President William Atkinson called the meeting to order at 3:30 P.M.

Nineteen senators were present or represented. Senators Randy Hines, Marilyn Robitaille, and Leslie Stanley-Stevens were absent.

1. Approval of Minutes
Corrections to the minutes were made and upon motion by Linda Duncan, the Senate approved the minutes of the Sept 12, 2000 meeting.

2. Treasurer's Report.
The Treasurer reported a balance of $3507.63.

Several items were done out of order to accommodate speakers.

6. Report on SACS committees - Linda Jones

A summary of the recommendations is available in the Faculty Senate office and each senator will have a copy.

SACS recommendations: 23 Stephenville, 7 Killeen
Many had been noted in Tarleton self-study

Initial self-study report is in Library.
The SACS report is not circulated, a copy can be viewed in Linda Jones office.

Discussed criteria 3.1:
Need more explicit reporting of research and service
OSP and Bert Little will collect data to reflect research efforts
Service will be addressed by client surveys (students and other)

Additional information was passed out that included the task force recommendations on advising equalization, qualitative admission criteria, graduate orientation, and graduate faculty workload.

On the issue of graduate faculty workload, faculty who teach all graduate classes will have their workload reduced to 9 hours. The original task force report had asked for a banking concept to be included which provides a mechanism for faculty teaching both undergraduate and graduate courses. That was not filed as part of the SACS report. Linda Jones promised to continue to push this concept.

Graduate applicants will be required to write a 200-300 word essay for admission. GRE scores will be used to decide on full or conditional admission.

A copy of the task force report on Graduate Faculty Council is attached. There are three levels of graduate faculty, recommendations are from the department head on an annual basis.

There was concern expressed that we continue to work on the items recommended in the self-study even if not part of the recommendations to SACS.

3. Committee reports
No visit with the Vice President of Academic Affairs as he has been out of town

A. Academic Council - Gene Atkinson
The Academic Council met for the first time since April 2000. There were no decisions made although about a dozen items were discussed. It appears as though no substantiative business is done by this committee.

B. Developmental Leave Committee - Linda Duncan
No progress. Still need to visit with Dr. Alexander.

C. University Calendar Committee - Gene Atkinson
The calendar was passed out and the conflicts discussed. One of the main points to be ironed out is when spring break will occur. Stephenville and Killeen campuses may not have a compatible calendar until 2003.

Some concern was expressed over the shorter calendar as this can greatly affect night classes, especially those on Thursday nights.

After discussion the calendar was approved provided that spring break not be in the 4th week of March.

As Linda Duncan had to leave the following item was moved up in the schedule.

7. Senate Luncheon - Linda Duncan
The Senate luncheon will be Thursday, Nov 16th. Dr. Bert Little will give a quick introduction to grant and proposal writing. After the luncheon, interested participants can attend a workshop where Dr. Little will provide a 2 ½ hour workshop on grant and proposal writing. Lunch will be $1, the senate will pick up the rest of the costs.

Richard Sale moved that the Senate support this. The motion passed unanimously.

3. Committee reports
D. Library Committee - Steve Simpson
Dr. Simpson gave a report on the Library Committee. It appears that the periodical budget has been frozen at $300,000 for quite some time. The library has no ability to change this on their own. Because the cost of journals rises every year, this leads to annual cuts in periodical holdings. This year, for example, $41,000 of journals were either eliminated or transferred somehow to electronic formats. Given the push for more research at Tarleton, the periodical as well as the general library budget needs to be increased.

Holly Lamb moved that the president of the faculty senate write a strong letter of support to be sent to the administration asking for more library funds. The motion passed unanimously. The letter will be written and brought to the next senate meeting for approval.

E. Announcement of Faculty Advisory Committee appointments

College of Agriculture and Human Science
Randy Rosier Joe Cadle (alt)

College of Business Administration
Bill Kirkland Joe Brocato (alt.)

College of Education
Holly Lamb Don Beach (alt)

College of Liberal and Fine Arts
Randy Popken Charles Howard (alt)

College of Science and Technology
Stephen Field Paul Lawrence (alt.)

F. Comparison of Senate recommendations with 2000 Committee Appts.
Overall most recommendations were utilized. Senators need to re-iterate to faculty that if there is a particular committee they want, they need to ask.

4. Awards for 2000-2001
Piper Award - Teresa Davidian
Application forms for the Piper award were distributed to be relayed to department heads. Twenty-two copies of the completed forms must be returned to Theresa Davidian by Tuesday, Oct 31. Faculty Senate will vote on the Piper nominee at the November meeting. They are due to the Piper Foundation by Nov 21st.

5. Report on meeting on CITDL changes - Janis Petronis
Janis handed out a summary of questions and answers that she had discussed with Ms. Wheeler of CITDL. A copy will be available for each senator.

Instructional equipment fees are part of department budgets. There is still no satisfactory answer as to who has control over equipment in general teaching rooms such as the lecture halls in Humanities.

A copy of the non-traditional course development documentation form was passed out.
A copy of the ITV evaluation form was also passed out.

8. Scheduling Problems
No progress as the VP was unavailable.

New Business:
None was presented. The meeting adjourned at 4:55 PM.