Straight Talk from the President - January 8, 2008
Dear Colleagues,
Welcome back and Happy New Year. I hope everyone enjoyed the break and rested well after a successful fall semester. We have a lot of work facing us during the next few months.
The first priority must be the reaffirmation of our SACS accreditation. I appreciate the hard work of the SACS committees and I know we will be successful if we continue this effort. During the spring semester, we will see the completion of all six of the Compliance Certification subcommittee reports, and the selection and development of the Quality Enhancement Plan (QEP). The QEP Committee is hard at work narrowing down the input that was provided during the many focus sessions last semester. Those who attended the QEP forums generated several good ideas that will make the subcommittee’s work to select a single project extremely challenging.
In addition, SACS requires that we directly tie our budgeting to our Strategic Plan. To assist with this requirement, I will appoint a Resource Advisory Committee, composed of faculty, staff, and administrators that will work with the Strategic Planning Committee and the Administration to advise and monitor University and College budgeting practices. Together the SPC and the SRAC will monitor the plans and activities directed toward implementing ULM’s strategic plan. You will hear more about this committee and the recently developed Strategic Plan in the coming weeks.
Lastly, approximately 18 months ago, I appointed a committee to evaluate the shared governance environment on campus. I also charged the committee with the task of preparing recommendations on improving that environment. Late in the fall semester, the committee completed a final draft of a set of documents. The first, entitled “Principles and Practice of Shared Governance,” establishes the basic premise of shared governance on the ULM campus and the second, entitled “Governance Procedures,” concentrates on the details associated with the various committees involved in the shared governance process. These documents can be found on the Shared Governance Web site. After completing these documents, the committee asked that “a new set of eyes” evaluates the proposed shared government principles and procedures before finalizing this effort.
I envision that during the Spring Semester we will obtain input to build consensus from the entire university community on not only the attached principles and procedures, but also the shared governance structure that ULM will use in the future. The current plan is to obtain that consensus through a series of focus groups including each college, the Faculty Senate, the executive staff, non-faculty professional staff, and others that can contribute to the discussion. While the exact timetable and schedule is yet to be established, I would like to have this task completed before the end of next semester so that all of the issues, with appropriate documentation and detail, can be presented to the entire campus community at the beginning of the fall semester.
To begin this process with that “new set of eyes,” I appointed a group of approximately 16 of your colleagues in a group that will include several full professors representing the faculty, a department head, members of the executive staff, members of the professional staff, and representatives from the previous shared governance committee.
I look forward to discussing all of these issues with you as the semester progresses. While I opened with a sincere “Welcome back," I close this letter with an even more sincere “thank you” for your hard work on making this last fall semester one of the best at ULM. I know you join me in anticipation of an even more exciting and successful spring semester.
Sincerely,
James E. Cofer, Sr.