Tuesday,
April 13, 2004
Senate Members Present:
Avila, Guadalupe |
Gemello, John |
Nichols, Amy |
Bartscher, Patricia |
Gerson, Deborah |
Noble, Nancy |
Bernstein, Marian |
Gonzales, Dan |
Palmer, Pete |
Bohannon, Tara |
Gregory, Jan |
Pong, Wenshen |
Boyle, Andrea |
Guerrero, Jaimes |
Shrivastava, Vinay |
Carrington, Christopher |
Heiman, Bruce |
Smith, Brett |
Chelberg, Gene |
Hom, Marlon |
Steier, Saul |
Chen, Yu Charn |
Houlberg, Rick |
Suzuki, Dean |
Cherny, Robert |
Jerris, Scott |
Terrell, Dawn |
Colvin, Caran |
Klironomos, Martha |
Ulasewicz, Connie |
Corrigan, Robert |
Langbort, Carol |
Van Dam, Mary Ann |
Edwards, James |
Liou, Shy-Shenq |
Vaughn, Pamela |
Fielden, Ned |
Mak, Brenda |
Williams, Robert |
Fung, Robert |
McKeon, Midori |
Yang, Nini |
Garcia, Oswaldo |
Meredith, David |
Absent: Aaron, Eunice (excused); Alvarez, Alvin (excused); Batista,
Natalie; Bernard-Powers, Jane; Contreras, A. Reynaldo; Daniels, Robert;
Irvine, Patricia (excused); Morishita, Leroy (excused); Otero, Aina J.;
Rocchio, Jean (excused); Scoble, Don (excused); Smith, Miriam (excused);
Stowers, Genie (excused)
Visitors:
Kenneth Fehrman; Hallum, Ann; Lee, Christopher;
Mullins, Willie; Rood, Jonathan; Sung, Susan; Turitz, Mitch; Verhey, Marilyn;
Whitaker, Gail
CALL TO ORDER: 2:10 p.m.
CHAIR’S REPORT
Chair
Edwards noted that in the next few weeks
the senate would be going through its annual election process for officers
and committees. He thought it important that elections have as wide a representation
as possible and urged senators with strong convictions in their own leadership
qualities to submit their names for nomination. He predicted that the upcoming
year would be difficult and that campus would need all the leadership available.
He indicated that the senate handouts for the day included a list of senate
members needed for committees. He spoke to the issue of nominations, specifying
that names other than self-nominations were welcome on the day of election
as long as they had the permission of the nominee. He indicated that some
of the positions were candidates to be elected by the Executive Committee,
not the entire senate, and promised to have more information by the following
week.
AGENDA ITEM #1 - APPROVAL OF THE
AGENDA FOR April 13, 2004
AGENDA ITEM #2 - APPROVAL OF MINUTES FOR March 30, 2004
Gregory, Jerris
m/s/p
Senator
Gregory noted that Item 4 of the minutes
contained a factual error and that she had actually “disclaimed full responsibility”
for the resolution by attributing some sections of the resolution to other
authors.
CFA President
Turitz indicated that he had been
present at the previous senate meeting.
AGENDA ITEM #3 -REPORT—ROBERT W.
CHERNY, CHAIR, CSU ACADEMIC SENATE
Chair
Edwards explained that the campus would
now receive a formal visit and report from the Chair of the Statewide Senate,
SFSU’s own Bob Cherny.
CSU
Senate Chair Cherny began by noting
that one of the things that statewide senators do is visit individual campus
senates, and he had personally been to half of them during his term. He felt
that he had learned a lot from these visits and hoped today to explain some
of what had been going on at the statewide senate. The most important topic
naturally has been the budget, but he commented that we will not really know
until the “May revise” what the true budget numbers would be.
He expressed
disappointment that while the Chancellor’s office had been hoping that the
mandated cuts would come to the system to be dealt with at our level, the
Department of Finance has been resisting.
