Academic Senate Youngstown State University Youngstown, Ohio  44555

March 3, 2004

Note 1:  Please submit agenda items and cover sheets for the April Senate meeting to Bob Hogue by noon on Monday, March 29, at the latest.  Provide both a hard copy and a disk or electronic copy of your report and cover sheet in Word or rich text format.  A downloadable cover sheet is available at the Academic Senate web site [hit "cancel" if asked for a password]:

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• Amendment to Bylaw 6
• Modification of Admissions Policy
• Modification of last date to add a course
• Acceptance of OFC Resolution of 2/13/2004

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Tom Shipka, chair of the Academic Senate, called the Senate to order at 4:09 p.m.  Dr. Shipka reminded speakers to use one of the microphones to help in accurate transcription of minutes.

Minutes of the Previous Meeting:

Minutes of the February 4, 2004, meeting were approved as posted.  To view the March minutes, go to <http://www.www.ysu.edu/acad-senate/minfeb04.htm>. 

Senate Executive Committee (SEC) / Report from the Chair:  Tom Shipka, chair of the Senate, reported:

1. The Executive Committee will meet with Provost Tony Atwater on Monday, March 15, for an update and general discussion.

2. You will hear today from the Charter and Bylaws Committee which has prepared recommended changes in Bylaw 6 to establish a standing Professional Conduct Committee pursuant to previous Senate action and recently approved Board Policy.

3. The Executive Committee has received a memo from the Senate Library Committee expressing concern over reductions in the library allocation. The Executive Committee will discuss this matter with the Provost on March 15.

4. Only Dr. Sandy Stephan and Dr. Bill Jenkins have volunteered to serve on a committee to review the Board approved policy of waivers in certain administrative searches. As a last resort, I will ask two or three Senate Executive Committee members to join these two.

5. In my capacity as Senate chair, I have been appointed to serve on the Search Committee to recommend an appointee(s) to the President of the University for the position of University General Counsel. Other members of the Search Committee include Atty. John L. Pogue, a member of the YSU Board of Trustees, who chairs the committee; Dr. Cynthia Anderson, Vice President for Student Affairs; Dr. Tony Atwater, Provost & Vice President for Academic Affairs; Atty. Franklin S. Bennett, Jr., Secretary to the YSU Board of Trustees and General Counsel to Butler, Wick & Co.; Atty. John L. Habat, Vice President for Administration; Mr. Jimmy Myers, Director of Equal Opportunity & Diversity; and Atty. Roger F. Carroll, Senior Deputy Attorney General, Ohio Attorney General's Office. Mr. Joseph S. Nohra, a member of the YSU Board of Trustees, had originally been appointed to the Search Committee but he withdrew upon learning that a member of his family planned to submit an application. As of March 1 thirty applications had been received. The deadline for applications is March 15. The Search Committee met on March 1 and will meet again on March 22.

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Ohio Faculty Council (OFC):   Tom Shipka reported:

The Ohio Faculty Council met in Columbus on February 13 at the best-attended meeting in the history of the OFC. Only the University of Toledo had no representative from among all the public universities and medical schools. Guests who gave well-organized and informative presentations were Thomas Noe, Chair of the Ohio Board of Regents, and Atty. Richard Pogue, Chair of the Governor's Commission on Higher Education and the Economy. A very fruitful dialogue followed each presentation. Dr. Katherine Canada, Project Director of the Governor's Commission, accompanied Atty. Pogue. Both presenters proved to be very well informed about Ohio public higher education. The presenters agreed that short of a turnaround in the national and state economy, the burden of financing higher education will continue to shift from the State to students and their families.

At this meeting the OFC also heard two reports from the Legislative Committee, including one by Dr. Paul Sracic of YSU.

At this meeting the OFC also adopted a resolution about science education in elementary and secondary schools. This will be presented to you under New Business at this meeting for your consideration. Scientists in Ohio and elsewhere have been concerned about the new standards for Ohio science curricula being developed by the State Board of Education. The Board drew back from an early plan to include in science curricula the concept of intelligent design, the theory that certain life forms are too complex to be explained by evolution alone and therefore a higher intelligence must have been involved. But they have included a segment on the critical analysis of evolution in the science curriculum. Bruce Alberts, president of the National Academy of Sciences, filed a formal objection to this in a letter to Board President Jennifer Sheets, pointing out to the Board that "The vast majority of scientists are not asking people to choose between science and religion. What concerns us is that intelligent design is not scientific because its ultimate tenet that life on Earth is the result of the work of some intelligent being is scientifically untestable and therefore cannot be invalidated through scientific means." Professor Jeffrey McKee of Ohio State said that the "The proposed lesson plan on evolution is a thinly disguised attempt to promote creationism in Ohio's science classrooms." McKee says that the science standards include misleading statements on the fossil record, fraudulent claims about the evolution of bacteria, and direct references to creationist literature. Professor Kenneth Miller, Brown University cell biologist, text book author, and Roman Catholic, also attacked the standards, observing that if we're going to have a segment expressing skepticism about evolution, we should also have segments expressing skepticism about germ theory and atomic theory. Miller has written a famous book about the compatibility of science and religion called "Finding Darwin's God" which was the basis of a lecture that he gave on this campus in February 2003.

The next meeting of the OFC is Friday, March 12, at which time we will meet with several current and former university lobbyists for a general discussion of legislative matters and with Dr. David Sweet, YSU President and chair of the Inter-University Council, the organization of university presidents, to discuss collaboration on a variety of issues.

