Faculty of Social Sciences
and Humanities
Faculty Board
SSH06-M1
Minutes
The
Minutes of Meetings of the Faculty Board are posted on the Web for three years
after the relevant date.
Minutes of the Meeting of the Faculty Board held on Tuesday 23
May 2006.
Members: Professor Terry Kavanagh (Chair), Professor Dave Allen, Professor
Barbara Bagilhole, Professor Stuart Biddle (ab), Dr Paul Byrne, Dr Ian Campbell (ab), Dr
Alastair Cheyne (ab),
John
Costello (ab), Dr Oliver Daddow (ab), Professor Ian Davidson, Huw Edwards,
Professor Peter
Golding, Tony Hodgson, Dr Phil Hubbard, Dawn Hurst, Professor Malcolm King (ab), Dr Moya Lloyd
(ab), Professor Joseph Maguire, Marsha Meskimmon, Sue Middleton (ab), Graham
Murdock (ab), Professor Shirley Pearce (ab), Dr Sarah Pink (ab), Professor Ian
Reid,
Nick
Rodgers, Phil Sawdon (ab), Dr Chris Spray, Dr Bruce Stafford (ab), Dr David
Stensel,
Ruth
Stubbings, Dr Neal Swettenham (ab), Kerry Walton (ab), Professor Tom
Weyman-Jones, Professor Nigel Wood, Dr Paul Wood (ab)
Apologies for absence: Professor Stuart Biddle, Dr Ian Campbell, Professor Malcolm
King, Dr Moya Lloyd, Sue Middleton, Phil Sawdon, Kerry Walton, Dr Paul Wood
In attendance: Jo Arno, Sandra
Jasper (Faculty Personnel Advisors), Sally McKinley (Secretary)
1. Minutes SSH05-M3
The Minutes
of the Meeting of the Social Sciences and Humanities Faculty Board, held on 8
November 2005, were CONFIRMED subject to one correction:
Minute 33.2 to delete ‘ELSU’.
Reports from the Dean and Associate
Deans
2. Dean’s
Report
i. New appointments
NOTED: Professor Neil Halliwell had been appointed
as Deputy Vice-Chancellor, Professor Morag Bell would continue for a second
term as Pro Vice-Chancellor (Teaching).
Professor Colin Rhodes, Head of Department (LUSAD) had taken up a new
post in
Dr Marsha Meskimmon Acting Head
of Department (LUSAD) until 9 July 2006.
Dr Clive Edwards Acting Head of Department (LUSAD) from 10 July 2006 to
15 June 2007 during Dr Meskimmon’s maternity and study leave. Dr Meskimmon would take up formal headship
from 1 August 2007.
Dr Jo Harris re-appointed Head of
Department (Teacher Education Unit) from 1 August 2006.
Professor Tom Weyman-Jones
re-appointed Head of Department (Economics) (for 2 years) from 1 August 2006.
Professor Elaine Hobby appointed
Head of Department (English & Drama) from 1 August 2006.
Professor Jon Beaverstock
appointed Head of Department (Geography) from 1 August 2006.
ii. University
Strategy
NOTED: There would be a joint Senate and Council Away
Day on 19 June 2006 to discuss the future of the University over the next five
years.
iii. Industrial Dispute
NOTED: The Board voiced its concerns about the
likelihood of exams being delayed.
Responses from the Faculty about the industrial action should be sent to
the Dean. The Dean would email the
Registrar the Faculty concerns about the proposed industrial action website for
students.
ACTION: Dean
(iv) Job Evaluation
NOTED: The HAY assessment had now been
agreed. New salary scales would be
implemented next month.
(v) Faculty Financial
Position
NOTED: The Faculty had produced a
healthy surplus at the end of the financial year. It was the first time all departments were
solvent and credit was due to the efficiency and management in all departments.
(vi) Periodic Programme Reviews
NOTED: The periodic programme reviews of
the Departments of Geography and English and Drama had been very positive.
2.1 The Associate Dean
(Research) (SSH06-P15)
(i)
Practice based/led PhD guidelines
NOTED:
Currently there were no University generic guidelines on practice
based/led PhDs. A working party had been set up to provide
guidelines for a recognised written thesis with a practical component and would
be distributed University wide following Senate approval in June.
(ii) AHRC review of postgraduate funding
mechanisms
NOTED: The AHRC were considering if student led open competitions
were the best way forward. John Feather would
be attending the AHRC meeting on 15 June.
Departments should contact John Feather with their views.
2.2 The
Associate Dean (Teaching) (SSH06-P16 electronically circulated)
(i) Recruitment
NOTED:
The University was expected to secure just over 3000 undergraduate first
choice acceptances, a drop of around 350 compared to figures in 2005.
The result was that there would be an increase in recruitment through
Clearing if the University’s target was to be achieved. Postgraduate international application statistics
showed that applications were down by 17.5% with offers up by 8.89%. UK/EU application statistics were down by
14.8% and offers up by 4.7%. Both
unconditional firm and conditional provisional offers had increased compared to
the equivalent time last year.
(ii) Annual
Programme Reviews
NOTED:
Annual Programme Reviews were positive and encouraging but the
availability of physical resources and space was still an issue, particularly in
3. Award of degrees (tabled)
APPROVED:
The award of Higher Degrees to candidates whose examinations have been
conducted since the last meeting of Senate.
