March 7th, 2025

ARKANSAS STATE UNIVERSITY 

 FACULTY SENATE MEETING 

 March 7 th , 2025 

 Reynolds 222 

   

 Attendees: Amanda Mohler, Julie King, Alexandr Sokolov, Rollin Tusalem, Karen Graham, Shanon Brantley, Stephanie Hoeckley,  John Hershberger, Katie Camden, Robert Williams, Donna Caldwell, Toccara Carter, Ed Salo, Suzanne Melescue, LTC Morgan Weatherly, Hung-Chi Su, Guolei Zhou, Khem Aryal, Scott Mangan, Jamie Pasmore, Richard Segall, Eric Dry, Bert Greenwalt, Gary Edwards, Kim Vickrey, Paul Finnicum, Ibrahim Duyar, Veena Kulkarni 

 Proxy Attendees: Rob Williams proxy for Sarah Scott, Rebecca Wellborn proxy for Rashele Wade, John Hershberger recording minutes for Audrey Folsom, Kevin Berry for Kristen Sumler, Asher Pimpleton-Gray for Savannah Cormier, Katie Camden for Trinity Pullam, 

 Guests: Kevin Hennings (parliamentarian) 

 Absentees: Hao Yang Teng, DayDay Robinson, Mark Lewis, Zahid Hossain, Jamie Pasmore, Dwayne Powell, Jessica Curtis, Pradeep Mishra, Argelia Lorence 

   

 The meeting was called to order at 3:00 pm. 

   

 Order of the Day: Motion to approve the order of the day by Richard Segall, seconded by Donna Caldwell all in favor, motion carried. 

 Approval of Minutes: Motion to approve the February 21 st , 2025 meeting minutes by Richard Segall, seconded by Ed Salo, all in favor, motion carried. 

   

 New Business: 

 There will be two speakers for last part of semester: 

 

 Melanie Wicinski – Strategic Plan 

 Chancellor Shields – Legislative Update 

 

 A question was raised about the use of pronouns. 

 A question was raised about students having issues with purchasing materials from the bookstore—apparently the bookstore changed its policy 

 A question was raised about where the Education Dean search was 

 A question about the centralized scheduling system was raised 

 A question about library funding by the legislature was asked 

 A question was asked about integrating online/in person courses 

 Faculty Senate Elections are coming up soon.  It was noted that the requirements are in the constitution and the only limit by college is that a faculty member in the current President’s college cannot run. 

   

 Old business: 

 Committee Reports: 

 

 The IRB committee has met with Travis Marisco about their concerns and the committee is currently working on an IRB strategy proposal. 

 The ombudsperson committee has started and will meet soon 

 Senator Caldwell mentioned that there are very few applicants from the Colleges of Agriculture and Education for the Wilson Award/Distinguished Service Award. There was a discussion of why that is and how to improve it.  It was also mentioned that the Awards committee discussed finding ways to introduce the award to students earlier in their academic career, perhaps in FYE.  Another possibility mentioned having some short mentions of accomplishments by previous award winners. 

 The equity committee has met a few times and is working on a new policy. The question was raised about why the goal in the current policy has 78% of CUPA data as the benchmark—this came from a previous committee and reflected the funding that was available at the time. 

 

   

 The meeting was adjourned by Amanda Mohler at 3:15 pm. 

 Minutes recorded by John Hershberger and prepared by Audrey Folsom, approved on 3/21/2025 (uploaded to KB on 10/14/2025)