Faculty Council Meeting of Tuesday, 5 November 2002

President: Joe Liles; Vice-president: John Woodmansee; Secretary: Floyd Bullard

Minutes

Announcements

Carol O'Dell encouraged the faculty to give to the Annual Fund.  We need it and it needs us.

Ginger Wilson then encouraged people to give to the Combined Campaign.  We'll receive (or have already received) more information in our boxes about this.  Both the Combined Campaign and the Annual Fund can have regular donations taken out of our paychecks.

Therese Taxis offered that the difference between mediocrity and excellence is private funding.  It makes a difference when visiting private donors if we can say "100% of our faculty are contributors to the Annual Fund."  Additionally, Therese said that she would like to tell alumni who raise money that they can "win" lunch with their favorite teacher (tab paid for by Alumni Development).

Gretchen Davis announced that over 30 pairs of eyeglasses have been turned in to Lost and Found.

Kevin Cromwell made numerous brief announcements.  We are fully staffed for the first time in 5 weeks.  Wendy Hicks is our most recent addition (new SLI), replacing Kristen Morris.  Club sponsors and other good Samaritans--please check gas level when you return a vehicle.  The Shell station on Hillsborough Road will fill up (non-diesel) vehicles without a credit card.  Thanks to Hall Parents and Mike Newbauer and Therese Taxis for organizing Hall Parents.  You can reserve the Hunt kitchen.  The fall play will be the next two weekends.  A brownies-from-home campaign will begin soon.  We're expecting over 1200 homemade brownies soon.  After the play on Friday, the Harry Potter movie will be shown on campus and students will be taken to see the new one.  Some students will go to a hockey game, others will play Jeopardy against faculty.

Kevin continued to speak about the current unhealthy anxiety levels currently on campus among students and some staff.  (This afternoon NCSSM learned that the Thanksgiving break is to be extended to a full week to help relieve the anxiety level.)  Kevin said that this year is highly unusual as regards anxiety.  There is much crying.  Many students--even straight A students--are feeling very high anxiety levels.  We've sent home several students (for a week) who are feeling high levels of stress.

Gail added that the Counseling office is "feeling no joy these days.  It's one crisis after another.  Some students say they want to go home, others say they don't want to live."  Gail thanked her colleagues on the faculty for all that we do and have done for students who have recently been sent home for psychological reasons.  An expert on post-traumatic stress will be visiting the residential life staff on 18 November.

Brief discussion ensued, with faculty expressing concern and asking questions about numbers of students experiencing abnormal anxiety.  One faculty member voiced her concern about the stress that may be arising due to the play.  Someone else suggested that it could be due to evenign classes.  Someone else voiced her opinion that the importance of grades has been escalated since we started computing GPA's.  Another faculty member suggested that stress could be greater due to the fact that nationally, college acceptance rates have been decreasing in recent years, and our seniors are getting more worried than they once did about getting acceptance to colleges.

Agenda Item 1: Discovery Days

Joe thanked Letita for being present for this discussion.  Since it is Election Day anyway, he brought paper ballots and is prepared for us to vote on any seconded motions that come up.

It was suggested that we return to having semi-finalists and then finalists, inviting only semi-finalists to visit the campus for Discovery Day.  This would reinstitute regional testing, etc., said Joe, but a faculty member suggested that we could make a first cut based on grades, SAT scores, etc.  She also said that having all applicants visit campus made the students on Discovery Day see a lot of students who were not future NCSSM students--and therefore gave them a poor impression of what their future classmates here would be like.

Letita pointed out that we would have little information on which to base a first cut at that time.

Another faculty member said he liked having the Admissions Committee looking at the candidates twice, as we once did.  But enough information needs to be provided to the committee at the first cut beyond standardized test scores.

A motion was made to recommend to the Admissions Task Force that they reconsider having two cuts.  It was seconded and voted upon.  The vote was 22 for, 0 against, and 4 abstentions.

A motion was made to return to individual interviews instead of group interviews--if we could lower the number of visitors to campus--but also that we train interviewers more so that the interviews can be more informative.  The person clarified when asked that the intent was also for the interview to count in the admissions process.  The motion was discussed very briefly and seconded and voted upon.  22 in favor, 2 opposed, and 1 abstention.

Letita answered a question, saying that application numbers were exceptionally high, especially from regions where we have historically received very few applications.

Someone said that while numbers of applications were great, it was at least as important for those who apply to be applicants who appreciated the challenging academic nature of the school.  Whether semi-finalists only or every applicant visits on Discovery Day, they should leave with the impression of NCSSM as an academically challenging place.  Two other faculty members voiced their agreement with this, with one suggesting that we could do group interviews in which we, the faculty, "owned" the topic of discussion.

A motion was made to--assuming the number of students visiting on Discovery Day were not diminished--to direct faculty representatives on the Admissions Task force to "reconfigure" how faculty were used on Discovery Day, considering a classroom visitation component and a group discussion or group interview covering topics proposed by the teachers involved.  [The secretary is guessing about this motion: it was not exactly formulated like this.]  The motion was not seconded.

Someone suggested that the group discussion be a recruiting tool, not an evaluative tool.  It was pointed out that this was voted on favorably at the last Faculty Council meeting.

The motion two paragraphs ago was repeated and seconded and voted upon.  25 in favor, 0 opposed, and 1 abstention.

Presently we discourage applicants from visiting classes at NCSSM.  A motion was made to change that policy and encourage applicants to visit--not with family members, but at least by themselves.  Brief discussion ensued.  One faculty member pointed out that "encouraging applicants" to do this was different from responding positively when applicants on their own asked to visit.  Another faculty member pointed out that it should be limited to at most two visitors at a time.  The motion was modified to include this latter restriction.

A visiting non-faculty member pointed out that this potentially could do harm.  We might intimidate the applicants, and we can't control what the students do.

Someone else pointed out that National Board certification involves producing a video of a good class.

There were no longer enough people to vote on the most recent motion and the person who proposed it requested that its vote be postponed.

A request was made of Joan Barber that she postpone the Calendar Committee meeting until the next Faculty Council meeting had occurred, including a discussion of Miniterm.

The meeting adjourned at 5:07PM.