A new NIU patent policy for inventions of members of the university community and the formation of a task force to improve the teacher evaluation process were approved by the University Council Wednesday.

The new patent policy, available to NIU students, faculty and staff, will give the inventor first rights in the use of the invention, physics professor Larry Sill said.

Sill, who is on the president’s commission to develop a patent and copyright policy for NIU, said the new patent policy is advantageous to the inventor. Unless there is external funding involved in the development of the invention, the inventor has first rights as to how the invention should be used, he said.

e said the policy also will be advantageous because it will be “consistent and parallel” with the copyright policy which the committee intends to develop next. This policy, which is the one most common among other universities, also will give first rights to the author, Sill said.

Sill said this policy is unusual. Most universities give ownership of the invention to the university because the inventor uses the university’s facilities to develop it, he said.

One aspect of this policy which is similar to those of other universities is it evenly distributes royalties from an invention among the inventor, the department in which he works and the university research foundation. One-third of the royalties go to each party, he said.

NIU President John LaTourette said he is in favor of such a policy, but had one concern. He said guidelines for governing the process of first rights and royalty distribution should be included in the proposal.

The council unanimously approved the policy on first reading at the request of the Faculty Assembly, said Jim Giles, executive secretary of the council. The policy must get approval from the Board of Regents before it can go into effect.

LaTourette said it would be “appropriate” to endorse this policy by a great majority of council members to show to the BOR the council’s sincerity in accepting this policy.

The council also approved the formation of a task force designed to review the present procedures of student evaluations of instructors.

Alan Voelker, professor of Curriculum and Instruction, chaired the committee that made recommendations to the council regarding the acceptance of the evaluation process. Voelker said, “We arrived at the sense that there was a lot more to decide than whether the document passed or not.”

LaTourette said, “I’m very supportive of this effort. It’s something we have to do from time to time.”

The task force will be set up to propose changes in the evaluation process to make it “a better system of evaluation,” LaTourette said.

“(The task force) will create a more effective system of helping the faculty to be better teachers,” LaTourette said.

Voelker said the task force will consider changes and will have to work them into the evaluation process before the council approves the procedures. The task force will consider such changes as the publicizing of teacher evaluations, Voelker said.