter to eliminate the phrase in his Recommendation 6 (Section C) that a faculty member's "ability to function within the academic community" be considered for granting tenure, and add the word "academic" to "needs of the institution" which would also be considered. In discussion, members noted that the overt meaning of the "ability to function" clause was covered elsewhere in the document, in the portions about service, and that Dr. Carter's proposed language would just make explicit the ability of the Administration to turn someone down for tenure arbitrarily. Prof. Ezell expressed the desire to distinguish between rejection for academic reasons like the elimination of a program and rejection because the professor did not wear the uniform right or some such thing. The motion was passed unanimously.

Prof. Thompson moved and Prof. Silver seconded that we accept Dr. Carter's changes in his Recommendation 7 (Section B), on the definitions of various kinds of appointments; everyone agreed that they were benevolent, and the motion was passed unanimously.

Prof. Silver moved and Prof. Pages seconded that Dr. Carter's Recommendation 8 (#3, Section A, 1) receive the same alteration as Section C in Recommendation 6: that is, that the academic needs of the college be considered and the "ability to function" be removed as a criterion for probationary reappointment as well as for tenure. This was passed unanimously.

The Council then returned to the most contentious of Dr. Carter's recommendations, the fourth, on evaluation for tenure upon appointment. The issue was that Dr. Carter reasoned that a person senior enough to have earned tenure elsewhere had already been scrutinized by that school's committee and therefore should not have to be looked at by the full Citadel Faculty Tenure and Promotion Committee. The FTPC, however, wanted to look at such a person. Prof. Thompson moved and Prof. Silver seconded (a) that sentence 4 of the proposed sequence for awarding tenure on appointment be amended to say the whole of FTPC, not just the Chair and Vice-Chair, will vote on the person, and (b) that sentence 1 therefore be amended to specify that all members of FTPC, not just the people named as deciders in sentence 2, get the materials about the candidate. There was some discussion on whether this meant all the materials, boxes full, or just summaries, and on whether we should call for the whole FTPC to be at the meeting in sentence 2; observations were made about Charleston being such an attractive place to retire that it might attract more than its share of tenure-on-appointment people who would just relax when here; it was agreed that the main thing we wanted was that faculty be involved in the process of getting them. The motion was passed unanimously and the Council was then finished (for now) with General Order 12.

7. While members went downstairs and got lunch, Prof. Feurtado asked that it be entered in the minutes that he had been misinformed about the way Public Relations had handled the publicizing of Black History Month, and that he had apologized to Jennifer Wallace of that office when he found out the real story. He had complained about the supposed, but wrongly attributed, policy in the Feb. 24th meeting before the arrival of the secretary.

8. The Council began discussion on the draft of Post-Tenure Review procedure approved by Academic Board. Two issues were raised. Prof. Pilcher pointed out that p. 4 of the draft says that post-tenure review was not meant to be used to revoke tenure, and then p. 11 says two unsatisfactory ratings in a row will start the College terminating that professor's employment. Thus, as Prof. Thompson pointed out, p. 4 claims post-tenure review is formative (to get information for the person's improvement) and p. 11 is summative (to take action against the person). Prof. Bishop suggested p. 11 be changed to say an unsatisfactory evaluation might be taken as grounds for starting the tenure-revocation procedure in General Order 12; this was not yet a motion. Prof. White noted that several unsatisfactory ratings in a row on ordinary annual evaluations are the real trigger for termination; Prof. Ezell noted that going beyond that on p. 11 was to demonstrate to people who want to abolish tenure our commitment to clearing out dead wood. The other issue, raised by Prof. Toubiana, was that p. 5 said pure and simple that the basis of evaluation was the three areas of teaching, scholarship and service, which was less nuanced than the previous standard that goodness in teaching plus one of the two other areas would make for a Satisfactory rating. The Council deferred motions on these issues and others until the regular meeting of March 23rd.

9. The meeting was adjourned at 12:44 p.m.