Cherny thought that one of the biggest
issues for the statewide senate was facilitating graduation. He stated the
three central principles of the CSU: access, affordability
and quality.
Presently
access is under a serious threat, as there is not enough money to accept eligible
students. Impacted campuses have already been taking measures to deal with
this and more will follow. The CSU does not currently
have the money to accept students.
Cherny reported that one of the areas
of discussion was the facilitation of graduation, which for students needs
to proceed as quickly as possible with a minimum number of units; thereby
freeing room for incoming qualified students. The senate has looked at a multitude
of ways to speed graduation. There are lots of approaches, many of them campus
specific, and appropriate to various units for specific tailoring. The issue
of transfers remains a concern, something all faculty
recognize as a problem. The legislature has a long-standing interest in this
as well. Academic Affairs has been preoccupied with SB 1785 a pending bill
which specifies transfer priorities for the CSU
in some detail. While not a wrong-headed bill, it tended to simplify a complicated
problem and once adopted would give less flexibility for solutions. The senate
has been trying to do the same things without the need for legislation, and
this would be a preferred outcome.
He explained
the most important features of the bill and the concerns of the committees
dealing with it.
Students
should enter the CSU with 60 units, including lower
division GE, and 6 units of lower division work counting towards their major.
To accomplish this, students would need to declare majors earlier and proceed
taking the courses appropriate for them. In many cases students would be better
off taking sequences of classes where it made sense. Every major in the CSU would need to agree on what those lower division courses
ought to be.
Making
a clear path for community college students would be a large undertaking,
and is not well accepted by all faculty members. The senate has been working
on this with two major objectives: making it easier for community college
students to figure out what to do, so they can come to the CSU
better prepared and not have to waste time taking more courses due to misinformation,
and secondly to head off as much legislation as possible to minimize interference.
Another
issue to deal with has been a result of the Governor’s budget and concerns
“excess units” defined as any units 10% greater than what is needed to graduate.
Many believe that additional courses are beneficial to the overall education
of students, but this is not necessarily good for all of California and this pattern has closed out
other CSU eligible students. To help facilitate
the graduation of students with a minimum number of units a combination of
approaches would be necessary. Transfer students would need to declare their
majors early, as well as our own freshman. A personal graduation plan ought
to be in place, from start to finish. Students need to know what courses to
take graduate, by consultation with an advisor, and file this plan
before completing their second year of coursework. At the finish of a third
year of study, an “automatic degree audit” would clarify and illuminate any
problems. Once 100 units are reached, a student would need special advising,
and too many additional units are accrued, more stringent provisions would
be needed to guide the student to graduation. These are all elements of a
package that might eliminate the need to penalize students for excess units.
The system needs to give very clear paths for students.
At the
last meeting the senate passed a resolution regarding sustainable architecture.
CSU Chair Cherny
told a story about being at Hayward with Trustee Kathy Kaiser, who is partial to solar power,
where they noticed a large array of solar panels on the administration building,
which helps to provide power to the university. Cherny indicated that we need to be doing this with our new construction,
and have more energy efficient buildings. In the long-run this type of construction
would generate clear savings. We need to examine campus policies and determine
how to incorporate these features into building design.
For the
past two years there has been a task force on graduate study, and he reminded
senators that SFSU is the largest graduate study campus in the CSU, a facet less important for some other campuses, and perhaps
not a priority for administration. The report from the Graduate Education
Task Force, available on the web, stressed the importance of graduate education
for the CSU and tried to urge appropriate funding.
Finally,
Cherny noted that the Board of
Trustees was dangerously close to not having a quorum. Former Governor Davis took a long time making BOT appointments, which were then withdrawn by Governor Schwarzenegger.
At the present, every member of the BOT is needed
for a quorum, a matter of major concern. It is possible that the Governor
could now appoint half the board.
Senator
Jerris dryly commented on Hayward’s ability to generate solar power
as opposed to our campus. He had a question on the “45-15”unit plan, which
had been discussed in FAC with some concerns that
many community college students are not as focused on a major, or even on
what they might want to study and that it would be a chore to implement this
plan.
