Minutes of the Academic Senate Meeting
Of September 25, 2001
Senate Chair Pamela Vaughn called the senate to order at 2:10 pm.
Announcements and Report
Chair’s Report
There was no Chair’s Report, as the Chair wanted to launch into the business at hand as quickly as possible. The Chair asked for a moment of silence for the victims of the events of 9/11. The Chair made several announcements. Summer semester review and assessment committee and the shared governance task force are meeting. The senate will be receiving reports from both groups as their work processes and their recommendations develop. The Chair welcomed all new, second term and continuing senators to the senate. The Chair made a special not to welcome the representatives of the associate students. The Chair announced that the senate would continue the vote on the change in the constitution until we have achieved a quorum. The Chair appealed to faculty to turn in their ballets. The election for faculty members to serve on the search committee for Dean of Faculty Affairs has been completed. The Chair requested that the agenda be amended so that President Corrigan could speak to the Senate after item 2 and so that My Yarabinec replacing Johnetta Richard can present the report from International Programs.
Agenda Item #1 - Approval of Agenda for Meeting of September 25, 2001
M/S/P (Turitz, Steier) to amend the agenda.
Continuing the announcements the Chair asks University Council Patricia Bartscher to give us an up date on procedures regarding inquires for information on student records. Bartscher, so of you may have hear that there is going to be a possible increase in asking for information about students and employees. Reminding everyone that if you get a request for information of any employee including faculty, staff, and administrators those requests should be referred to Denise Fox in Human Resources. If you get any requests for information regarding any student do not give out that information contact Susan Dmytrenko the university registrar. Through those offices they will confirm that the request is from an appropriate person. That the appropriate measure and safeguards are taken to insure that individual privacies are not violated. Cherny, will there be something to this effect that goes into every faculty mailboxes? Bartscher, the message will be sent out to all department chairs with instruction to place a copy of the message in faculty mailboxes.
Agenda Item #2 - Approval of Minutes for Meeting of May 8, 2001 and May 15, 2001
Saul Steier requested that the minutes should reflect that he was present for both meetings.
M/SP (Shrivastava, Steier) to approve the minutes as corrected.
President Corrigan made the following remarks: Pam has asked me to say a work or two about how we have been doing over the last couple of weeks. The first response is I think remarkably well. I think the way the students faculty and staff have come together on this campus in the aftermath of the horrific events on September 11 have been extraordinary. I particularly appreciate the support we have had from the Senate Executive Committee and from the CFA and other during this period of time. It’s been a very good spirit on the campus. If you have been to any of the events the candle light event, students in the residence hall, some1200 that first night or one of the rallies outside of the student union. You would see that the discourse is generally going on at a level of maturity and sensitivity-sensibility that would make us all proud. This is not to say there hasn’t been passion statements, or haven’t been some statement that were meant to hurt or in fact have been misinterpreted and there for have hurt. But when I hear about what is happening on other campuses I am very proud of this place. For example I was called only yesterday by a Chronicle reporter asking if any of our Muslin students felt forced to leave the campus. The answer is no. I asked why the question. I discovered that in the area Muslin students are leaving their campuses. Six of them for example have left the University of San Francisco. (The President cite other examples) This campus has really come together in an important way. Those of you who are the old hands around here know that the tone is likely to change. It can change if we are not careful. When Washington picks up on the pace in regards to how it handles the situation in Afghanistan and other parts of the world. If we can continue to keep the same open dialogue. The same respect for other in the community. I think we will again get through this one in reasonably good shape. Thank you very much for your support.
Agenda Item #3 – Report from Vice President La Belle
The president mentioned in his welcoming speech this past fall the concept of destination campus. I though I would walk you through what we have been teasing out of what is a destination campus versus commuter campus. Why we are even thinking along these lines. (La Belle spoke from a “Draft for Discussion” covering the comparative statistics between 1992 and 2000, a copy of the draft was provided for each senator.) The CSU, especially in Southern California is experience a dramatic demographic push especially at the freshman level but also transfer students. A number of the campuses, Fullerton and others, are increasing very rapidly and the future looks very much the same. One of the interests of the Chancellor offices is to have SFSU become more of a residence campus so that some of the pressure from Southern California can be belayed. Students from Southern California then would come here. (La Belle, continued and read from the draft document) To summarize SFSU statistics: (1) becoming more attractive to first time non-commuting freshmen; (2) has been and remains an attractive upper division institution for transfer students from a reliable group of feeder institutions; (3) has been and remains a commuting institution for graduate students; (4) is attracting a larger number of international students – generally from the same countries and as transfer students not freshmen; (5) Non-Calif-resident domestic population is very small. Implications: SFSU has been both a commuting and a destination campus for some time. It will need to build its non-commuting student population to sustain students, building a community of social/intellectual/recreative support, building extracurricular activities, students support services, fellowships and assistantships, recruitment outside the commuting, new faculty and staff roles and responsibilities. Cherny, we may want to think about creating a special task force to look at this issue similar to what has been done at the state level. La Belle, this will be a major issue for this campus at all levels in planning for the future. This will also be a topic for the academic deans at a retreat later in October. Houlberg, these demographics show that are student are from the greater bay area not just the city. Believe it is confusing to base a ban on the smallest city within our area. La Belle, the bay areas outside of San Francisco has two other CSU campuses at Hayward and San Jose. We do draw from areas outside San Francisco and we can get those statistics for planning purposes. We do get from CCSF about 1100 transfers students yearly. What we are not doing very well is of the HS applicants. We only get about 20 percent of those who apply. One of our challenges to find out how can we increase our “yield” from freshman applicants. These statistics are a first pass and more needs to be done.
