President's Report 1/26/24

January 26, 2024 / Lyndsay Rhodes

Board of Trustees and Board of Governors Updates

The BOT met December 7th, 2023, and unanimously approved the 2024-2029 University Strategic Plan. The plan was presented to the BOG on January 24th, 2024, by President Timur and was widely supported. Chair Brian Lamb, Vice Chair Alan Levine, and Chancellor Ray Rodriguiez all gave positive comments supporting the plan, which was unanimously approved.

Amendments to Regulation 8.005, General Education Core Course Options, including the removal of Principles of Sociology, were approved despite numerous public comments and statements by Governors Hitchcock, Phalin, and newly appointed Governor Ashley Bell Barnett. Prior to the vote, Governor Phalin motioned to table the discussion until further information could be provided by institutions on the potential impact of removal of Sociology from Gen Ed, specifically sighting possible impact on student cost and time to graduation. That motion failed. Amendments to Regulation 9.016, Prohibited Expenditures, were also approved.

Video coverage of the full BOG meeting is posted on the FL BOG website with timestamps for points of interest outlined below:

FGCU Strategic plan discussion and vote - 3:34:16-3:53:17
Public comment - 5:43:51-6:05:04
Regulation 8.005 discussion and vote - 6:14:28-6:38:02
Governor Phalins comments start @ 6:25:13
Regulation 9.016 discussion and vote – 6:38:18-6:40:31
Florida Atlantic University Presidential Search Update - 6:43:02-

The next Board of Trustees meeting is scheduled for Thursday February 8th at 8:30am. This is a virtual meeting with a limited agenda, which has not yet been released.

FGCU Townhall – Understanding Performance-Based Funding and Metrics

The President and Cabinet will be holding a townhall Friday February 2nd, 11-12:30 in the Cohen Ballroom to discuss PBF. Topics for discussion will include background on PFB in Florida, information on benchmarks and how these measures impact funding, as well as our current position and how our new strategic plan will impact our future performance. Links to relevant documents are included below and I encourage you all to review this information and attend the Townhall for discussion.

2023 Performance Based Funding: Metric Scores and Allocations

2023 SUS Accountability Plan (includes metric definitions and metric comparisons between SUS institutions)

COACHE Update

The Priority-Setting Taskforce has shared the COACHE report widely with the university community and has held several townhall meetings since December 2023. Additionally, the Strategy-Setting Taskforce has held several discussion sessions to gather faculty feedback on the report and ideas to move forward to actionable goals to address the areas of concern (Culture of Leadership, Recourses and Support). The Strategy-Setting Taskforce is encouraging continued feedback through the survey, open office hours, or you can provide feedback directly to Andi Clemons or myself. The Taskforce will be moving toward setting specific actionable goals and generating a report before the end of the Spring 2024 term.

Office of Research and Sponsored Programs Updates

Contract grant writer and strategist, Dr. Madeleine Khan, will be on campus in late January/early February. There are several workshop opportunities through the Lucas Center as well as availability for one-on-one sessions to brainstorm ideas for grant submissions. Please contact Julie Leyden (jleyden@fgcu.edu) for additional information.

You all also received the Faculty Transfer Guidelines that outline the process for transferring grant awards to FGCU. ORSP is happy to work with faculty to facilitate this process and answer any questions. Additionally, position descriptions have been created for research positions that are fully award-funded. ORSP Pre-Award staff and HR are available to assist with identifying the proper position level for budgeting in application preparation.