Minutes of the
NIU Board of Trustees
ACADEMIC AFFAIRS,
STUDENT AFFAIRS
AND PERSONNEL COMMITTEE
March 7, 2001

We have a full agenda today, Chair Vella said, and this meeting is particularly important for our faculty. At this time of year, the Board and the Committees act on recommendations for tenure, promotion and sabbatical leaves. Also on the agenda are a number of programmatic actions, including new degree programs, a new minor and other curricular changes. We will also receive the annual report on oral English proficiency for last year. The Chair then recognized the representatives of the University Advisory Committee, Dan Gebo and Dolly Jones. Also in attendance was UAC Representative Dan Griffiths.

Agenda Item 7.b. – Recommendations for Faculty and Supportive Professional Staff Sabbatical Leaves for the 2001-02 Academic Year
These recommendations also have been carefully reviewed at the three levels that I mentioned before, Dr. Waldeland stated. Departments review applications for sabbatical leaves and rank them. The Chair has to concur. The college then reviews the departments' rankings and then creates a college-level ranking. Those go to the University Council Personnel Committee (UCPC), which reviews all of the sabbaticals again. Because there are usually more applications than there are slots available, the UCPC makes recommendations as to which are funded and which go on an alternate list. These come forward with the concurrence of all of those bodies, my agreement and that of the President, she said. We ask that you endorse these decisions and ask the President to forward them to the Board for final approval at the March 19 meeting. In answer to a query from Trustee Boey, Dr. Waldeland stated that individuals may apply for sabbaticals every seven years, and Board rules allow only one sabbatical for every 25 faculty members. Also, faculty who receive sabbatical leaves have to file a report within 60 days of completing that leave. Those reports come to the Provost. We have received reports in prior years that were very impressed with, Trustee Boey said. 

A year or two ago, Trustee Sanchez said, issues arose regarding sabbaticals through a perception among too much of the public that they were basically vacations. He wondered if any faculty were present who had taken a sabbatical and could give the Board a perspective. Two years ago, because of that legislative perspective, particularly, Dr. Waldeland said, I asked three faculty members who had been on sabbatical that preceding year to present what they had done to the Board, and we would like to do that again. We did not do it today because we had a full schedule. Virginia Cassidy was one of the people who reported to you two years ago. Dan Gebo, who is currently on sabbatical, was at the meeting and gave a brief report on his activities.

Since I was not going to be overseas, Dr. Gebo said, I told everybody I would fulfill my duty to UAC. My sabbatical time has allowed me to work on the fossils from China. These fossils are at the Carnegie Museum of Natural History in Pittsburgh, for the most part, as well as in Beijing. The sabbatical has also allowed me to make several trips to Beijing to go through that material and pull out new fossil primates. Essentially, it has given me a time to concentrate on not only finding more material but writing up that material for publication.

In reply to a question from Trustee Boey, Dr. Gebo said that he was in Tibet last summer. Unfortunately, we did not find as many good fossils as we would have liked in Tibet, he said, so I am not sure if we will go back. We will definitely be back in China. We go every year, but we have been going to different parts of China. We try to go wherever we think we can get the best return for our efforts. Although Tibet was a phenomenal place to visit, I have to say it was not very productive in terms of our scientific output. So, although we will be in China for at least another decade, if not more, Tibet is kind of on the back burner for now.

If I could represent all faculty, Dr. Gebo said, I would confirm that it is a very rigorous process to prepare our proposals, and then we use the time to concentrate on our research effort, some of which has paid off for the university in terms of public relations or other types of activities. So, these activities have a broader impact, such as attracting students.

Trustee Boey stated that he had far more appreciation of sabbatical leaves since he came to the Board because of sessions like this.

I read all of the sabbatical reports, Dr. Waldeland said, and they describe what faculty have published or exhibited. But the reports also mention how work during the sabbatical period has enriched faculty teaching because they have been able to bring new material into their courses. We are very committed to the idea that there is a direct connection between research and teaching, and the sabbatical reports suggest that faculty are experiencing that and carrying it forward.

Let me add that this is a wonderful program NIU has established, President Peters said. It is a rigorous program based on meritorious proposals. In no small measure, I am sure, it has resulted in our ability to move to the top of the Carnegie classification and to spread our national reputation on the research side. It also feeds into the instructional side, particularly in the graduate and professional areas. I suspect we will see more and more proposals that also permit faculty to get some retraining, not only in specialties they need to do their research but also for learning the instructional technologies. It is a great plus for NIU in attracting new faculty. Many universities do not have sabbatical programs.

Chair Vella asked for a motion to approve the recommendations for faculty and supportive professional staff sabbatical leaves for the 2001-02 Academic Year. Trustee Sanchez so moved, seconded by Trustee Boey. The motion was approved.

