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This week Chalk Day kicks up dust for free speech Visit the mall today between 11:45 a.m. and 1:15 p.m. south of Loftin Student Center to join in the fun of Chalk Day sponsored by the student chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists, The Ranger and media communications. Everyone in the college community is welcome to write messages on the pavement to celebrate the First Amendment rights to freedom of expression and association. Write a favorite quote, draw or leave messages of patriotism, protest, love, team spirit or religion. For more information, call the newsroom at 210-486-1776.
Vol. 87 Issue 4 • Oct. 8, 2012
theranger.org
Rule could limit adjunct load, classes Exceeding a two-class limit would mean new retirement contributions by district and part-time faculty members. By REBECCA SALINAS
rsalinas191@student.alamo.edu
Adjunct faculty members teaching more than 7.4 semester hours must make a contribution of 6.4 percent of their compensation to the Teacher Retirement System of Texas beginning in the spring semester. The Alamo Colleges also must contribute 6.4 percent. On Sept. 27, President Robert Zeigler sent an email to all faculty members at this college, informing that there are three options. One option is that this college will limit adjunct faculty to fewer than 7.5 semester hours and hire more adjuncts. Zeigler said the college is planning an adjunct recruitment fair, but details will be determined later. The second option is that adjuncts will be able to teach the 7.5 semester hours and the district will pay the retirement contribution. The third idea is
that the college will offer fewer classes. Zeigler said cutting classes will have “long-term negative impacts.” He said classes would be canceled in extreme circumstances. Zeigler said Tuesday that he does not like the rule change because it left the college “scrambling.” He said hiring more adjuncts was not budgeted, so budgets will be tight. He said the rule might feel “callous” to adjuncts, but the rule applies to colleges across the state and not just this college. Zeigler also confirmed that the change does not apply to adjuncts who are retired from this college. The rule also would affect adjuncts after one semester of employment. On Sept. 26, Chancellor Bruce Leslie encouraged affected faculty to call the human resources benefits team if they have questions about participation or benefits. Jerry Townsend, Adjunct Faculty Council chair
and media communications full-time adjunct, said he is currently researching the issue, but he expects it to affect about 100 adjuncts at this college. Dr. David Wood, director of institutional research, planning and effectiveness, said there is a total of 468 adjunct faculty members this semester at this college. Of those, 34 are full-time adjuncts, Wood said. Townsend said he was informed about the change on Sept. 24, but department chairs learned about it the week before. Townsend said he thinks the college will not be willing to pay the 6.4 percent, except for adjuncts with qualifications and expertise that is difficult to replace. He said it is unfair if the college picks and chooses who is able to teach the 7.5 or more hours. Vernell Walker, dean of professional and technical education, said the rule change was a “big surprise.”
See RULE, Page 4
Police investigation of dispute ongoing The investigation of a Sept. 26 verbal altercation among four to 15 students in Oppenheimer Academic Center is at a standstill until the Alamo College police department completes its portion of the investigation, Dr. Robert Vela, vice president of student affairs and interim vice president of academic affairs, said Wednesday. “There were just a lot of people involved, so it’s just taking a little bit of time to get everyone interviewed,” he said. He said he expects the investigation to conclude by early this week. Vela said he has not received a copy of the police report and would not have it until the police department completes its investigation. Campus police have not released the incident report even though the incident transpired more than one week ago. According to the district police blotter, a student reported a disturbance on campus property at 11:20 a.m. Sept. 26. An estimated 10 Alamo College police officers responded. Vela said Sept. 27 that two students faced interim disciplinary action and more participants could face action.
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Kinesiology sophomore Tyler Pennington swims a relay lap during Aquatic Conditioning 1 and 2 taught by kinesiology Professor Brad Dudney Thursday in the pool in Candler. Recreational swim hours are from 2 p.m.-4 p.m. on Monday, Wednesday and Friday. Effective Oct. 22, hours will change to 1 p.m.-4 p.m. Carolina Vela
MyMAP requires posting of midterm grades By ALMA LINDA MANZANARES amanzanares6@student.alamo.edu
Phase 1 of MyMAP, or My Monitoring Academic Progress, rolled out this semester and requires faculty to give progress reports every four weeks to first-time-in-college students, JoCarol Fabianke, interim vice chancellor for academic success, said Tuesday. She said the initiative is being tested on first-time-in-college students this semester to see how the system works. “We’re only doing the first-timein-college students this semester because we want to make sure that our process works and the system works as it’s been put together. We’ve probably got between 9,000-10,000 FTICs, and each one of those FTICs is taking probably somewhere between
two and five classes. So that’s kind of our pilot to see how it’s going to work,” Fabianke said. Fabianke said faculty receive a list of first-time-in-college students from Banner and are asked to submit grades and record attendance for those students to see if they are at risk of failing the course. She said if a student is at risk, an email is sent to the student asking them to meet with their instructor. “A lot of faculty do that anyways,” Fabianke said. Teams from all the Alamo Colleges including advisers, faculty, deans, information technology services staff, financial aid staff and district employees, developed the system to improve student success. Fabianke said for spring 2013, this progress tracking will be expanded to
every student in every course. She said the next phase in the spring will be to gather all reports for one student in an accumulative report and figure out what the problem is if a student is getting multiple reports from multiple instructors. “Then we want to maybe have a process for the student services people to contact you kind of as a second phase,” Fabianke said. “Each of the colleges has been doing some kind of early alert, but it’s not been linked with Banner and it’s not been in a way that we could do any kind of cumulative report about actions on students. So this is just kind of to be a little more comprehensive.” She said this semester, after one of the periods has passed and faculty submit their reports, then the report will go to the department chairs.
“It is really just for the department chairs to be able, maybe, to say to a faculty member, ‘Well, you had 30 FTICs and you didn’t even have one at risk,’ to kind of try to prompt to make sure everyone’s doing this,” Fabianke said. She said she understands faculty will have to get used to submitting the progress reports. “This is really all to help students and so it may take awhile, and we’re going to have to reinforce this and talk about what it might do for students. And this is not about anything punitive. This is to encourage faculty to be sure to provide the information to the students,” Fabianke said. MyMAP used to be called the Comprehensive Advising and
See MYMAP, Page 4