Faculty Council Meeting of Tuesday, 4 February 2003

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

Minutes

Announcements

Joe announced the upcoming Powwow on 22 February and encouraged people to come and to promote it.

Julie Graves announced that the math department would like volunteers to proctor for 1.5 hours the AMC12 Math Exam (formerly called the AHSME) next Tuesday (Alt Day).

Carol O'Dell announced that she needs a volunteer to drive the Quiz Bowl team to a competition on 8 February.

Tom Clayton circulated a sign-up sheet for Discovery Days (faculty are required to participate in one).

Between agenda items, Jerry Boarman arrived and Joe asked him to update the faculty on the hiring of an Assistant Executive Director.  He did so.  There are four highly qualified candidates, which include three men and one woman.  The evaluation team includes Elizabeth Moose from the faculty.  They will be interviewed and will visit the campus and meet the community during the period from 10-13 February.  Hopefully, a decision and offer will be made by 20 February. 

Agenda Item: Results of the Junior and Senior homework surveys

Tom Clayton shared the results of the Junior and Senior homework surveys.  (These are linked in an appendix to these minutes.  The Excel files show cumulative proportions of students.  e.g., 27 juniors, or 10% of all juniors, reported spending 20 or fewer hours per week working outside of class.)

Agenda Item: What are we doing well at NCSSM? What do we need to do to improve?

Joe asked Dot to come help him lead a discussion on this topic.

There was some discussion about the role of task forces.  Jerry said that they, like Faculty Council, have the role of making recommendations to the Executive Director.  Faculty should be (and are) on those task forces and he would never want a task force to recommend something without faculty input.

It was stated that one of the best things about NCSSM is the classroom experience, with innovative classroom experiences and activities and great instruction from knowledgeable, experienced teachers.  Task forces who are (for example) changing the schedule or the calendar need to know that.  Students will say that that's the main difference between NCSSM and their old schools.  This was seconded by three other teachers who agreed that students said that NCSSM classes were great.  Joe added that more than half the parents on the parent email forum said that their students valued the classes and the whole school experience greatly, and that they didn't want us to change the school [e.g., by restricting homework or Internet access].

Someone said that students find NCSSM to be a place where they are encouraged to grow intellectually and to think thoughts different from their parents' thoughts.  They got to do great things here that challenged their minds that they never would have been able to do at their old schools.  Joe then shared a story of a student who was, at NCSSM, very shy and did not talk much, but now she is flying all over and is "a dynamo".

Sally Adkin said that many alumni valued the diversity at NCSSM when they were students.

We do a good job of collaborating with our colleagues, and working together to continually improve our courses.

We have been innovative in the past--have created innovative classes--without necessarily altering the structure of the school.

We support our faculty in attending professional conferences.  It was said that financial support should be greater for this.  Another person stated that she learns more from her colleagues on a day-to-day basis than at NCTM meetings--this is praise for the collegiality and scholarship of her colleagues, not a put-down of NCTM.

There were 18 faculty in attendance at this meeting, including the Faculty Council officers.  Joe expressed his disappointment with turnout an urged the faculty present to urge their colleagues to come to Faculty Council meetings.

Appendix

Time Devoted to Academics Outside of Class, Fall Semester Survey (MS Word document)
Time Devoted to Academics Outside of Class, Fall Semester Survey Results (MS Word document)
Junior Survey (Excel file)
Senior Survey (Excel file)