Minutes
of the Academic Senate Meeting
|
| The Academic Senate was called to order by Chair Vaughn
at 2:10 p.m. |
| Senate Members Present: |
| Aaron, Eunice Alvarez, Alvin Avila, Guadalupe Cherny, Robert Collier, James Colvin, Caran Concolino, Christopher Corrigan, Robert Cullers, Susan deVries, Brian Duke, Jerry Edwards, James Elia, John Johnson, Sharon La Belle, Thomas | Ferretti, Charlotte Garcia, Velia Gerson, Deborah Gillotte, Helen Goldsmith, Helen Gregory, Jan Harnly, Caroline Hom, Marlon Hu, Sung Hubler, Barbara Jerris, Scott Johnson, Dane Langbort, Carol Leal-Idrogo, Anita Amy Nichols | Onate, Abdiel Raggio, Marcia Sayeed, Lutfus Scoble, Donald Shrivastava, Vinay Smith, Miriam Steier, Saul Strong, Rob Su, Yuli Turitz, Mitch Vaughn, Pamela Warren, Penelope Williams, Robert Wong, Alfred Yip, Yewmun |
| Senate Members Absent: McKeon, Midori
(exc); Contreras, Ray (exc); Blomberg, Judith (exc); Moallem, Minoo (exc); Bernstein, Marian (exc); Bartscher, Patricia (exc); James Kelley (exc); J. Sagisi; E. Pasaporte; Oswaldo Garcia |
| Guests: P. Barnes; J. Combs; Ted DeAdwyler;
Anna Bishop; Jane Bernard-Powers; Jeanne Wick; J. Kassiola. |
|
| President Corrigan talked to the Senate about
where we as a campus are going with regard to the FMI review process. He first thanked the Senate Executive Committee for counsel at various stages. He also thanked the CFA leadership on this campus for their handling of this issue, particularly how they have given him space in a civil environment to consider this issue. He thanked his cabinet colleagues for their counsel and 466 faculty colleagues who took part in the survey, 40% of tenured/tenure-track (t/tt) faculty, which is for us a very very high turnout for a survey of this kind. He was also struck by fact that 60% of the t/tt faculty did not participate in the survey. [secretary's note: the results of the survey were as follows: 312 - NO to proceeding with FMI this spring; 159 - YES to proceeding with FMI this spring]. This makes for a more complicated decision. Corrigan went on to explain that this is a decision that is difficult for all of us, not so much whether you are for or against merit pay but because of the peculiarity of our campus situation. He reiterated that we are not without a contract; there is a contract in place, and collective bargaining means bargaining a successor contract from the premise that what is in the old contract is in fact an agreement under which you operate unless you change it. The bargaining process also demands that you offer up some items in exchange for those that you want. There is a commitment that SFSU would in fact complete its FMI review in the spring semester. Corrigan elaborated on discussion that we are out of sync with the other campuses. He reiterated that he believes our calendar is better, and he noted that as of March 1, 2001, we were the only campus in system that was able to provide all compensation increases for faculty. He added his continued concern about the nature of our environment that makes it difficult for our faculty--especially younger faculty--to have a decent wage and a decent quality of life, noting some of the exorbitant costs for living in the Bay Area. He added that to some extent there is a generational issue here with some faculty much more comfortable than others, listing some of these differences. Corrigan summarized the two good arguments that he has heard over and over again about why he should abort the FMI process for this spring: first, we don't know what the pay package will look like; second, we don't know what the process will be in the review of faculty for a merit pay increase. He detailed some of the negotiations between the CSU administration and the State Government. He noted that there has been little progress on CSU and CFA review of merit pay programs. Thus, the argument advanced to him is that in the absence of knowledge of the new guidelines, it is premature of us to go ahead. Corrigan commented that the Senate Executive Committee were both persuasive and elegant on why the FMI process on this campus should be aborted, especially in terms of this last point. He then explained that he put on the table a couple of conditions that he would guarantee were we to go ahead with the review process: first, he would honor recommendations from the departments in so far as they were endorsed by the deans. He would not cut the recommendation at the President's level if it was supported by the deans, though he would have the 10% presidential pool to augment those increases. He added the caveat that the departments would honor the process; that is, basically what was done this year rather than the last year with individual review and some kind of assessment on an individual basis of the quality of the faculty. He added that this would apply to all faculty recommendations and not just t/tt. Corrigan explained another condition with regard to the President's pool. If we were to go ahead with the FMI process, and we had less money than we were allocating to the departments now, he would dedicate all of the dollars from the president's pool plus other dollars that might be available in order to bring up the recommendations as best he could to what had been proposed by the department and approved by