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English Department Meeting: Feb. 18, 2021

English Department Meeting Information

“Go forth! Be brave! Be proud! Be true!”

  • IUP English Professor Jane Leonard (1840-1925)

Image result for jane leonard iup

Congratulations

  • To Chauna Craig who has finally been announced as the official permanent Director of the IUP Cook Honors College
  • To Ken Sherwood and Mike Williamson who are working hard on the projects they had approved for Spring 2021 sabbaticals
  • To Chris Kuipers on being awarded a sabbatical for Fall 2021
  • To Emily Wender on being awarded a sabbatical for Spring 2022
  • To Lynn Shelly and Rosalee Stilwell on their approaching retirements at the end of Spring 2021
  • And speaking of fabulous people, tomorrow, Feb. 19, is Peggy Kane’s Birthday!

Thanks

  • Thanks to Dawnette Shellhammer, Peggy Kane, Gloria Park, Veronica Watson, Dan Weinstein, Emily Wender, and Mike Williamson who all helped Gian get the Fall 2021 schedule done
  • Emily Wender and Dan Weinstein who are helping Gian with developing an English major recruitment video and with attending a virtual majors fair tonight!
  • Melanie Holm and Matt Vetter for giving their ongoing job placement workshops

English Leadership Changes

  • Thanks to Melanie Holm who is serving as Interim Director for MA Literature and MA Composition and Literature while Mike Williamson is on sabbatical for Spring 2021; Thanks to Mike for his ongoing work in the role
  • Thanks to Bryna Siegel Finer who will take over as Liberal Studies English (LSE) Director after Lynn retires in May, 2021; Thanks to Lynn Shelly for her ongoing fine work as LSE Director
  • To Curt Porter who will take over as MA TESOL Director in August 2021; Thanks to Gloria Park for her ongoing fine work as MA TESOL Director

Approval of Department Meeting Minutes

We will vote to approve Minutes from the English Department meetings held on the dates below:

  • 11/19/21 (Minutes Taker: Reena Dube)

Minutes are available in the Microsoft Teams English Department Group folder called English Department Meeting Minutes.

Agenda Items

1. IUP Spring 2021

  • Please make sure your students are clear on the delivery mode you are using for your courses
  • ENGL 100, 101, and 121 should be hybrid delivery (with half the students attending in person while the other half are on zoom, then reversing the pattern for the next class)
    • Students in a hybrid format courses have the option to request to attend solely online, but are required to attend when the class meets
  • Other courses are either Remote (via zoom with a required meeting time) or Distance Ed (online/asynchronous with no required meeting time)
  • Last Day of Classes for Spring 2021: May 3
  • Finals Week for Spring 2021: May 4-May 7
  • NEW Spring Break 2021 Dates (no course activities or deadlines should be set for these dates)
    • Thursday February 25
    • Friday February 26
    • Saturday March 13
    • Sunday March 14
    • Monday April 5
    • Tuesday April 6
    • Wednesday April 21
  • Student Evaluations
    • All Student Evaluations will be sent via email link
    • Students get roughly 4 weeks to complete these
    • If you are teaching Hybrid or Remote and wish to set aside a specific time in which students can voluntarily complete their evaluations, you can arrange for someone to serve as a facilitator while you exit the room/zoom meeting

2. IUP Summer 2021

  • We can expect summer to be online or remote
  • Each program will decide on its mode of delivery

3. IUP Fall 2021

  • Thanksgiving Break
    • Be sure to let students know in writing course requirements for after Thanksgiving break
    • Faculty are encouraged not to have students return from home, but you may require that if you feel it is best for your courses
  • We expect Fall 2021 to be face-to-face
  • The president may change this plan, but this is the current thinking
  • The majority of English classes will be in person
  • A few classes will be online as we normally offer them
  • A very small set of classes will be remote
  • We will hold our department meetings via zoom in the new common meeting hour which is 11:30 a.m. – 12:30 p.m. alternating between Wednesdays and Thursdays

4. Some Positive News

  • Administration is indicating that it thinks it will have sufficient faculty attrition for next year to avoid another round of retrenchments
  • This is not an official announcement, just the current speculation
  • The cleaning staff is not being outsourced
  • Although the above items are good news, some staff and administrator cuts are still likely to come but have not been announced

