February Faculty Council Meeting Minutes

February Faculty Council Meeting Minutes
RICE NEWS OFFICE
April 9, 1998

Minutes of Faculty Council Meeting
Feb. 10, 1998 – noon
Faculty Club

Present: Isle (speaker), Antoulas, Aranda, Braam, Caldwell, Cox, Driskill,
Ghorbel, Gibson, Hightower, Wilson, Wittenberg, Yunis. Absent: Beckingham, Meade,
Patten.

The agenda consisted of: (1) Committee Reports, (2) Bylaws Revision and Dismissal/Sanctions
Procedures Document, (3) Honor Council, (4) Grievance, (5) Intellectual Property
Policy, (6) Faculty Council Web page, (7) Graduate Council Review of MA Degree
Requirements, (8) March-April Schedule.

Isle called the meeting to order and the minutes of the previous meeting were
approved.

(1) Committee Reports: (a) Committee on Committees–this committee is operating
on schedule and should have recommendations to the president by early March.
(b) Elections–a call for nominations will go out early March. (c) Athletics–Fred
Rudolph, chair, University Standing Committee on Admission and Student Financial
Aid, and the members of the subcommittee on athletic admissions, John Boles,
Phil Davis and Debbie Nelson, are invited to give a report to Faculty Council
at its next meeting. (d) Policy (Spousal Hires)–Faculty Council’s policy committee
met to study what, if any, policy recommendation should be made to the administration.
Council was asked to study the report and give any suggestions to Caldwell prior
to further discussion at the next faculty council meeting.

(2) Bylaws Revision and Dismissal-Sanctions Procedures Document: The question
of timely notification was raised and Isle will talk with the Rice legal department
to see what wording could be adopted to satisfy concerns which came up at the
last faculty meeting. Isle and Driskill will prepare a final version of this
document and have it distributed to the faculty.

(3) Honor Council: In response to (a) questions regarding the dismissal of
cases by the Honor Council because of an overload of cases, and (b) to an article
forthcoming in the Thresher regarding this subject, Isle asked Faculty Council
to study the issue to determine if this is something council should take up.

(4) Grievance: Isle reported that it is possible that a grievance could be
brought up before the dismissal/sanctions procedure document is in place and
asked for procedural recommendations. A vote was not taken but it was suggested
that an ad hoc committee could be appointed or the aggrieved could be asked
to wait until the procedures document is adopted. It was also suggested that
the aggrieved be given his or her choice of the two.

(5) Intellectual Property Policy: A memo from Jordan Konisky regarding this
subject was distributed with Isle’s request that council study and be prepared
to discuss it at the next meeting. Driskill volunteered to send the secretary
additional information on this subject to be distributed to council.

(6) Faculty Council Web Page: Wittenberg announced that except for photos,
which he took at the meeting, it is complete. After he has given the URL to
the secretary, she will pass it on to council.

(7) Graduate Council Review of MA Degree Requirements: Council was asked to
read and forward any comments to Isle or Moshe Vardi.

(8) Date for Next Meeting: The next meeting was scheduled for noon, Tuesday,
March 10, in the Faculty Club.