1. Immediately following a meeting of the General Faculty-Graduate Faculty, the regular meeting of the Faculty Senate was called to order at 3:10 p.m. in the Cherry Auditorium, Chester Kirk Building, Chairperson Rollo-Koster presiding.

All members were present except Senators Betensky, Chadha, Dunn, Kulenovic, Kusz, Lee, Licht, Lloyd, Mandel, Martin, Maynard, Meagher, Menden-Deuer, Pearson-Merkowitz, Rynearson, Thiem, and Vocino; ex officio members Vice President Gonzales, Vice Provost Katz; Deans Bonn, Brownell, Ebrahimpour, Larrat, Sullivan, and Wright.  Associate Dean Seitsinger represented Dean Ciccomascolo, Associate Dean Smith represented Dean Corliss, and Associate Dean Veeger represented Dean Kirby.

2. Chairperson Rollo-Koster announced that the minutes of Faculty Senate meeting #7, March 31, 2016 had been posted with the agenda. She asked if there were any additions, corrections to or questions about the minutes. There were none. Chairperson Rollo-Koster ruled that, in the absence of any changes or corrections, the minutes were approved.

3. REPORTS OF OFFICERS AND EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE

A. Announcements

1. Chairperson Rollo-Koster reported on the 2015-16 Faculty Senate meeting attendance by college. She said that today’s meeting was the last Faculty Senate meeting for Senators whose terms were expiring in 2016.  She thanked the following outgoing Senators:

ARTS AND SCIENCES
Ben Anderson, Art & Art History
Susan Brady, Psychology
Holly Dunsworth, Sociology & Anthropology
William Gordon, Landscape Architecture
Charles Kaufman, Physics
Mustafa Kulenovic, Mathematics
Annu Matthew, Art & Art History (Spring replacement, Ron Hutt)
Barbara Meagher, Journalism
Damon Rarick, Modern & Classical Languages & Literatures

BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION
John Dunn
Eugene Lee

ENGINEERING
Faye Boudreaux-Bartels, Electrical, Computer & Biomedical Engineering
Zongqin Zhang, Mechanical, Industrial & Systems Engineering

ENVIRONMENT AND LIFE SCIENCES
Marian Goldsmith, Biological Sciences
Lenore Martin, Cell and Molecular Biology

GRADUATE SCHOOL OF OCEANOGRAPHY
Susanne Menden-Deuer

HUMAN SCIENCE AND SERVICES
Kyle Kusz, Kinesiology
Linda Welters, Textiles, Fashion Merchandising & Design

NURSING
Debra Erickson-Owens

PHARMACY
Lisa Cohen, Pharmacy Practice
Ruitang Deng, Biomedical & Pharmaceutical Sciences

UNIVERSITY LIBRARIES
Brian Gallagher

2. Chairperson Rollo-Koster reported that there was one remaining Senate meeting scheduled for May 5^th. She said that elections to fill three positions on the Executive Committee would take place at that meeting.  She urged returning Senators to plan to attend in order to welcome 23 new Senators and to elect new members of the Executive Committee.

3. Chairperson Rollo-Koster reported that the Administrative Evaluation Committee for President Dooley’s review had completed its final report and had submitted its report to the President. She said that the committee had met with the President.

4. Chairperson Rollo-Koster reported that she and Senator Sullivan had met last month with Vice President Valentino and Vice President Sonnenfeld regarding the Sponsored Research Administration (SPA) budget. They were told that these offices would be cutting their budgets $167,492 and $222,000, respectively.

5. Chairperson Rollo-Koster reported that the search process for the Director of General Education was underway.

6. Chairperson Rollo-Koster announced that, at today’s meeting, the Office for the Advancement of Teaching and Learning would present information about Gateway courses.

7. Chairperson Rollo-Koster thanked Dean Wright for graciously agreeing to sponsor the reception after today’s meeting at 95 Upper College Road (former UClub).

8. Chairperson Rollo-Koster reminded non-Senators to sign the Permission to Speak form and asked everyone to remember to wait to be recognized and to identify themselves before speaking.

