Faculty Council Meeting of Tuesday, 3 May 2003

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

Minutes

Announcements

Joe announced that progress was being made on (1) Executive Director evaluations by faculty, (2) Faculty Council officer nominations, and (3) Committee choices for next year (faculty will soon be asked their preferences).

Marilyn Link thanked everyone for their involvement in Research Symposium Day, and especially thanked Jon Miller for his particular technological expertise.

A faculty member read a bit from the minutes of the 22 April Curriculum and Standards Task Force.  "Discussion of the results from the Faculty Council survey from Tuesday, April 22. We were “not confirmed” by at the gentlest a ratio of 3:1. Steve pointed out that as a task force we have thought about these issues a lot more than most of the faculty at Tuesday’s faculty council meeting."  This faculty member felt that the faculty's experience and teaching expertise were taken too lightly.  Further, that if the only input that the Task Force was willing to receive was input that was agreeable to what the Task Force already wanted, then the input process was hypocritical.

Donita Robinson, co-chair of the Task Force, responded.  She said that they had discussed this further in a later meeting, and among other things discussed bringing questions back to the Faculty Council or to the faculty through emails.  (But no decision was reached.)  Also, their charge had certain constraints that they have to meet, and they're trying to make the best decision/recommendation possible within those constraints.  They plan to bring something more concrete than their last proposal to the faculty in the future.

A motion was made to approve 10 meetings' worth of as-yet unapproved minutes.  It was seconded and voted upon favorably by a show of hands.

Agenda Item 1: Summer Reading

Steve Warshaw talked about the plan to give incoming students and rising seniors a reading assignment over this coming summer.  He and a group of staff who have been considering which text to use are proposing a book called "Study Power".  Like "Study is Hard Work", it has some deficiencies.  For example, it is mostly about test-taking and paper-writing, not (for example), problem-solving.

They would also like to propose a second book, one (like "Ishmael") that would potentially be discussed and used in courses.  Three tentative texts are "My Ishmael", "Brave New World", and "Fast Food Nation".   They'll be making a decision soon.

Agenda Item 2: Admissions Update

Letita Mason shared some figures.  There were 744 applicants (24 fewer than last year), of whom about 135 self-eliminated, meaning they began but did not complete the full application process.  That left 611 complete applications sent to the selection committee.  We selected 278 students, of whom 18% are minority students, including 7 Native Americans.  80 students are on the wait list.  70 counties are represented in the finalist pool.  (The other 30 were mostly rural counties and mostly in the western part of the state.)

In response to a question, there were 16 instances this year of applications that, after more careful review by guidance counselors following the selection committee review, received recommendations to change their status (from finalist to wait list, for example, or from wait list to finalist).

Agenda Item 3: Discussion with Bill Carey of the Board of Trustees

Joe said that Mr. Carey was here to discuss the reasons the Board was so in favor of a multi-year contract for the Executive Director.  (Recently, the faculty voted largely against such a contract and their vote was presented at the Board meeting, but the Board voted in favor of the contract.)

 Mr. Carey (a labor employment lawyer) described what is meant by "employment-at-will" and contrasted this with a contract, which limits (but does not eliminate) both parties' (employer's and employee's) rights to terminate employment.  A three-year contract keeps headhunters from continually trying to woo the Executive Director.  The three-year contract really reflects the desired nature of the relationship (inherently long-term) between the school (or the Board) and the Executive Director.  Mr. Carey said it is not helpful for him to hear details about what the Executive Director did or didn't do, or mistakes he made... he and the Board are concerned with the bigger picture, about whether or not the school is being led in the right direction.

A faculty member questioned the apparent discrepancy between the claim that the Board is interested in the "bigger picture" not details of how the ED does his job, and the written description of his duties, which are all very detailed.  Mr. Carey responded with an example.  "If the ED declares a holiday and throws a party for the seniors, and that disrupts the learning process, that's not of interest to the Board, who do not want to micromanage.  That's the ED's decision, which he might make, for example, to raise student morale if he recognizes the need.  But if he is saying things publicly that may be leading us to attract the wrong kind of students to the school, then that's something maybe the Board is interested in.

A faculty member (who has been at NCSSM for a long time) said that there was a time when perhaps the Board confused their loyalty to the Executive Director with their loyalty to NCSSM.  A few members of the Board eventually established a "Fairness Commission", who wrote a report about the ED's performance.  Reading the report leads you to wonder why the Board remained loyal to that particular ED for so long.  Mr. Carey's response was that tension between a Board and an ED is inherent and any institution.  There are a number of reasons that the events of the past are unlikely to recur.  At that time, the Board knew little about the school and the school had few natural supporters in the legislature and the general public.  Today, the Board knows much about the school and they care about the school.  The confluence of a do-nothing Board and an ED not doing his job is unlikely to happen today.

A faculty member said that during Jerry's staff meeting yesterday, Jerry encouraged us not air dirty laundry in public, that some of our financial stability today is due in part to our disagreements remaining in-house.  This person said that no one would feel any need to air dirty laundry if we could have utter confidence in the evaluation process of the ED.  [Last year, the Board did not solicit the faculty's evaluation of the ED.  It was only by insistence on our part that a 'retroactive' evaluation was put in place.]  Mr. Carey said he does not like the Faculty Council to present to the Board votes presented by the Faculty Council.  That just leads to bad press.  The faculty member clarified his question: "Is it possible that in the future the evaluation of the ED by the faculty could be seen by more than one or two members of the Board?"  Mr. Carey's response was that that might not be appropriate without breaching confidentiality.  But he would pass that concern on to the current Board (Carol Hughs) and the rising Board Chair (Brock Winslow).

Another faculty member said that many faculty here and many North Carolinians saw NCSSM as being a step above "a good high school on a block schedule", and saw the ED as being more akin to a small college president rather than a school superintendent.  But the written description of the ED's duties resembles that of a school superintendent.  Mr. Carey acknowledged that indeed, this written description of duties was a modified version of a description of a superintendent's duties.  But it's not intended to encourage micromanagement.  The ED knows that his responsibilities are principally to pay attention to the bigger picture.

A faculty member returned to the question of so few Board members showing up for committee meetings (the meeting may not have had a quorum, or indeed may have had only one member in attendance) but the Board voting anyway.  Or only two members of the Board reading evaluations of the ED but then the whole Board voting on contract renewal.  It makes me uncomfortable when you say "Trust the Board", yet half the Board doesn't attend, and many of the other half don't know what's going on.  I don't think the Board as a whole tries hard to inform themselves.  Mr. Carey responded that with a new chair coming in in June, things will be run a little differently, as with any new chair.  Mr. Carey will work to make sure the new Chair strives to keep the Board informed and seeking to be informed.  Give us a chance to put that in place.  He added that although he did not want to seem defensive, he was somewhat perturbed that most of what he heard from the faculty as a Board member was about running the school, which isn't the faculty's job.  He wanted to hear from faculty about teaching classes, and about working with students, which is the faculty's job.

A faculty member said that the school seemed to be run like a business.  Mr. Carey responded that he knew many teachers were uncomfortable with that, but that sometimes (not always) it was necessary.  He also warned the faculty that there could be future Board meetings in which changes would occur that we may not like; for example, it might evolve that the Board would eliminate reports from various constituencies so as to free up time for meaningful debate on important issues.  Two faculty members said they concurred, but that they would like those representatives to be able to participate in debates of issues.

Mr. Carey thanked everyone for letting him attend the Faculty Council meeting.  Joe Liles thanked him for coming, and the meeting adjourned at 5:25PM.