Cherny responded that he did not like
the “45-15” designation. For some majors the units might be higher than that
and some may need less. What was important to do was allow faculty in each
discipline to determine what is necessary. It should be a faculty decision,
not the BOT or legislature. It would establish a
priority for transfer, and would not be exclusionary.
Senator
Vaughn wanted to add a corollary regarding
declaring majors, which is that the suggestions impact students who change
majors and wanted to know if anyone had talked about this.
Cherny responded that many had indeed
considered this, and did not want to discourage it. We want students to explore,
but that after a year, we do want them to declare, and after some point make
it difficult to change. Other colleges seem to be able to do this and we should
perhaps be able to do this as well.
Senator
Vaughn had a second question about the
prohibition against second BAs that might create some problems.
Cherny noted some exceptions to the rule.
Many campuses have no rules about repeating courses and we need to look at
that.
Senator
Houlberg noted that this news was becoming
part of a general miasma of despair. Currently academic and educational ends
were being driven by other than important means. Determining what is good
for students seemed based on non-academic reasons. He expressed despair coupled
with paranoia in the push to make the community colleges a feeder system for
us. He found his only real joy presently was an approaching retirement.
Senator
Williams noted that the decision to have
students make educational decisions early in their careers was not always
wise. There are developmental issues for this, and asking 18-year old students
to make life-long decisions may cause some problems. Transfer students often
were ignorant of what a major is.
Cherny recognized this point and affirmed
that many students not only do not know what “a” major is, they do not know
what “their” major is. But they do need to know a bit about what they want
to do. The financial issues a major influence regarding the declaration of
a major, and will not simply disappear. As a state institution, we are faced
with the issue that if we don’t do something about it, it will be worse. California has one of the lowest college graduation
rates in country. We need to do better and while we do not have the money
to do so, we still need to try.
Statewide
Senator Gregory felt compelled
to note that as a statewide senator she had anticipated every question raised in discussion so far, and observed that our culture
has now functionally pushed adolescence into one’s thirties. She asserted
that the concerns expressed had been represented statewide.
AGENDA ITEM #4 -- REPORT—GAIL WHITAKER—DEAN,
COLLEGE of EXTENDED LEARNING—MOVING ACADEMIC PROGRAMS to SELF SUPPORT: POLICY
& PROCEDURE
Chair
Edwards noted a conversation now taking
place on many campuses about moving programs to self-support, and reducing
dependence on the general fund.
Dean
Whitaker wanted to make four major points.
These were to highlight some important features of current senate policy,
identify what programs would be the best candidates for self support, and
then discuss the implications for faculty and for students.
Dean
Whitaker noted that policy #F98-204, the
current policy, applies not just to degree programs,
but also to credential and certificate programs. Secondly, she noted that
the intent of the policy was that colleges and departments would maintain
leadership of their programs, regardless of whether they are held through
general fund or self-support. The quality assurance should always come back
to the faculty.
The policy
provides instructions on developing the content and format of the proposal,
as well as the role of CEL, which is predominantly
administrative, supportive, clerical, facilities, etc. Whitaker urged chairs or deans with potential
proposals to consult with CEL about procedures and
get the right information.
This
program is targeting students who would be willing to pay more for a given
program and this would mean taking a look at the current job market, entry
level salaries, etc. The program would
not necessarily be a subsidized set of programs, unless there was an outside
funder to provide support.
Good
candidates would include programs that allow students to be grouped and moved
through the program as a cohort, which provides a better learning environment.
Good candidates are ones with little entanglement with other programs. Free
standing programs make a better fit. Finally, proposed business plans should
be competitively priced.
For faculty,
there may be various ways for compensation, depending on their appointment.
Tenure-track faculty in a given program can teach on a casual basis in CEL,
but if the whole program moves to self support, we need another alternative.
