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What's Really Happening - 2004/05/18

Posted On: 5/18/2004


What's Really Happening

Columbus State Education Association Newsletter of May 18, 2004

GOOD NEWS!

CSEA has settled the right of faculty to have a CSEA representative in any meeting with an administrator that the faculty member feels could result in disciplinary action.

This decision was the result of a successful grievance filed by a CSEA member in the Computer Science Department.

If you feel a need for CSEA representation, or if you have any questions about your rights under the contract, contact your Association Representative immediately.

MEMBER MEETING MAY 27

CSEA will hold a member meeting 3 p.m. Thursday, May 27, in Nestor Seminar B.

Agenda items will include a recommendation to amend the CSEA By-Laws to shorten the time required for contract ratification. There will also be brief updates on governance issues, grievances and settlements reached so far, progress reports from representatives on committees considering lead instructor/program coordinator roles and intellectual property, and information about opportunities on CSEA committees.

The meeting will last no more than an hour.

GOING TO ARBITRATION IN JULY

A grievance filed by a CSEA member in the Modern Languages Department has raised several important issues:

  • Can a faculty member be forced to teach fewer hours and therefore be paid less?
  • Can a faculty member be forced to take an overload?
  • Can a faculty member be forced to teach a course as an independent study?
  • Can a full-time faculty member qualified to teach a course have the right to choose to teach the course before it is assigned to an adjunct faculty member?
  • Can a department chair arbitrarily decide that a faculty member is not qualified to teach a course that the faculty member has historically taught?

WHAT'S REALLY HAPPENING will keep you updated concerning these issues.

OUTSTANDING TEACHERS

CSEA salutes this year's recipients of Outstanding Teacher Awards: Sue Longenbaker (Biological & Physical Sciences), Betsy Nichols (Social & Behavioral Sciences), Ann Palazzo (Communication Skills), and Alan Yang (Mathematics). All received their awards during Spring In-Service.

DATATEL OR DATAHELL?

After millions of dollars, two years of delay, a Herculean effort of over 150 volunteers and an unspecified number of full-time staff to implement Datatel, and bringing all other data processing functions to a halt, the college was able to register the peak enrollment week of the lowest enrollment quarter (SU 04) and declared VICTORY!

April 26 saw the first use of the college's Colleague system by students hoping to register for Summer Quarter 2004. While the Colleague system is new, it remains to be seen whether it is also an improvement over the current legacy mainframe system.

Staff who work in the IT department discussed what may be Colleague's Achilles heel: the system is limited in the number of users who can simultaneously access the database at once.

So how limited is limited? Evidently, the magic number is 80. That means the total number of students who could access the $10 million Colleague system to register by any method - by phone for touch-tone registration, on-line, or on campus - couldn't exceed 80 at a time.

With thousands of students wanting to register, the college relied on volunteers, many of whom were CSEA members, to help students overcome the limitations of the new system. Staff members and faculty were asked to curtail their use of Colleague during the week to keep more of the 80 access spaces available for students.

Apparently, the first week of Summer Quarter registration went smoothly. Was it because Datatel is so good or that thousands of administrative, staff, and faculty volunteer hours went into the coordination of the first week? It's another indication of how CSEA members are helping to ensure Columbus State students receive the best educational experience possible, regardless of the hurdles students encounter.

Have a Datahell story? Please share with your building representative.

DID YOU KNOW?

Did you know the administration has interpreted the meaning of scheduled office hours to mean that once scheduled for the quarter, the hours remains fixed and immoveable? This creates problems for faculty who serve on committees, sponsor student groups, and/or give presentations elsewhere on campus.

In light of recent conflicts between chairs and faculty over whether or not office hours can be moved, WHAT'S REALLY HAPPENING is publishing what the contract says:

Section 4.02.

OFFICE HOURS
Faculty are required to hold 10 hours per week per quarter in the academic year. Seven hours must be regularly scheduled; 3 hours per week may be flexibly scheduled by the faculty member.

The CSEA position is that faculty should be able to reschedule office hours with reasonable notice to chairs, students, and office personnel.


What's Really Happening is produced by the Communications Committee of the Columbus State Education Association. We welcome your comments, news, and insights.

Steve Abbott, President / x5096
Karl Rieppel, Vice President / x2500
Amy Brubaker, Secretary and Association Representative / x5068
Greg Goodhart, Treasurer / x5431
Darrell Minor, Parliamentarian / x5310
Bill Mundy, Association Representative / x5176
Dr. Jane McDowell, Association Representative / x2656 
Dave Busch, Association Representative / x5079
Dr. Charlie Gallucci, Association Representative / x5499
Leslie Smith, Association Representative / x5302
Dr. Wendy McCullen-Vermillion, Association Representative / x2693
Lisa Schneider, Association Representative / x5124


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