Agenda Item 7.c. – Request for a New Degree Program
Dr. Waldeland asked Dr. Virginia Cassidy, Assistant Provost for Academic Planning and Development, to present this request.

Dr. Cassidy stated that this request proposes a new Master of Science degree in Sport Management. Currently, there are no other master's programs in Sport Management in the state, she said, so this program will fulfill an important need for students seeking leadership positions in a variety of sport organizations such as intercollegiate athletics, campus recreation, fitness centers, semiprofessional and professional sports, and sport facilities management. The growing interest in fitness and the expansion of sport organizations has created a multibillion dollar industry in the United States which employs millions of workers. Our location in the northern part of the state and our proximity to Chicago is also a factor that should contribute to the success of this new degree program.

The Department of Leadership in Educational and Sport Organizations, which is housed in the College of Education, has worked diligently to design a high quality degree program that will meet the national standards of the Northern American Society for Sport Management, Dr. Cassidy said. These standards require that students complete course work in areas including leadership, management, finance, marketing and research methods and that they are familiar with the legal and ethical issues and the current problems occurring in sport. Students will also participate in an internship experience so they will be able to apply their knowledge from their classroom studies in a work-based setting. The department currently offers a specialization in sport management within the M.S.Ed. in Physical Education degree program, which positions it well to offer this new master of science degree. Many of the courses from the specialization will be included in the new program, and the faculty has already created the needed additional courses for the degree so no additional resources are required to implement this program.

This proposal for the new degree program in Sport Management has received all the needed curricular approvals at the department, college and university levels, the endorsement of the Academic Planning Council and the concurrence of the Provost. The university recommends that the Committee endorse this request and ask the President to forward it in his report to the Board of Trustees March 19, 2001 meeting. Chair Vella asked for a motion to approve the request for a new Master of Science degree in Sport Management. Trustee Sanchez so moved, seconded by Student Trustee Barr. The motion was approved.

Agenda Item 7.d. – Request for a New Minor
Dr. Cassidy stated that the Department of Communicative Disorders would like to offer students who are not majors in their department the opportunity to learn about disabilities in communication by offering a new minor. This minor in communicative disorders will help students in a variety of fields develop an understanding of how disorders in speech, language and hearing impact on the lives of individuals who have these disabilities. The proposed minor could be of interest to students enrolled in many of the degree programs offered at Northern, such as education and child development, psychology, sociology, physical therapy, nutrition and dietetics, and community and public health. The students will work with an advisor in the department to select appropriate courses for the completion of this minor. The university believes that this new minor will help students as they seek employment in their respective disciplines and professions. The minor will also benefit those students who might be interested in graduate work in communicative disorders. No additional funding is required to implement this minor because the courses needed for it are currently offered to students who are enrolled in the B.S. degree in Communicative Disorders. This minor has also received the approval of the department, college and university curricular bodies, and the concurrence of the Provost, Dr. Cassidy said. Therefore, the university recommends that the Committee endorse this request and ask the President to forward it by means of his report to the Board at its March 19 meeting. Chair Vella asked for a motion to approve the request for a new Minor in Communicative Disorders. Trustee Skoien so moved, seconded by Trustee Boey. The motion was approved.

Agenda Item 7.e. – Request for New Emphases within Degree Programs
The next requests are really housekeeping matters more than they are new emphases, Dr. Waldeland said. I want to emphasize that these requests come forward because of reorganization of departmental curricula to give some structure and visibility to already existing courses.

The first request for a new emphasis comes from the Department of Kinesiology and Physical Education for a modification in their curriculum within the B.S. degree in Kinesiology. They are proposing to change the areas of study in athletic training and preventive and rehabilitative exercise sciences to emphases, Dr. Cassidy reported. At this time, both of these areas of study are part of the emphasis in fitness leadership, which is noted on the student's transcript but is not particularly helpful in describing the knowledge and skills the students gain from enrolling in these very different areas of study. The notation of an emphasis in athletic training or in preventive and rehabilitative exercise science on the transcript would benefit students by informing employers of the specific competencies that students have obtained by completing their respective emphasis within the B.S. in Kinesiology degree. All of the courses needed for the new emphases are currently taught in the university, so no new curricular requirements or costs will result from changing these areas of study to emphases. In a few minutes, Dr. Cassidy said, we will request the deletion of the Emphasis in Fitness Leadership, which will be replaced with the new Emphasis in Athletic Training and the Emphasis in Preventive and Rehabilitative Exercise Sciences.