4. Destination statistics for 2005
Graduates (tabled
paper)
RECEIVED: A tabled paper and presentation from the Head
of Careers, and Faculty Careers Advisor on the destination statistics for the
Faculty’s 2005 Graduates.
NOTED: The tabled paper summarised first degree graduate
destinations by department in the Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities
during 2005. Overall the Faculty profile
was very similar to that of 2004. The
percentage of those employed rose from 58.7% in 2004 to 60.1% in 2005. There was an increase in the unemployment
rate with 6.7% still seeking work which was comparable with the other
faculties. The percentage of graduates
taking time out to travel remained the same while the percentage for students
going on to further study was the highest of the three faculties. It was noted that no graduates were reported
as unemployed in the
There had
been a huge increase in demand for information from the Careers Office and a
request had been submitted to restore the Careers Advisor allocation. Listings will be available on the Careers
website in the next few weeks. Andrea
Reed, the Graduate Destinations Coordinator, could be contacted for further
information. National figures ranking
the employability statistics of higher education institutions will be released
from HESA in September.
5. RAE
RECEIVED: A verbal report from the Faculty’s RAE panel chairs on
the progress of the RAE.
NOTED: The Panel criteria of subject specific working methods had
been published. There was still time to encourage staff to
produce material for publication before the RAE deadline of December 2007. In summary, the rehearsal for the RAE was
very important and Heads of Departments should now be writing draft RAE
submissions and encouraging every member of staff (including new researchers)
to submit. Tangible information must be
produced on esteem indicators, environment provision for research and organisation/institutional
involvement and support (eg SRIF) as well as producing profiles of output.
6.
Prize Assessors (SSH06-P17)
The Board APPROVED
the appointment of Mr Jim White, LUSAD to a Prize Assessor Panel in respect of
the Sir Robert Martin Faculty (SSH) Prize.
7.
Associate Dean
(Teaching) Action
The Board RATIFIED the
actions taken by the Associate Dean (Teaching) in approving the following:
i. Waivers
of Programme Regulations
ii. Appointment
of Programme Boards
iii. Credit
Transfers
iv. Appointment
of Examiners of the University
v. Appointment of External
Examiners/External Programme Assessors
Further details of
the actions were available from the Faculty Board Secretary upon request.
8. Curriculum
Sub-Committee
8.1 Recommended New Programme Proposals
The Board NOTED that Curriculum Sub-Committee will be recommending the
following new programme proposals to Learning and Teaching Committee, subject
to certain requirements being resolved to the satisfaction of the AD(T), prior to the meeting of Learning and Teaching
Committee on 8 June 2006:
i.
Part-time MSc Strategic Automotive
Dealership Management (
commencing
July 2006.
ii.
MA Creative Writing commencing
October 2006.
iii.
Part-time PGCert Healthcare Fire
Safety Management commencing October 2006.
iv.
BA 3D Design corrected to BA 3D Design: New Practice commencing October 2007 (including
discontinuation of three existing 3D Design programmes in Ceramics, Furniture,
Silversmithing and Jewellery with final recruitment in October 2006).
v. MSc Business Analysis and Management commencing October 2007.
8.2 Programme
Title Change
The Board NOTED that
Curriculum Sub-Committee will be recommending a proposed programme title change
to Learning and Teaching Committee, prior to their meeting on 8 June 2006:
MSc Economics and Finance / Financial Economics /
International Finance and Economics / Monetary Economics with effect from
2006-07.
8.3 Discontinuation of Programmes
The Board NOTED that Curriculum Sub-Committee will be recommending to
Learning and Teaching Committee prior to their meeting on 8 June 2006 to
discontinue the following programmes (proposed date of last intake shown in
brackets):
i. MSc Transatlantic
Relations (October 2005).
ii. MSc International Relations of the
European Union (October 2005).
iii. MSc Policy-Making in the European Union
(October 2005)
iv. MSc Globalization and
v. MSc Globalization, Development and
Difference (n/a)
9. Staff/Student
Committees
The Board NOTED
that reports of the Staff/Student Committee meetings had been deposited with
the Faculty Board Secretary as follows:
Department of
Economics (undergraduate) 16
November 2005, 22 March 2006
Department of
Economics (postgraduate) 30
November 2005
MBA 15
November 2005, 16 March 2006
Department
of Geography 30
November 2005, 1 March 2006
Department
of English & Drama (joint) 8
March 2006
Department
of Social Sciences (undergraduate) 1
March 2006
Department of
English 2
November 2005, 25 January 2006
Department of
Drama 9
November 2005, 18 January 2006
Postgraduate
Cert in Management (BPIF) 5
January 2006
MSc
Management/MSc International 7
December 2005, 26 April Management/MSc Marketing & Management/ 2006
MSc
Finance & Management
Postgraduate
Diploma/MSc Diploma in 10
April 2006
Industrial
Sales & Strategic
Marketing
Postgraduate
Diploma in Management 27
April 2006 (NG Bailey)
10.
Membership of Faculty Board
SSH06-P18
The Board NOTED the vacancies for elected
departmental representatives of the Faculty Board for the session
2006-2007: LUSAD (1), Department of
Social Sciences (2)
11. Date
of Next Meeting
The next Faculty Board meeting will
take place prior to a Directorate meeting on Tuesday 14 November 2006.
Author
– Ms S J McKinley
May 2006
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