      B. Activities of the Executive Committee

Vice Chairperson Welters announced that the Minutes of 2015-16 Executive Committee meeting #26 were available on the Faculty Senate website. She asked if there were any questions.  There were none.

4. REPORT OF THE PRESIDENT

The President said that the status of the legislation from the previous Faculty Senate Meeting could be found on the agenda.  The President thanked the members of the Senate and other faculty and staff who had participated in his evaluation.  He thanked the members of the Administrator Evaluation Committee: Lori Ciccomascolo, Gordon Dash, Marlene Dufault, Joëlle Rollo-Koster, and Bingfang Yan.  He said that the process had been lengthy but informative and helpful.  The President commented that he would take steps to improve communication, participation, access, and visibility on campus.  He added that he pledged to do this while also executing the next fundraising campaign that would require much off-campus work.

5. REPORTS OF STANDING AND SPECIAL COMMITTEES

A. Professor Owens presented the Five Hundred and Thirty Second Report of the Curricular Affairs Committee. She said that Section I was Informational and asked if there were any questions. There were none.  She reported that Section II required Senate approval. Professor Owens moved approval of three new courses. The motion passed.  She moved approval of one course change.  The motion passed.  She moved approval the following curricular items individually: changes to the BA in Spanish, the creation of a Religious Studies Track in the Philosophy major, changes to the Bachelor of Interdisciplinary Studies (B.I.S.) degree, changes to requirements for BS in Civil and Environmental Engineering, the creation of a Minor in Environmental Engineering, and changes to PharmD Progression Standards.  All were approved.

B. Senator Mead presented General Education Committee Report 2015-16-11, a list of 27 existing courses including 2 Grand Challenge courses that had been approved for offering in the new general education program. The report was informational.  Senator Mead presented a data report of approved general education courses and the number of seats in each student learning outcome.  He had calculated the number of “opportunities.” Because many courses fulfill two outcomes, each seat is an opportunity to complete two of the leaning outcomes.  He summarized that there were over 65,500 opportunities, to date.  Senator Mead presented General Education Committee Report 2015-16-12, a proposal to eliminate University Manual Section 8.20.15 from the description of the General Education Program.  He moved approval and discussion followed.  The section described proficiency testing available to students to allow waiver of certain general education requirements.  A rationale was made for the irrelevancy of the testing.  The vote was called.  The motion was approved.

C. Professor Lang presented the Annual Report of the Library Committee. He provided an update on the URI Open Access Policy, in its third year of implementation. Through the URI Open Access Policy, articles may be made available to the public in an open-access repository through the Digital Commons. To date, 109 URI faculty members have participated in the Open Access Policy and 370 articles have been deposited.  Approximately 12 uploads have occurred each month; this rate has been constant in the three years of the policy. Professor Lang explained that there is a monetary benefit to the policy.  Not having to check publication rights saves approximately $1800/year.  The savings in journal publication costs was estimated to be $300,000/year.  Nonmonetary benefits, he said, included the number of downloads/article, which has averaged 114.8 with a maximum of 2,666.  Professor Lang answered questions.  Faculty expressed concern for the copyright issue [under the OA Policy, the University is granted permission to exercise faculty rights under copyright while the faculty retain the copyright of their scholarly articles] and the possibility of making their work vulnerable to plundering if it were to be posted prior to publication.  Academic social network sharing of research was discussed.  Chairperson Rollo-Koster suggested that the Committee explore publication differences by discipline and welcomed more education of faculty on the merits of the OA Policy.