the dean. Corrigan addressed an outstanding issue: what would the Merit Plan look like and will there be one. The Faculty Activity Report (FAR) deadline has passed; decisions for putting forward faculty for SSIs must be made this week. The next step on that calendar is the March 16 deadline for the Department Chair to pass Department recommendations on to the Dean and then an April 13 deadline for the Dean to report to the president with a May 11 deadline for Presidential decisions. After talking with Dean of Faculty Affairs, the President confirmed that, if we chose to, that calendar could be modified as follows: the presidential decision by May 25, deans to president by May 1, with departments having from March 23 to April 20 to do departmental deliberations on the merit increases. Corrigan concluded that it is his considered judgement--because we can revise that calendar and we might have some movement with regard to dollar amounts and process--to hold back from aborting the process entirely at this time. If departments wish to start the review process now, he encourages them to do so, and he will honor those decisions. If, on the other hand, most departments choose to wait him out on this until March 23, the process can begin then at the department level. He is not persuaded that losing the opportunity to put dollars in the hands of our faculty early on should be lost because of indecision at the statewide level, and he is not persuaded that he should make a hasty decision today over concerns about our ability to stay within that calendar. He added that he cannot go beyond the middle of March, but that he might make a decision earlier when he has more clarity on what process will be used. Corrigan amplified his perspective on that process, considering it inconceivable that any change in the Merit Pay Process would involve taking away from the departments the right to review faculty and make recommendations about compensation. He doubts that the role of the Dean would be compromised in any new process. If there is any level of review that might be compromised, it would be the role of the President, and, based on last year, he is comfortable with that. He added that Presidents should have the authority to deal with equity. Corrigan summarized by saying that, if he makes a decision not to go forward in the Process, it will be made on the basis of the fact that we have no evidence before us that we are likely to get that extra 2% and not much evidence that the people arguing on our behalf statewide will be able to deliver on a process that will get us a contract quickly. In that situation, Corrigan threw out a challenge to the Senate in order to avoid frittering away our ability to get major funding out of the state because we do not have our act together: given that we have the major leadership in the legislature in our area, the Senate, CFA, and Administration, need to do our best to bring the leadership to the campus and face them with three or four or five hundred faculty members in an educational situation and show them why we have this need and what that increase in compensation can mean for this faculty. Corrigan concluded that he is holding off on the decision to abort the FMI process in order to see what happens. He is prepared, if he does abort the decision, to ask us to join him in order to get better funding out of the state. He also asks our forbearance, giving a little more time on this issue for the opportunity to see how the contract bargaining goes, which may allow us to be at the head of the pack and get the money that our faculty need. |
Senate Chair, Pamela Vaughn reported briefly on the CSU Academic Conference, which included Statewide Senators, Campus Senate Chairs, Provosts, Presidents, the Chancellor briefly, and many Trustees. Vaughn commented on the Chancellor's speech, noting its canned and promotional nature that seemed not directly addressed to the people in front of him. He mentioned our recent resolution, singling us out for our alleged position on the "necessity" of FMI--a comment which prompted her to email the Chancellor and suggest that he re-read the entire resolution. She also could not resist quipping to Board of Trustees Chair Lawrence Gould that it occurred to her that the Chancellor read our resolution much as the NRA reads the second amendment to the Constitution. She reiterated to Gould the importance of the Chancellor's office reading and understanding the report of the CSU Academic Senate Merit Pay Task Force. Vaughn then summarized Gould's speech, where he insisted on the harmony among the Trustees and stated that his primary concerns were workload, housing, salaries and benefits much more so than merit pay. He is also very concerned about keeping parties to bargaining talking to one another. Informally, Gould made clear his belief in the partnership between the Board of Trustees and Faculty, not just the Board of Trustees and the Chancellor's Office. Vaughn described the major concerns brought up by Senate Chairs, summarizing that most clustered around imposition by the central administration of priorities that may not be shared priorities on each campus, e.g., common calendar and year-round-operations. This resulted in a resolution from Chairs of Campus Senates reminding