CALL TO ORDER
The second meeting of the 1995 Fall Semester was called to order at 3:15 p.m. by President Charles Harding in Room 206 of the Boling University Center. Present were 41 Senators, two substitutes, and 11 visitors.

APPROVAL OF MINUTES
There were no additions or corrections to the minutes of September 26, 1995. Minutes stand approved as distributed.

UNFINISHED BUSINESS
There was no unfinished business.

REPORTS OF STANDING COMMITTEES
Executive Committee
Harding gave a report of the October 10 meeting of the Executive Committee. He discussed briefly the imbalance in Senate classes, i.e. School of Education has to elect all four allotted senators this year. A revision in the bylaws will need to be done, in order to correct this imbalance. The Committee on Personnel Policies has worked out a revision and will be sending information out to the faculty in the near future.

Chancellor Perry reported on the Systems Improvement Teams and gave background information on what is planned regarding development and operation of the systems improvement teams. More information about Systems Improvement will be distributed to the Senate at a later date.

Harding reported that a question had been raised about how items get placed on the agenda for a particular Senate meeting. Specifically a comment was that perhaps if any faculty member had an area they would like to see considered, the executive committee should automatically place that item or that topic on the agenda. There is a policy for this. Any Senate member can come to the Senate meeting and make a motion that an item be placed on the agenda and if the motion receives a second and a simple majority, that item will go on the agenda. Any faculty member can recommend an item go on the agenda and if it is seconded by any five senators, then that item goes on the agenda. This motion and second should be in written form to the executive committee. The Executive Committee should use their judgement on what to put on the agenda.

Harding discussed the meeting of the Counselors to the President. Cile Grasfeder and Bill Zachry also attended as faculty Counselors to the President. Some items discussed at that meeting were phased retirement and part time work after retirement. In the UT System, you cannot go from full time work to part time and participate in insurance, even if you pay all of it. Systems officials agreed to look into this. They are also investigating other early retirement options, such as the possibility of going to half time work. Eli Fly and Dr. Johnson agreed to check this out.

Another topic of discussion was library resources, with discussion on statewide pooling or sharing of resources as well as the possibility of cooperative purchases. Everybody expressed concerns about periodicals and reductions in budgets.

Computer access was also discussed, with UTM being cited by Dr. Johnson as an example in the state of being far out in front in this respect. He complimented us for moves we have made in that direction, but also pointed out that we do not have everything we would like to have.

Salaries was a major topic. The last payraise was in October 1994. Dr. Johnson said chancellors and UT system administrators are pushing for some sort of pay raise package for 1996-97. The Governor s staff has indicated to Dr. Johnson s staff, and the Governor has personally indicated to him, that the pay raises would not be across the board but that the payraise package for 1996-97 would be something like involving the top 30% of performers for some sort of pay raise. Questions were raised about local discretion in distribution. Harding got the impression that there would be no local discretion in distributing the raises. The second way that he indicated that there could be a payraise even this year through reallocation of funds.

In the reallocation process that money could be freed up. Harding's understanding was that with this we would have local discretion. There was also discussion of cost of living raises.

Budget and Economic Concerns
Mary Ruth Gibbons stated that there were no items to come before the Senate at this time.

Undergraduate Council
Doug Cook presented and moved approval for the curriculum changes as approved by the council at their October 3 meeting. He mentioned that Management 430, which was tabled at the last Senate meeting, has been pulled and will be resubmitted at a later date. Dwight Gatwood asked for a friendly amendment to FPA Music 168-368, requesting that the effective date be Spring 1996. A motion to amend was made, seconded and passed. The motion on the packet, as amended, was passed.

Graduate Council
Robert Erk presented and moved approval for the curriculum changes as approved in their October 5 meeting, with the packet coming as a motion and second. Motion passed.

Instruction Committee
Nell Gullett stated that there were no items to come before the Senate at this time.

Library Committee
There was no report from the Library Committee.

Personnel Policies
Sandra Gossum stated that there was nothing to come before the Senate at this time. The committee, however, will be reporting on balancing the number of senators in each class at a later date. The committee is also working on evaluation of administrators, and will be reporting on this at a later Senate meeting.

NEW BUSINESS
Harding turned the floor over to Dr. Kendall Blanchard, who discussed his first few months here and his early impressions of UTM and Martin in general.

ADJOURNMENT
The meeting was adjourned at 4:20 p.m.

Charles E. Harding, President

Daniel F. Pigg, Secretary