D. Senator Sullivan presented the Annual Report of the Joint Classroom Steering Committee. He noted the charge of the committee, to develop plans for all aspects of classroom planning and management, and projected a list of its 11 faculty and 11 administrative and staff members.  Senator Sullivan summarized the expenditures in FY15: $301,465 in technology in Washburn Hall, NOMAD (Next Order Multi-modal Advanced Design) classrooms, and Quinn Hall; and $163,378 in new furniture and installation in Fogarty, Morrill, and White Halls.  Projects spanning FY15 and FY16 included upgrades to Pastore 124, White Hall Auditorium, and to general assignment locks.  Seating upgrades in Bliss, East Auditorium, and Woodward Halls totaling $134,850 were summarized.  Senator Sullivan commented on the plans to use College of Engineering equipment and seating in temporary facilities while the new Engineering buildings are under construction.

E. Professor Webb presented the Annual Report of the Council for Research. She summarized the activities of the Council in 2015-16.  She reported that the Council had revised the documents pertaining to the calls for Proposal Development and Faculty Career Enhancement Grants and the criteria and format for nominations for the Research Excellence Awards.  She reported that a Council member had regularly attended the Intellectual Property Committee meetings as the Chair’s designee (ex officio on the committee).  Professor Webb reported that the Council had met with Michael Katz, Associate Vice President, Intellectual Property Management and Economic Development, about his role in the Research Office.  The Council contributed to the development of the Academic Strategic Plan 2016-2021.   The Council approved the following centers (new and renewals):

Center for Integrated Drug Discovery, Nov. 2014, NEW
Feinstein Child Development Center, Nov. 2014, RENEWAL
Coastal Resources Center, Feb. 2015, RENEWAL
Metcalf Institute for Marine and Environmental Reporting, RENEWAL
Institute for Integrative Health and Innovation, March 2016, NEW

Professor Webb reported that several center renewals were overdue.  The Subcommittee on Distribution of Overhead Funds met three times in Fall 2015, reviewed overhead expenses within the University, and submitted its annually required report to the Faculty Senate and the Administration on January 27, 2016.  The Subcommittee had concluded that there were no issues with regard to the expenditure of overhead in FY 2015. The Council evaluated Faculty Research Grants and awarded 5 Proposal Development grants totaling $64,540 and 5 Faculty Career Enhancement grants totaling $45,460.  The Council reviewed the nominations for the Research Excellence Awards and added “Research Staff” to the postdoctoral award category.  Seven awards will be made at the May 17, 2016 Excellence Recognition Ceremony.  Professor Webb said that the Council would meet once more this semester and elect a new chair for 2016-17.

F. Caulkins, Assistant Director of Faculty Development in the Office for the Advancement of Teaching and Learning, presented a summary of the URI Gateways to Completion (G2C) Project. He distributed printed information about the Project.  He explained that URI had engaged in a 3-year pilot designed to improve student success in “first-year experience” courses.  First-year, gateway courses were defined as foundational in nature (of essential content), high enrollment, and high incidence of low grades (D), failures, withdrawals, or incompletes (DFWI).  URI chose to focus on the following courses: Pre calculus (DFWI: 36.9%), General Chemistry (DFWI 32.0%), Elementary (DFWI 25.3%), Introductory Chemistry (DFWI 23.2%), and Human Anatomy (DFWI 23.2%).  Over the course of the pilot, improved learning, improved student attitude, and increased success rates were impacted by early and frequent feedback for underperforming students, a two-stage testing technique, more group activities in classes; student effort, performance, and learning analytics; a stronger connection with Academic Enhancement Center, and efforts to establish consistency across multiple sections of courses taught by different instructors.  Mr. Caulkins said that success of the Project was supported by institutional-level efforts including the Starfish communication system, a campus-wide early alert system linking students, instructors, and an available support network, soon to be initiated (intended to function through SAKAI).  Mr. Caulkins recognized Professor Cindy Brittain, Department of Chemistry, for her key role in the Project.  He answered questions.  He encouraged faculty to learn more about G2C and to become involved.

6. UNFINISHED BUSINESS

Chairperson Rollo-Koster asked if there were any Unfinished Business. There was none.

7. NEW BUSINESS

Chairperson Rollo-Koster asked if there were any New Business. There was none.

8. A motion was made to adjourn. The motion carried. The meeting was adjourned at 4:45 p.m.

Respectfully submitted,

Nancy Neff