This mid-winter Board meeting kicked off with a discussion with the negotiating team about the details of the memorandum of salary settlement. As you have no doubt seen, this settlement shows evidence of the strong productive and collegial relationship between FAUW and the administration, and sets a positive foundation for future salary settlements. A well-deserved note of appreciation to the entire negotiating team for their tireless work on our collective behalf.
In addition to concluding salary negotiations, we are now entering a busy FAUW events season, with many exciting workshops, panels, and meetings over the remainder of the winter term. Of particular note are the upcoming Hagey Lecture, workshops on Navigating University Governance and Writing University Policy, the President’s Luncheon on Academic Freedom, and, looking further ahead, the Spring General Meeting and Tenure & Promotion workshops in April.
Ongoing topics included exam scheduling, specifically discussions with the Registrar’s Office to better understand the current timing of the release of the exam schedule, and the possibility of moving it earlier in the term. We feel that early release of this schedule will be a positive support for both student and instructor mental health.
The recently revealed ‘bug’ in Evaluate, the online course evaluation software used by the University to collect student course perceptions (which are in turn used to evaluate faculty for merit pay), caused much discussion. Though we applaud how the discovery of the bug was handled, there is much work to be done to develop a system of governance to guide the Evaluate project. We look forward to discussing how Evaluate will be used and its governance structure with the University and IST in the future.
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