On February 3rd, we will have our first Faculty Council in the new configuration.  From now on all issues related to the Faculty Professional Association (Union) will be handled by the Association. This would include the Salary Plan, Grievances and Evaluations.  However, Adjunct Faculty at NMC will still receive support on these and all other issues from Faculty Council.  We are your advocates and we are here to help, so please don’t hesitate to contact us.

The new Faculty Council will now focus on celebrating and enhancing our teaching.  The first of our initiatives will be to meet once a month on the first Friday from 3-5PM.  The first hour of the meetings will focus on issues and decisions that need to be discussed and decided.  The second hour will showcase faculty innovation.  Our first Friday, we are focusing on  what apps we are using in our classes.  Susan Odgers, Deb Pharo, Beckie Wooters, Nick Roster, Keith Overbought and Keith Kelly have volunteered to share an app.  They will explain what it is and how to use it.

The second of our initiatives will be to offer seminars.  Faculty will offer seminars to the college community in their expertise.  All adjunct and full-time faculty are invited to offer a seminar.  Start thinking about a seminar you could offer.

The third of our initiatives is the Faculty Exhibition.  Once a year, we will offer an exhibition in which faculty share their talents, successes and innovations.  We will work together to create this event with CIE and all of you!  We’ll spend some time at our first meeting on the 3rd to start planning.

Faculty now have back our hard won place on the Board of Trustees meetings.  Our first presenters were Brandon Everest and Melissa Sprenkle. Deb Pharo and Mary Burget presented on January 23rd.  This is the beginning of a wonderful new partnership with our Board of Trustees.  For March 20th, we have Tom Gordon and Mark DeLonge, and on April 24th we have Keith Kelly, Hans VanSumeren and Jason Slade.  We still need volunteers for February and May.

Thank you all for being so decidedly wonderful, talented and dedicated.  I am very grateful to serve as your Chair of Faculty Council for the rest of the year.

Please direct your questions or concerns via NMC email to: Deb Pharo, Beckie Wooters, Mike Torre, Nancy Gray, Mike Surgalski or Brian Sweeney.