I remind you, finally, that the OFC web site is being administered out of our campus by Bob Hogue and James Sacco. The Senate web page has a link to it and the OFC web site continues to include more and more information that should be of interest to you, such as the recommendations to STRS on health care by a consortium of K-12 and higher education groups called Ohio Health Care Advocates.

 

College of Education:   Dean Philip Ginnetti provided a PowerPoint presentation on news and events in the College:

The College is housed in Beeghly Hall, which opened in 1998, and it has the 3rd largest enrollment on campus. 86% of Mahoning County teachers and 74% of Trumbull county teachers have degrees from the College. NCATE has now accredited YSU, with the next accreditation scheduled for 2010. A number of institutions have not passed on their first attempt since new standards were adopted. We did!

The college has 34 full-time and 7 cross-appointed faculty members, with 150 years of combined experience among the faculty in P-12 settings.

Modifications have been made for admission requirements. Students who have at least a 2.67 GPA and have passed Praxis I are admitted. They are also admitted if they have a GPA of at least 3.0 and have completed at least 60 semester hours. In order to student-teach, must first pass Praxis II exams.

YSU is the only university in the state that licenses teachers in Italian.

The College houses several Master's Programs, including Counseling, Educational Administration, and Teacher Education, as well as the University's only doctoral program, an Ed.D. in educational leadership.

The Wilcox curriculum resource center is housed within the College. There is also a "Little Penguin Story Tellers" group to tell stories to pre-school students in the area.

The College has started a "shadow" program: High School students can come to campus and shadow a current student to see what it is like to be an education major at YSU.

We continue with the work associated with a Title II Teacher Quality Enhancement Grant in conjunction with Arts & Sciences. There is also faculty in residence program, as well as a teacher in residence program.

On the horizon: The College hopes to be submitting a new Title II grant. There is also a new project being developed to determine the impact BCOE student teachers have made on student learning. This new approach is called the Teacher Work Sample as developed by the Renaissance Partnership - a national Title II funded project. There are three new Special Education Master's programs in the works. The College is working with the Rich Center to put together a Master's cognate area to prepare teachers to work with autistic children, one on Deaf Education and another to provide a Special Education licensure. We are proposing a Master's in Secondary Education with licensure for those who already have a degree in a licensure area (i.e. math, science, social studies, language arts). A new doctoral strand is being examined for the Ed.D. program to prepare administrators for the Small School Initiative. Also, we are working to move the ECHS program forward.

Charter & Bylaws Committee:    Christopher Bache, chairperson of the Charter & Bylaws Committee, reported.   Dr. Bache moved adoption of the proposed changes to Bylaw 6 as shown in Attachment 1.  Motion was seconded.  Discussion: none.  Motion passed.

Elections & Balloting Committee:  No report.

The Committee has two proposed changes, one dealing with admissions standards for home-schooled students, and another one dealing with the last day for a student to add a class.

Dr. Morrison moved adoption of the Admission policy, contained in Attachment 2, as a replacement for the current policy as stated on Page 11 of the YSU Undergraduate Bulletin. Motion was seconded. Discussion:  Michael Crescimanno asked if out-of-state included Pennsylvania.  Dr. Morrison replied that it did.  Robert Kramer asked if a home-school student who passes the GED would still have to comply with parts 1 through 4.  Response was affirmative.  Dr. Kramer moved to amend point 3 to refer to Ohio Administrative Code rather than to the Ohio Revised Code. Motion accepted as an editorial change.  Paul Kobulnicky asked if admission to the University applies to the taking of any courses for reported credit.  Dr. Morrison responded that a person may come to the University as a non-matriculated student for up to 2 courses.  Mr. Kobulnicky noted that many parents are moving students to home schooling but that they get to a point where they might want to have additional material. He stated his opinion that there are still very heavy burdens on home schooled students in order to be admitted to the University, and that we are creating barriers to possibly very successful students.  Dr. Morrison replied that these are simply consistent with the State guidelines. With no further discussion on the matter, a vote was taken. Motion passed.

Dr. Morrison moved that the last day to add classes be set no later than the 6th week day of the term.  Motion was seconded.  Dr. Morrison noted that having students show up to add the class without consulting the instructor places many students into a hole. If the deadline is moved, we will still get people coming in at the deadline. There seems to be no benefit to our enrollment by having a longer period for adding a class. Hy Sockel stated an objection to the proposal, since some classes are taught two days or even one day a week. He noted that in such cases, a student could not even see the instructor before the deadline and asked if the language be changed.  Josh Hiznay asked if approving this would change the deadline for electing the CR/NC grade option in a class.  Dr. Morrison stated that it would not. The motion was then voted on.  Motion passed.

Unfinished Business:   None.

New business:

Charles Singler moved that the Senate accept the OFC Resolution regarding the teaching of science, as contained in Attachment 3. Seconded. Discussion followd:  Phil Munro read into the minutes the contents of a written statement. The statement is contained in Attachment 4.   Dr. Kramer: The text states twice that it does not mandate the teaching of creationism, so why is the resolution needed? I ask that it not be endorsed. Dr. Crescimanno: The sections in the back are rather disingenuously done. I think this is a timely issue, since the Board will be meeting soon to discuss this, but the wording of the resolution is not good.  Dr. Singler: It is my intention to encourage that science and the scientific method are subjects that should be taught in science classes, and that religion and religious philosophies should be taught in other classes or appropriate settings.  

A vote was then taken on the motion. Motion passed.

Adjournment:  The Academic Senate adjourned at 5:01 p.m.