The Department of Geology and Environmental Geosciences is proposing to reorganize its undergraduate curriculum by creating three formal emphases. At the December meeting of the Board of Trustees, Dr. Cassidy said, the Board approved an Emphasis in Earth Science Education within this degree program. The department now proposes to create an emphasis in Geology and an emphasis in Environmental Geosciences to complete its curriculum reorganization. Students in all three of these emphases will complete a set of core requirements in chemistry, mathematics, physics, earth science and geology, which will provide them with a foundation in the essential principles for studies in this discipline. Students in the proposed emphasis in Geology will then complete 15 semester hours of upper-division course work in geology, which will prepare them for careers as professional geologists and to pursue graduate study within the field. Students completing the proposed Emphasis in Environmental Geosciences will enroll in nine semester hours of upper-division course work in geology and nine semester hours in course work in other departments. These students are most likely to pursue careers and professions that may use the knowledge of the environment, such as land use planning, the law, political science or economics. The creation of these emphases, which will be noted on the student's transcript, will benefit the students by clearly specifying their preparation as beginning geologists or as students who have studied in the interdisciplinary area of Environmental Geosciences. No new costs will be incurred from the creation of either of these emphases, Dr. Cassidy said, because all the courses have been taught on a regular basis at the university. These requests have also received the appropriate approvals within the university structure and the concurrence of the Provost. The university, therefore, recommends that the Committee endorse these requests for new emphases and ask that the President forward the requests by means of his report to the Board of Trustees for action at its March 19 meeting. Chair Vella asked for a motion to approve the requests for a new Emphasis in Athletic Training and a new Emphasis in Preventive and Rehabilitative Exercise Science within the B.S. in Kinesiology and a new Emphasis in Geology and a new Emphasis in Environmental Geosciences within the B.S. in Geology. Student Trustee Barr so moved, seconded by Trustee Boey. The motion was approved.

Agenda Item 7.f. – Request to Delete Existing Program and Emphasis
The Department of Finance in the College of Business proposes to delete the Master of Science degree in Finance. Because of declining enrollments in this program, Dr. Cassidy explained, the department made the difficult decision that the continued allocation of its resources to offer all of the courses needed each semester for students to be able to complete this degree in a timely manner was no longer justified. Students who are currently enrolled in the program will be able to complete the course work they need to complete the degree, and all of these students are expected to graduate by spring semester of 2002. The department, however, will continue to offer graduate courses in finance to support the degree requirements for the Master of Business Administration program, which does require that students take at least one graduate level course in finance. This MBA curriculum program also gives students the opportunity to complete a nine-semester hour area of study in finance.

The second request is for deletion of the Emphasis in Fitness Leadership, which is currently a subdivision of the Bachelor of Science degree in Kinesiology. This request accompanies the department's proposal to change the two areas of study in athletic training and rehabilitative exercise science currently housed within the emphasis. Given the move to treat these two new areas of study as emphases, Dr. Cassidy said, there is no longer a need for the umbrella title of the current emphasis, Fitness Leadership. No new savings will be realized from the deletion of either the Master of Finance degree or the Emphasis in Fitness Leadership because the courses contribute to other programs. These requests are brought to the Committee after approval from the appropriate curricular bodies, at the departmental, college and university levels and the concurrence of the Provost. The university recommends that the Committee endorse these requests and ask the President to forward them to the Board of Trustees in his report for the March 19 meeting. In reply to a question from Trustee Boey, Dr. Cassidy said that the master's students have been gravitating to the MBA degree because it gives them a broader perspective and perhaps more flexibility in employment.

Interim Provost Waldeland said that part of what is putting the pressure on the department to make a decision to not maintain a full 30-hour master's is the popularity of the undergraduate degree in finance. The department has to balance its resources between the graduate and the undergraduate levels. All MBA students take one core course in finance, and those who wish to have more of a focus in finance may take additional courses and electives within the MBA. Dr. Cassidy replied to Trustee Sanchez's question, stating that in looking back over enrollments in the M.S. program in Finance showed that almost 40 students were enrolled in the program in 1995, and over time enrollments have shown a steady decline to a current enrollment of six to eight students.

Dr. Waldeland stated that for many of our M.S. students, the MBA would be the prelude for going on to a Ph.D. in Finance. More of the people who wish to work in business are choosing the MBA because of its breadth. Many fields are becoming so much more interdisciplinary, she said, and the need is for specialists in any of these areas to know something about the others.

David Graf, Dean of the College of Business, stated that if someone really wanted to pursue a Ph.D. in Finance, they would probably go from an undergraduate degree right into a doctoral program. Through that process, they take master's equivalent courses, but they sort of skip over the master's and go right to the Ph.D.

