New College of Florida Campus Update

September 2, 2005

The New College faculty revised its faculty governance structure at its final faculty meeting in May. Under the new arrangements, the Chair of the Faculty’s role has been enhanced. The COF, rather than the Provost, will now chair the faculty meetings. The President has agreed to monthly meetings with the COF. The Provost, Charlene Callahan, announced at the same meeting that she is stepping down and a search is now underway. At the COF’s first meeting with the President Gordon Michelson, the COF was able to raise the issue of the composition of the search committee and the role of the faculty on it. President Michalson indicated that he intended to appoint all of the faculty representatives. The COF urged him to reconsider, and he agreed to allow the faculty to choose four members of its own with two additional faculty positions to be selected by the president.

New College has announced that it will be pursuing a more ambitious line in its budget requests this year. It is supporting its request by an independent consulting assessment that showed that the failure of the state to follow a plan to transition New College to independence, such as was followed at FGCU, has left the institution badly understaffed across the board in all administrative areas. One major justification for administrative growth is to meet the reporting requirements under the mandated learning compacts. (How this mandate is being met is still unclear, even though it should be the case that the requirements mesh well with practices already in place.) Meanwhile, the College continues to grow, leading with students rather than faculty lines, predictably enough. There are now over 700 students in the college, up significantly from only a few years ago. The president is promising to push for increased faculty lines so that we can remain in the neighborhood of the 11/1 teaching ratio on which the institution bases its reputation.

The College is now undertaking a serious long range planning exercise for the campus. It has hired a team of national and local planning firms to guide the community through the process. It has successfully completed a strategically important land purchase and is in the process of negotiating a second one. A new dormitory and improved student center are also in the works.