Sabbatical Committee Report, 2001-2002

Membership:

Bill Woolsey Business Administration

Conway Saylor Psychology

David Heisser Library

Gardel Feurtado Political Science and Criminal Justice

John Carter Health, Exercise, and Sport Science

John Murden Civil and Environmental Engineering

Suzanne Mabrouk Chemistry

Elba Andrade Modern Languages

Kanat Durgun Mathematics and Computer Science

Dennis Forsythe Biology

George Williams Education

Russell Hilleke Physics

Robert White English

Jeffrey Pilcher History

The department of Electrical and Computer Engineering chose not to send a representative to the committee. The committee met with Dean Ozment on September 20, 2001, to discuss procedures. At that time, the committee elected Jeffrey Pilcher as chair. The committee finalized the following procedures through an email vote taken on October 6.

The committee would interview all applicants and discuss the proposals before voting. The committee also agreed to rank all applicants. Because there were four eligible applicants, the scale was 1 to 4, with 1 being the highest and 4 the lowest. In keeping with past practices, these ratings were then to be converted using a formula of 1=20, 2=10, 3=5, and 4=1. Finally, the committee agreed to meet again to discuss the weighted scores before report them to the administration.

On November 28, the committee held a special meeting to determine the eligibility of sabbatical proposals. Applicants were interviewed the following day and a discussion was held of the proposals. The committee then ranked the applicants. The committee met again on December 12 to discuss the rankings, which were then transmitted to the Undergraduate Dean. At this meeting, the committee also began work on rechartering. On January 18, 2002, the Provost informed the successful applicants of their awards. Katya Skow-Obenaus and Keith Knapp were awarded full-year sabbaticals, subject to Citadel Foundation funding, and Tom Thompson and William Sharborough received half-year sabbaticals.

The committee met one final time on March 27 to complete revisions to the charter. At the same time, the committee approved a proposal to begin discussions with the Provost of the College about possible changes in the administration of the sabbatical program. The proposal received the endorsement of Faculty Council in its April 25 meeting, and the letter was delivered to General Carter on April 26.

For the Committee,

Jeffrey M. Pilcher

Chair, 2001-2002