the Chancellor and the Board of Trustees of the role of the faculty in deciding on their calendar and curriculum. To illustrate this feeling, Vaughn quoted from her colleague Ted Ruml at CSU-San Bernadino: "The main point is that nobody has been consulted. Given the lack of consultation, it is easy to see the common calendar as leading to common CMS course numbers, leading to common lower division course descriptions, leading to common lower division textbooks . . . leading ultimately to complete homogenization of the twenty-three campuses. An alternative way of putting this is that the faculty have engaged the Borg [a Star Trek allusion]: 'We will assimilate you. You will comply. Resistance is futile.' The Borg are, if nothing else, 'efficient.'" Vaughn also noted the wonderful discussions of university and community partnerships like our own presentation by Dean Zingale on the Lake Merced project. She mentioned brilliant presentations from the statewide Academic Affairs Committee, led by our Senator Cherny, which provided some chilling perspectives on the future, and one on which Senator Gregory collaborate from statewide Faculty Affairs. Statewide Senator Eunice Aaron noted Harold Goldwhite's remark about how representative the group was, meaning the various segments of the system: staff, faculty, administrators, trustees, etc. Aaron shared with him an alternative perspective from a colleague who said the conference seemed like being at Pebble Beach for its absence of diversity. She suggested the need for an incubator to get faculty involved in shared governance, to get everybody in it so that we can truly represent the students that we teach. |
Agenda Item #1 - Approval of Agenda for March 6,
2001
Vaughn moved that the agenda be amended to reverse
items three and four and to postpone the chair's report to closing.
The agenda was approved as amended.
Agenda Item #2 - Approval of Minutes for Meeting of February
20, 2001
The minutes were approved as written.
Agenda Item #3 - Proposed Revisions to Academic Senate
Policy #S86-96 Establishing the Liberal Studies Council
Academic Senate Vice-Chair Helen Goldsmith introduced
this consent item from the Senate Executive Committee, noting that she is also
the Liberal Studies Program c\Coordinator. She summarized that most of the changes
are to bring us in line with where we are today as opposed to where we were
in 1986. The changes came out of deliberation within the Liberal Studies
Council and in response to the recent program review.
Robert Cherny suggested adding explanation regarding
the differences in items #1 and #2. Specifically, he asked for clarification
on what the policies and principles are that do not
involve curricular review that are involved in #1. Jane
Bernard-Powers, Liberal Studies Council Chair, replied that the policies and
principles that govern the program have to do with issues like assessment, interaction
with departments, and other things related to running the Liberal Studies Program.
She added that they were careful not to identify the Program as a department,
but it does have some attributes of a department. The governance of the program
does not necessarily fall under curriculum review. Cherny followed up by posing
an additional question, noting that #2 is a significant limitation on #1. He
asked whether, if we approve this change, are we delegating to the Liberal Studies
Council the power to constitute themselves. Jerald Combs noted that the old policy said we would
recommend policy to the senate, which meant we would be running back and forth
here all the time. He pointed to the addition of "operating under the aegis
of the Academic Senate" and suggested that this model is parallel to the General
Education Council; major policy changes would come back to the Senate.
Vaughn added that all due reference to curricular
review and reporting to the Senate is in this document.
M/S/P (Duke, Hu) to second reading.
M/S/P (Hu, Shrivastava) to close debate.
The vote was taken and the policy was approved unanimously.
Agenda Item #4 - Agenda Item #4 - Report from Vice President
La Belle
Vice President La Belle reported on the College of
Extended Learning. He characterized its importance as our "front-door" to the
community with its professional development courses, and winter and summer terms.
He reminded us of its strong leadership under Peter Dewees, and suggested that
new CEL Dean LucyAnn Geiselman will carry that forward. He noted the
close working relationship between CEL and the university at large, and he recounted
the success of CEL in a very competitive environment, pointing to the multimedia
center as an example of CEL finding a niche. CEL has been a very important fiscal
resource, too. La Belle then discussed these changing times with
the general fund supporting summer session, which puts CEL into a transitional
phase in search of a new marketplace. He then laid out some of the past summer
numbers, summarized past profit-sharing and supplemental fees, and suggested
that colleges will need to be weaned from the supplemental fund. La Belle went into the CEL transition in greater detail,
noting a human resources review of staff, the search for new market niches,
and the plans for a new downtown campus building in the next half dozen years.
