Funds freed up by a $14.4 million budget realignment plan will require proposals to be distributed to planning units, an OU administrator said at last night's Faculty Senate meeting.
OU freed up $6.3 million in strategic investment funds through a budget realignment plan for the 2007 fiscal year, said John Day, associate provost for Academic Budget. He then explained the process for planning units ' which include colleges and academic support units, such as Student Affairs ' to receive some of that money.
Planning units will review their strategic plans and determine action items for future funding
Day said, adding that each planning unit will then submit a proposal by Jan. 1.
The proposals will be reviewed by a committee of deans and senior administrators which will comment on and rank the proposal's strategic importance Day said.
The rankings then will be passed along to the Budget Planning Council, he said.
The Budget Planning Council will then rank the proposals in terms of budgetary impact and potential return on investment before forwarding its recommendations to the president for final decisions
Day said.
The $6.3 million in reinvestment funds will be divided among three areas: undergraduate education, graduate education and research and faculty compensation.
Senators also debated OU's possible switch from a quarter system to a semester system, with a majority of senators favoring the plan in a vote.
However, support for the switch was far from unanimous, with some Senators concerned that a switch would greatly increase faculty workload.
I am vehemently against the change because it would demolish faculty for three to four years
said John Bender, a philosophy professor. What about sequenced courses? Faculty would spend all their time trying to remodel their courses. What happens to our research?
Others felt that a change to semesters would make OU more productive and competitive.
We need to ask
'How does it benefit the university
and does it make us more competitive?' Chris Bartone, an electrical engineering and computer science professor, said. If it does
I don't care if it's extra work.
A senate vote to determine if OU administrators should survey faculty resulted in 25 senators in favor, 13 senators opposed and 8 abstentions. Bernt said she will request that OU President Roderick McDavis survey all faculty members about their feelings about the switch to semesters.
Senate also voted to pass a resolution setting a time limit of 60 days for the Provost to respond to Faculty Senate resolutions. The resolution now will go to Provost Kathy Krendl for approval.
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