A follow-up open forum designed for faculty to give input on WKU’s academic future will be at 3 p.m. today in the Mass Media and Technology Hall Auditorium.

“It’s just really for people to ask questions and ask us to clarify things,” said Gordon Baylis, vice president for Research. “I hope that perhaps some people can give us even better ideas.”

People didn’t have the opportunity for discussion at the last forum, Baylis said.

Gordon Emslie, provost and vice president for Academic Affairs, said he wanted to give faculty members time to digest information at the first forum on March 25 so they could engage in informed discussion.

Today’s forum will be more informal than the first, he said.

Led by Emslie and Baylis, the first forum provided results and recommendations from the “listening tour,” a comprehensive evaluation of Academic Affairs conducted last fall.

Among suggestions were remodeling the general education core, reorganizing and re-titling certain divisions, implementing a new faculty workload model and reallocating money.   

Baylis said at the forum that many of these suggestions are just that —suggestions.

“Our role is to give more people options, tool and flexibility,” he said. “We do not believe in one size fits all.”

A large number of the recommendations centered around making research a higher priority.

Baylis said it needs to be a goal for the entire university.

“Everybody helps everybody else,” he said at the forum. “The reputation is carried by us all.”