He also mentioned a new multimedia center in Oakland and the expansion of the
American Language Institute. La Belle stated that CEL anticipates a deficit this year,
and concluded that it is incumbent upon all of us to think through how CEL can
assist our programs, how CEL can remain healthy in order to remain that "front
door" to the community
Agenda Item #5 - Agenda Item #5 - Proposal for a Master
Calendar of Events
Helen Gillotte, Chair of the Student Affairs Committee
(SAC), yielded to Barbara Hubler, chair of the
implementation committee for this proposal. Hubler provided a brief history
of this proposal, noting how it came out of a survey of student needs that indicated
a need for some way of finding out all that was going on across campus: a master
calendar. A campus-wide task force took up this challenge and has produced this
proposal. Hubler moved that Senate approve this proposal and forward it to President
Corrigan for his consideration and implementation.
M/S/P (Gregory, Aaron) to second reading.
M/S/P (Edwards, Steier) to close debate.
The vote was taken and the proposal was approved unanimously.
Vaughn thanked Jeanne Wick and all the others
who worked so hard on this proposal. Great applause erupted.
Agenda Item #6 - Proposed Resolution on Adoption of a
Policy on the Administration and Processing of Teaching Effectiveness Evaluation
Forms
Penelope Warren, Chair of the Faculty Affairs Committee
(FAC), introduced this consent item, recalling
the lively discussion we had around gathering student feedback of teaching effectiveness.
The question of the common core of questions has been dealt with by the Senate,
but guidelines for the administration of such an instrument had been set aside.
This proposal represents research on practices that are current around campus;
part of the impetus for this proposal is that sometimes even positive evaluations
of teaching effectiveness were called into question because there was no control
on how those instruments were administered. It is important to be beyond the
appearance of impropriety. Caran Colvin added that FAC felt that the administration
of the instrument is as important as instrument itself. This proposal is a collection
of the best practices on campus. Saul Steier raised a question about #4 since he often
does not know ahead of time which student will carry the evaluations to the
department office and feels trapped by the rigorousness of that rule. Vinay Shrivastava asked about specific guidelines
for evening and weekend classes when the office is closed. Colvin replied that
it would be up to the department to make that determination. Vaughn followed up with respect to Steier's question
whether we would consider the instructor notifying the department upon leaving
the room as sufficient notice. Colvin replied that this would be in keeping
with the spirit of the policy. Marlon Hom noted that we have a policy on teaching
evaluation, suggesting that this might be overkill to have this as a policy
rather than as guidelines or principles. Robert Wiliams wondered where
this policy is. Dean Barnes echoed Colvin's rationale for this policy
by noting that this is a this is a prelude to the uniform teaching instrument,
which will not be worth diddly without some uniform policy for the administration
of the instrument. Anita Leal-Idrogo asked about #5, on reasonable accommodations,
suggesting that the instructor does not usually do this alone, which makes this
misleading; she also asked about on-line course evaluations for on-line courses,
which have been developed by some faculty in lieu of policy. Cherny raised a concern going back to students in
evening classes given responsibility for these documents when the department
office is closed: in some cases slipping under the door is not realistic, so
we have to say that students take them home and turn them in the next morning,
unless we assign a paid staff member. Scott Jerris responded to Cherny's concerns by noting
they have a drop box at the office of the dean in the college of business.
Provost La Belle spoke in favor of the friendly amendment
to include the Disability resource Center; he also commented on on-line courses
noting that the guidelines for on-line courses include the need to identify
the way in which assessment will be conducted.
M/S/P (Warren, Smith) to second reading.