5. IUP NextGen

  • Karen Rose Cercone and Hilliary Creely are leading the IUP NextGen Steering Committee
  • This committee is overseeing the IUP restructuring work
  • Gian and Francisco Alarcon (Chair of Math and Computer Science) are Co-Chairs of the Council of Chairs and were asked to serve on the Steering Committee as representatives
  • Gian, Francisco, and a limited number of other faculty are also serving on the IUP NextGen Task Force which is charged with actually doing the specific planning for the restructuring
  • Immediate issues like department names and mergers are being handled first
  • Longer term issues will be handled later
  • It appears unlikely that English would move from the Humanities Building in the long term, although this has not been officially noted

6. New College/New Dean

  • The new college name has not been announced yet, but Gian is on the subgroup overseeing the work to plan the process for picking the best name
  • Although it has not been officially announced, it now seems certain that Curt Scheib, current Dean of Fine Arts, will become dean of this new college
    • Curt Scheib, Dean, IUP College of Fine Arts
  • Gian has meet with Dean Scheib to give him an overview of our department
  • Gian has asked Dean Scheib to attend our next department meeting (Mar. 18)
  • To help that visit run smoothly, please send questions ahead of time to Gian and John Marsden so we can organize them
  • You are welcome to ask whatever questions you think are appropriate

7. Department Suite Information

  • Nikki Wilcox is developing a simple guide to using our new copier/scanner which has finally been installed; if you want to watch the full instructional video on using the copier, Dawnette can send it to you
  • Nikki is available to scan items for faculty
  • There is no cleaning staff in the building after about 3:00 p.m.; if you are working in your office in the late afternoon/evening, please lock the door to the office suite as you leave
  • There was small vandalism issue in HSS 306, so we need to be more on guard about security

8. Hiring Issues

  • It is unclear whether we will be able to hire Teaching Associates for the next three years
  • We do not have enough faculty to cover all our courses, so we need about 8 half time positions
  • How these will be staffed has not been decided by administration yet

9. Curriculum Issues

  • We face several curriculum challenges which Gian will discuss:
    • A need for someone to assume leadership on teaching MUHI 102: Music and Literature which is required by music majors and counts for ENGL 121 Humanities Literature
    • A request from the Department of Music to drop the additional ENGL literature course requirement that a small group of their majors (currently 17) have due to problems with pre-requisites and seat availability (Gian will be discussing this Dan Weinstein and then the BA Program Committee)
    • A need for someone to assume leadership for teaching ENGL 314: Speech and Communication in English Language Arts
    • Staffing issues at Northpointe and Punxsutawney
    • Steadily increasing class sizes in our LSE courses due to the lack of replacement of permanent English faculty
    • Interest from the Department of History to offer a history focused ENGL 202 from their department (Gian will be discussing this with Lynn Shelly and the LSE Committee)
    • Interest from IUP’s Liberal Studies Committee for us to make more English literature courses count for the ENGL 121 Humanities Literature requirement
    • Staffing issues for graduate courses and the need for a clear policy on program membership which the English Leadership Council (ELC) has begun discussing

10. A Final Positive Thought: The Power of Collaboration

  • Although 2021 was challenging, a vaccine for COVID-19 has been developed in less than a year
  • That is a remarkable human accomplishment achieved through global cooperation that would have been impossible 10 years ago
  • With that collaboration in mind, I wanted to share something very special with you
  • Video: The Biggest Global Collaboration Song EVER (Probably)
    • Posted by Brett Domino
    • Break at 3:50; then jump to 5:00 for ending
    • The song contains 54 musicians using almost as many instruments, culled from 100s of additional entries
    • The individual musicians did not get to hear each other, but they did have to play with a specific tempo and key
    • In the words of one YouTube viewer, Graham Haslett: “I’m not one for exaggerating, but this is Quite possibly the single greatest thing ever put out on YouTube”
    • This composition, or mashup, could really only be created through collaboration

Announcements

  • Myth Collaborative Virtual Dedication: April 24, 2021!
    • Zoom link to be sent out later
    • Please attend to watch the unveiling of our new MYTH mural currently being painted by IUP Art alum Jordan Hershberger
  • If anyone has an important announcement, we’ll use the last few minutes of the meeting to cover this