Dean Graf is the expert in this field, President Peters said, but my observation of what is happening to the College of Business Ph.D. programs in general, in the past decade, is a movement toward MBA's – Executive MBA's, Master's of Accountancy, Risk Management type master's degrees – that cut across three or four area, and there are fewer Ph.D.'s in the business disciplines being produced. And this makes it very hard for us to recruit faculty, Dr. Waldeland said.

Several years ago, Dean Graf said, we eliminated the Master's in Marketing and the Master's in Management. Those were moves made because the enrollments were low. The Master's of Finance seemed to have a little more life at the time, so we decided to give it a little longer to see if it was going to work. It just has not proven to be popular with students.

Chair Vella asked for a motion to approve the request to delete the M.S. in Finance and the Emphasis in Fitness Leadership within the B.S. in Kinesiology. Trustee Sanchez so moved, seconded by Trustee Skoien. The motion was approved.

Agenda Item 7.g. – Annual Report on Oral English Proficiency 1999-2000
Our final item is a report we present to the Board annually, Dr. Waldeland said. The state legislature passed an act in the 1980s requiring governing boards of Illinois public institutions to take appropriate steps to ensure that those who teach in the classrooms of the public institutions are proficient in oral English. Each university was expected to come up with a policy and a procedure to give students the opportunity to express any problems they are having. NIU's policy has multiple facets. All international teaching assistants must have a minimum score on the Test of Spoken English. Some departments, such as English, set that minimum score higher. The university provides several clinical settings in which faculty, whether they are teaching assistants or regular faculty, can seek assistance with pronunciation or usage of English. The issue is always getting students to come forward with complaints. Often students are tentative about doing this, she said, and our policy invites students to talk to the chair of the department in which the course is offered. For any student who does not feel comfortable doing that, the student is encouraged to go the Ombudsman, and then the Ombudsman will contact the chair. The chairs are then expected to go back to the individual about whom the complaint is registered, observe the situation and make a determination as to the nature of the problem and effect appropriate remediation. Over the 15 years that we have been doing this, Dr. Waldeland said, we find that often the basis for the difficulty the student is experiencing has as much to do with teaching styles as it does with the pronunciation of English. Sometimes people face the blackboard too much and not the class; sometimes they may not project enough; they may not be as responsive to questions. So, very often the remediation has involved assistance with teaching methodology more often than it involves oral English, she said. What we ask the chairs of every department to do annually is to submit their list of complaints and an indication of how the situation was resolved. We make this report in order to help the Board be in compliance with the public law that asks you to oversee this process on our campus, Dr. Waldeland concluded.

I want to mention three things, Dr. Peters said. First, I wanted to report to the Academic Affairs, Student Affairs and Personnel Committee that on this past Monday, we had a meeting on campus of the Governor's Commission on the Status of Women, and our Governor, by proclamation, declared that day as Lynne Waldeland Day. And the wonderful thing about it was that all of us kept that as a surprise for her. You certainly deserve the accolades, he told Dr. Waldeland. You are so thorough in your preparation, and you are such a wonderful role model for all of us, and we appreciate it. It is well deserved.

On behalf of the Board of Trustees and the Academic Affairs, Student Affairs and Personnel Committee, President Peters said, I want to thank the students, the faculty and the deans who went with us for NIU Springfield Day. It turned out to be a wonderful chance for us to show state legislators and policy makers that NIU works for the citizens of this state, and that we are enthusiastic and committed to public higher education. I was in Springfield recently, and a number of the representatives told me how they enjoyed the steel band. So, congratulations to you all.

The third thing I want to mention because you may read about it, the President said, is I am quoted in Time Magazine this week. I do not know how I got in there or how they got me, he said, but I indicated that I was going to ask the faculty to evaluate the role of the SAT in our admissions policies. I will do that this afternoon when I attend the Faculty Senate Meeting. We really use the ACT more. This comes on the heels of the president of the University of California, Robert Atkinson, asking the faculty there to scrap SAT-1 because he feels it is not an appropriate predictor of performance at the university. I will ask our faculty not to drop it but to evaluate the ACT in its role in admissions. I think they are in the best position to think this problem through. I have had the personal view on this for many years that we place an overemphasis on the score on a single test – and we are not quite sure what it measures – and then we all rank ourselves according to that. My personal view is that I much prefer encouraging college bound students to take a challenging high school preparatory course of study that emphasizes four years of math, languages and sciences at increasingly challenging levels through honors and AP courses. So, I just wanted this Committee to know that I am out a little bit ahead of the faculty on this one, but I am going to ask them to take a look at that.

I would like to add that the Chair is also very happy that Ms. Waldeland had that commendation, Chair Vella said. She is very easy to work with and has been a great help to me. You are very deserving.

Respectfully submitted,

Sharon M. Mimms
Recording Secretary