Sung Hu suggested a modification of La Belle's friendly
amendment, so #5 would read: "administrator of the evaluation process" rather
than the instructor. Warren explained that they were thinking of the prior thought
and arrangement that would be needed in order to make appropriate accommodations;
that is, they were addressing instructor responsibility here. The Committee accepted La Belle's friendly amendment and rejected
Hu's. Vaughn suggested the following language for #5: "The
evaluation process is subject to ADA regulations and reasonable accommodations
shall be made in advance." Steier asked if they wanted to delineate instructor
responsibility, and, if yes, suggested: "The professor shall give sufficient
notice of the date of evaluation so that appropriate arrangements may be made
in advance." Miriam Smith spoke in favor of "reasonable accommodation"
but raised a question about "in advance" since, if student is already in class,
reasonable accommodation is already being made. Vaughn suggested it might be
better to just stop it at "made." Jan Gregory suggested another friendly
version: "instructors shall arrange for reasonable accommodation in conjunction
with the Disability Resource Center." Jerry Duke commented on #2 with regard to night and
weekend classes: the instructor could walk with the student, open the office,
and have the student deposit them in the office. La Belle offered that the provost's office will work with
each Dean's office to develop a drop box or alternative arrangement.
Leal-Idrogo returned to #5, noting that not all accommodations
involve DRC; she offered the following suggestion for #5 that would accommodate
everything: "The evaluation process is subject to ADA regulations." Jeanne Wick offered the following gentle suggestion
for those departments using the computer tally sheets: drop them in boxes lightly.
La Belle promised that they would be padded boxes. Cherny thanked the Provost for providing resources to do
this, noting the repeating problem of students wanting to deliver things to
departments after hours. La Belle specified that his office would pay for a drop box for each college. Gregory commented
that department drop boxes might be appropriate since some large departments
have many night classes. FAC Chair Warren replied that departments can figure
out policies that are keeping with principles that are articulated here. To
clarify #5, she added that we have now arrived at a friendly amendment as follows:
"The evaluation process is subject to ADA regulations."
M/S/P (Colvin, Alvarez) to close debate.
The vote was taken and the proposal was approved unanimously.
Agenda Item #7 - Proposed Academic Affairs Faculty Recruitment
and Hiring Handbook
Vaughn introduced the discussion of the Academic Affairs
Faculty Recruitment and Hiring Handbook, recalling the previous senate discussion
and reiterating that this is not a Senate document but one that comes from the
Dean of Faculty Affairs, with the Senate providing feedback. This new version
is here in case there are further comments or discussion points. Cherny first stated that the document does look better
each time and then raised a question about the section on "Checking the Candidates'
References (8): given that candidates supply three letters, what is involved
in checking the references? Dean of Faculty Affairs Paul Barnes noted several
changes in that paragraph and explained that calling referees is standard practice
for finding out additional information. Cherny followed up by asking
for further clarification, noting the required letters of recommendations (3),
and still wondering what the committees are responsible for checking in the
section on "Checking the Candidates' references." Barnes suggested a prudent
approach: there may be cases where the committee does not feel the need to check
the references or cases where they feel it is necessary. Hu suggested a couple of minor changes: p. 5, sixth bullet
from the top still has "search committee" and should be changed to "hiring committee";
p. 12, last paragraph, second line, should read "often" not "oftern." He also
suggested the need to provide guidelines about how to handle negative information
(8), acknowledging the difficulty of doing so while suggesting that this very
difficulty is part of the reason that committees need guidelines. Deborah Gerson raised a concern about the basis on
which we are checking references of names that were not generated by the applicant,
noting several examples of how this might be unfair. La Belle first agreed that
the paragraph on checking references might need further revision; with specific
regard to checking references not on the candidates list he described a situation
whereby the committee might ask a named referee whether there is anyone else
they would recommend that the committee speak to. He added that there is no
legal requirement to notify the candidate. He also added that it is difficult
to cover every conceivable issue, so common sense and logic are most important,
and we could add that the Dean of Faculty Affairs is available for consultation.
Vaughn wanted to clarify what committee was being
referred to in various comments above, noting that there is no Senate committee
that clarify the language here. Cherny suggested that the material on conference interviews
(7-8) may need to have an introductory sentence since there are two different
types of conference interviews being discussed in a single paragraph.
Gregory commented that many issues of clarity might
be resolved by changing many passives to actives and putting agents into the
sentences. She volunteered her skills to do so to general assent. Vaughn encouraged Senators who have raised comments
on the floor to send actual text of suggested changes to Dean Barnes.
Carol Langbort noted that the section on keeping files
(3) seems to contradict what is in the video; she suggested double checking
one with the other.
The Senate was adjourned at 3:50.
Respectfully submitted,
Dane Johnson
Secretary to the Faculty