Agenda Item #4 – Elections
GE Segment I – Basic Subjects Committee
Wei Ming Dariotis, Asian Studies was elected.
Agenda Item #5 – Report from Professor Johnetta Richards, SFSU Academic Senate Representative, CSU Academic Council for International Programs – time Certain No later than 2:35 p. m.
My Yarabinec spoke for Johnetta Richards (attending a conference), and read from a report a copy of which was provided to each senator. SFSU is number one in the CSU of students participating in the study abroad program. The bilateral exchange programs, started by the local departments, 37 students leaving this semester to participating in these programs. Received a large number of awards for study abroad, two Fulbright and a Japan Award. The scholar fund begun last year continues to grow and we were able to give a couple of $250 awards this year. Faculty continued to participate in the interviews of the student candidates for study abroad. Finally, thanks to the entire faculty who have give support and participation in the programs. Especially thanks to many department who participate in the study abroad programs. Cherny, thank you for coming I admire what you do and your numbers that speaks very well for the good work of your office. We owe you all great thanks for making us the leading campus in study aboard in the CSU. Like to see 10 times the numbers. Steier, why are the Australian, New Zealand students subtracted? Yarabinec, these students are on an off cycle. Steier, what is the status of the Zimbabwe program? Yarabinec, the university there is far removed from the strife in the country. Things seem to be going very well. Smith, I went abroad and arranged with My the opportunity to visit one of our programs. I had a great experience and recommend faculty to visit there. Yarabinec, if faculty members would like to visit any our programs please contact the office of international programs.
Agenda Item #6 – Report from Ken Monteiro, Dean, Office of Human Relations – Time Certain No later Than 2:45 p. m.
Monteiro, thank you for inviting me back [to catch up on the office of human relations and review the first three years of the office of human relations]. The office was set up after a recommendation of the human relations commission, which was established by President Corrigan after his first year. He reviewed the history of the function of the office development and the importance of the diversity of the campus, combined several services under this office (affirmative action, disability services, hiring plans etc.). It has taken ten years for the structure to take its present form. He discussed the changes to improve the SFSU facility for the disabled; Discussed the provost document on diversity issues and how they are discussed was made available to chairs, available from Academic Affairs; Discussed why we need a diversity plan, “We still have our problems and we could do better,” …want to improve our diversity in hiring as we have in the past but we still need to improve. Need to improve representatives of Women Hispanics, Blacks American Indians in many areas. Doing well with the core issues of hiring and diversity, Slightly lower in African Americans when compared with the rest of the nation. Overall conclusion: we are doing well, we can improve, and it is a process. Summarize the office response to the events of 9/11. Concluded his report.
Agenda Item #7 – Proposed Resolution Endorsing the Guidelines for Short-Term Study Abroad Programs: a consent item from the academic Senate Executive Committee – Time Certain No Later Than 3:10 p. m. (first reading)
Agenda Item #8 – Report form Committee on Committees – Time Certain No later than 3:20 p. m.
Jim Edwards, chair of the committee, presented the report from the Committee on Committees to the senate for its acceptance. He reported that 26 of the 28 committees that were established by senate policy and required to submit annual reports did so. The senate chair is in contact with and requesting that the two committees that did not submit reports do so as soon as possible.
Jan Gregory asked senators to take back to their colleagues the suggestion that many committees made recommendations that might have differed had they consulted with the appropriate other campus committees or bodies. She suggested that one of the reasons for lack of consultation maybe that many committee chairs are not clear on who they should be consulting with. Gregory ask the senate chair to make a list of the known chairs of the committees that are not standing committees of the senate and provide the list to senators so that some of this information can go back to faculty. Chair Vaughn responded that she would do that as soon as the possible.
Agenda Item #9 – The Academic Senate – Orientation and Review: Time Certain No Later Than 3:30 p. m.
Senate chair Vaughn welcomed all new senators and reviewed the procedures and functioning of the senate. Vice chair Penny Warren viewed the functioning of the Executive Committee (Xcom). Warren reported that the make up of Xcom consist of Senate Chair, Senate Vice Chair, Senate Secretary, and the elected chairs of the Senate’s standing committees. Two at-large members elected by the senate each spring and representative of the statewide senate and the chair of the campus chapter of CFA. Warren continued and outlined the responsibilities of Xcom. The statewide senators Jan Gregory, Robert Cherny, and Eunice Aaron reviewed the functioning of the statewide academic senate. Cherny played the point role and reviewed the functioning, operation, and policies of the CSU Academic senates. He continued and read from the statement titled Collegiality in the California State Wide University System taken from the major policies adopted by the state wide academic senate, a copy of which was given to all senators. Gregory and Aaron added their comments. Vaughn reminded senator that they received Association of University Professors articles on shared governance on July 1, 2001. If any senator is in need of additional copies please contact the senate office. She reminded senators that they are responsible to pass the information that is gained in senate meeting back to their constituencies. Senator Andres Consoli outlined some of the activities that he uses to pass information on to the dean, chairs, and faculty of the college that elected him. Vaughn asked for the chair from the standing committees to report on their jobs. Vaughn stated that all Executive Committe meetings are open to all and that Executive Committee meetings are held every Tuesday, 12-2, in the Verducci room in the University Club.
Respectfully submitted,
Jim Edwards
Secretary to the Faculty