FACULTY MEETING -- APRIL 14, 2004

ATTENDEES: S. Choate, J. Cuda, P. Coon, T. Fasulo, J. Foltz, H. Frank, Debbie Hall, D. Hall, G. Hall, M. Hoy, P. Koehler, B. Larson, P. Lawrence, N. Leppla, O. Liburd, J. Maruniak, H. McAuslane, B. McSorley, F. Oi, B. Overholt, J. Stimac, S. Webb, G. White, S. Yu, and M. Litchfield

Meeting convened at 1:15.

Capinera passed out ballots for faculty to vote on Marc Branham to be appointed to Graduate Faculty Status. Vote was unanimous.

Dr. Hoy announced that there are still two more candidates to be interviewed for the Physiology position. She encouraged all faculty to attend both the teaching and research seminars of the candidates. Capinera announced that there would be a special faculty meeting held in two weeks to decide on the candidates (April 28, 1:15 in room 3118).

Capinera announced that Dr. Jorge Peña has nominated Dr. Anthony (Tony) Bellotti to be appointed to Courtesy and Graduate Faculty in the Department and at the Tropical Research and Education Center. Dr. Bellotti would provide a boost for internationalizing the curriculum of some of our courses and would be an excellent guest lecturer on different entomology courses, e.g., Tropical Entomology, Biological Control, etc. Dr. Bellotti will give a seminar ("IPM of Cassava Arthropod Pests") in the new teaching lab, room 3118, on May 25 at 11:00.

Capinera announced that Pauline Lawrence's endowment for insect physiology or biochemistry was complete and it is to be used for a stipend for graduate students working in this field.

The Department is in need of a Social Committee to plan and organize social events for the department. Capinera asked for volunteers to serve on a rotating basis. Committee should be comprised of faculty, staff and students. Volunteers were Faith Oi, Heather McAuslane, Jim Cuda, John Capinera, Norm Leppla, Jane Luzar and Myrna Litchfield. Myrna will send out an email to staff and students to request volunteers.

Capinera introduced Dean Cheek and Dean Luzar. Dr. Cheek said that he has been trying to visit different departments to talk about the graduate and undergraduate programs. The Graduate Program is in good shape and has had an increase in funding allowing departments to recruit and enroll more graduate students by offering more scholarships and assistantships. Undergraduate program is critical to the graduate program as we continue to graduate a large number of students who are satisfied with our program. Dean's office receives emails from students that have been very pleased with the program. Enrollment has increased for the past five years as well as credit hours taught. The opportunity for students is at the graduate level. The research centers have increased their participation in the graduate program. The college has acquired 112 alumni and fellowship scholarships in the past two years. We (Entomology and Nematology) currently have extra dollars for a faculty position (insect physiology). The college increased graduate credit hours to 2300 this year, the largest on campus. The college received extra funds in December to match graduate assistantships.

Dr. Cheek discussed the budget and said it will cost approximately $1.5 million to get a 1% raise for faculty, but this is a priority for the president. New President will have three Vice Presidents, one in IFAS, one in the Health Center, and one in the Provost Office. IFAS may get control of the tuition remission account. The degree program remains interdisciplinary.

We will continue to have faculty, staff, and alumni recognized for their excellent performance. IFAS has more awards than any other college on campus. These awards can't be given out unless someone is nominated. There are two CALS alumni awards. Individual has to be out of college for more than two years. Nominations are being called for now. You can go to the Web page and complete the forms. There is Teacher of the Year, Mentor of the Year and Advisor of the Year.

The college has been given the go ahead to increase lab fees to whatever the expenses are for your class or lab. Some lab fees were increased to over $100.00/lab this year. Lab fees need to be used for class and lab supplies; hopefully, in the future they will include depreciation costs for equipment. Some lab supplies can be very expensive and the teaching budget does not have sufficient funds to cover these expenses. If you are teaching a class and/or lab that have expenses and you have not assessed a lab fee to that course, you need to do so.

Dean Luzar talked about the new biology undergraduate degree program. This program has 6 tracks and is shared between CALS and Liberal Arts and Sciences. Entomology and Nematology will play an important role in advising students. She discussed the Distance Ed program that the department is setting up and mentioned that it may even go to the international level. Soil and Water Science Department has been very successful with their Distance Ed program. Graduate students, whose advisors are located at the research centers, are able to take some of their courses by Distance Ed and don't have to travel back and forth so much between the main campus and the centers. The college is going to upgrade the videoconference system to be Internet based and this will complement the Distance Ed program. She said we needed to look at this holistically as an overall tool and upgrade the existing equipment to be Internet based. The college system is scheduled to go online by August 1. This will have a major impact on our programs.

The Doctor of Plant Medicine Certificate Program will have the first graduates this year. Graduation is April 30th at 9:00 am. There will be a reception after graduation and the entire faculty is invited to attend. A note will be sent out about this and the Friday night ceremony to be held on the McCarty lawn.

A question was raised about the Gordon Rule and is there a way to get around it because it seems that some of the Community Colleges are doing this. Dean Luzar said that she has not found a way and is not interested in doing so. She stated that students that have not met the Gordon Rule requirement have a problem getting into graduate school. She stated that the AS degree is not acceptable because there is no biology or chemistry courses included for this degree.

Dean Cheek is uncertain about the tuition situation in the future. A rule is pending in the Legislature now that a student on a 2.5 assistantship appointment would automatically be qualified as in-state. If passed, this would help our tuition problem. Meanwhile, plan on grants supporting tuition as well as stipends.

Graduate students are now eligible for employee health insurance and it will cost $400 per year.

Dr. Luzar announced that the college has several summer internship programs. They would like to match students up with faculty to do research and the student will be paid by an internship.

The minority program with FAMU was discussed concerning expanding the program to include a Masters degree. The deans thought that this was a good idea but it needs to be discussed with collaborators.

Dr. Luzar announced that the course that Carl Barfield taught 'First Year Florida' was a good recruitment tool and it had helped to recruit students into Entomology and Nematology as well as other departments in IFAS.

Are there any matching assistantships that don't have a teaching component? Dr. Luzar said that she encouraged all students to teach even if it was to guest lecture in a class.

The question was raised as to how to word a course proposal to differentiate between an undergraduate and graduate course. Sometimes this depends on the Curriculum Committee. Wildlife has a very good model that could be reviewed. Discussion followed.

Dr. Barfield has agreed to be the adviser for the specialty of Natural Science within the Biology Major. The Animal Disease Biology Specialty curriculum did not make it because it included plants and animals, and some committee members did not like the name. Since the department authored this specialty it will have the opportunity to revise it. There will be other opportunities to add to the Biology Curriculum.

Dr. Koehler announced that the search committee for the Vet Med faculty position met and wrote the position description. The position will be 40% teaching, 50% research and 10% extension. The position description has been sent to IFAS Personnel for review, signatures and a position number so that it can be advertised. Members of the search committee are Phil Koehler (Chair), Oscar Liburd, Roxanne Rutledge Connelly, Jerry A. Hogsette, Ellis Greiner, Saundra H. BenBroeck, and Jonathan Day. There was a discussion about whether or not we should have more faculty from the department on the Search and Screen Committees for prospective faculty members. No conclusion was reached.

Meeting adjourned at 2:50.