Published on April 29, 2024
Applications are now being accepted for the SEC Visiting Faculty Travel Program. This program is intended to enhance faculty collaboration between SEC member universities. It gives faculty from one SEC institution the opportunity to travel to another SEC campus to exchange ideas, develop grant proposals, and conduct research. The application deadline is Monday, July 1, 2024.
The Office of the Provost wants to celebrate with all faculty members who submitted an application for either a prestigious or highly prestigious award since summer 2023. Please complete this form to let us know what award you submitted or were nominated for over the past year. All prestigious and highly prestigious awards can be found in Faculty Insights. (Search by award and change the prestige tab to prestigious and highly prestigious awards.)
COACHE Committee Update
Interim Provost Matt Martens met with the Collaborative on Academic Careers in Higher Education (COACHE) committee in April to discuss efforts related to the last Faculty Job Satisfaction COACHE survey and the launching of the Faculty Retention and Exit Survey. Beginning in fall 2024 semester, the Office of the Provost is partnering with COACHE for a 3-year cycle of the Faculty Retention and Exit Survey. This survey gathers information about the factors influencing faculty members’ decisions to stay to MU. The COACHE committee will work with the Office of the Provost, deans, chairs, and eligible faculty on this Retention and Exit Survey. In addition, the Office of the Provost has signed a contract with COACHE for another 3-year cycle of the faculty job satisfaction survey. We look forward to launching this again in 2025. If you have any questions regarding these surveys, please reach out to COACHE co-chairs Nicole Campione-Barr & Daryl Smith.
Update on the Task Force on Generative Artificial Intelligence in the Learning Environment
This new task force is being led by Tori Mondelli, director of the Teaching for Learning Center, Enid Schatz, associate dean of the Graduate School and professor in the Department of Public Health, and Ben Trachtenberg, associate dean for academic affairs and Isidor Loeb Professor of Law in the School of Law.
The Task Force has begun its work to determine how Mizzou compares to peer (and aspirational peer) institutions with respect to adopting GenAI in the learning environment.
It is also creating an inventory of existing GenAI expertise at Mizzou among faculty and staff. Part of the process will include a description of what resources are needed to help Mizzou instructors (both faculty and graduate students who teach) use GenAI more effectively—both for improving their teaching in general and for teaching about GenAI more specifically—to ensure that MU students graduate with the skills necessary to be competitive in this shifting environment.
There are three working groups:
1. Ethics – Responsibility & Respect
2. Learning (Expectations) – Discovery
3. Pedagogy – Excellence
The Task Force is holding an open forum for idea exchange at the Celebration of Teaching May 15-16.
Update on Classroom Space
At the April 3, 2024, General Faculty meeting, several faculty members asked about the availability of classroom space on campus for the upcoming fall semester. Vice Provost for Enrollment Management Kim Humphrey reported back to Faculty Council that 4,513 course sections have been successfully assigned classrooms for Fall 2024 and there is still classroom space available to accommodate up to 750 more class sections. The Office of the University Registrar follows the MU Policy on classroom utilization and uses course scheduling software to optimize classroom space across factors such as requested preferences, space availability, course and room capacities, and days/time of the class. For Fall 2024, 82% of classes are scheduled between the preferred times of 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. To date, all courses have been scheduled for FS2024. If you have questions about the classroom utilization policy or scheduling processes, please reach out to Kim Humphrey or Brenda Selman, University Registrar.