We need to move the faculty member on general fund support in their department
and college so that self-support funds the faculty member. We can do that
with tenure-track faculty in permanent positions. If faculty
are lecturers it depends on their appointment. Often CEL
faculty are outside the regular collective bargaining agreement and do not
get entitlements, etc.
Implications
for students include regular standards for admission, being admitted at the
beginning of a course of study, being coded differently although matriculated,
and they would be tracked differently and not considered in FTES. Otherwise
special session students might be booted from Touch Tone, etc.
As for
financial aid, there is not much for graduate students; however, alternative
loans might be available. Since undergraduates would not pay regular fees
they would be ineligible for regular financial aid, but PELL grants might
be a possibility.
Senator
Jerris spoke as a Business faculty member
and noted that his college had planned to remove themselves from the general
fund to the tune of $2.3 million. He wanted to know whether that proposal
would come through the senate. He also wanted to know whether CEL would pick up the advertising costs when launching a new
program. Also, he wanted to know if a program went on self support, and those
students would not count for FTES, how the college would manage to make up
their “missing” FTES.
Whitaker responded that she had spoken with
the CoB Dean, and that some Business programs were
good candidates for self support. CEL would handle
any advertising. As for FTES, the college target would change and the college
would alter their response accordingly.
State
Senator Gregory sought to have
the self-support FAQs in written form, and gave
credit to Whitaker when Chair of
FAC. She expressed serious concerns about lecturer employment
and moving faculty from general fund to self support.
Whitaker responded that there was the policy
and Executive Order, and was optimistic in finding ways to make it work. She
was not optimistic that so many would be able to make their programs self-supporting.
She was not expecting a flood.
State
Senator Gregory understood the
policy and Executive Order and would expect further faculty involvement.
Senator
Heiman addressed informal talk about making
courses available only to those who could pay for them, part of a widely perceived
corporatization of education, a real worry. He observed
a tension between educational missions and access, and asked if Whitaker could speak to this issue.
Whitaker thought it necessary to separate
out tasks and processes. The policy would apply in the case of duplicate programs,
but also when a program could no longer be supported by the general fund.
A whole tangle of issues needed to be sorted out with the dean to come up
with a general agreement.
Senator
Heiman noted that one concern was that
an incentive to teach in CEL would play havoc in
the program if the elite jobs were to occur only in special programs. This
elite group would not then be providing education to the campus’ main market.
Whitaker spoke to the move of the MBA program
- it should not be run on overtime.
Senator
Langbort indicated that previously faculty
had not been able to get release time and this would save some lecturers’
jobs. She wondered if any consideration had been given to Open University
students who could take regular courses, and whether regular students could
then take CEL courses.
Whitaker responded that this would be considered
outside of cohort programs.
Senator
Pong questioned whether each program could
have different fees, and who would decide that.
Whitaker responded that the fees would be
variable. Fees needed to cover expenses plus figure in indirect costs, the
number of students and number of courses. Every program would have an MOU and contract, which would specify how the money would
flow.
Senator
Pong asked if students would get the same
privileges.
Whitaker responded that currently there
are not a large number of students in these programs, but they did have library
rights. For programs moving completely off the general fund, library funds
would be needed to be accounted for in the business plan.
AGENDA ITEM #5 - RECOMMENDATION
from the ACADEMIC POLICIES COMMITTEE - REVISION to the UNIVERSITY’S GRADE APPEAL PRACTICES and PROCEDURES
APC
Chair Meredith noted the earlier
healthy discussion, and asked for clarification regarding second reading.
Chair
Edwards indicated this was a time that
amendments could be entertained.
Senator
Williams expressed discomfort that a student
would not be represented on the panel and suggested an amendment. He proposed
having a non-voting student member on the panel, with access to any information.
Meredith asked who would appoint the student.
Senator
Williams asked for input from Senator
Gerson Chair of SAC.
Senator
Gerson read a prepared statement from
SAC that indicated that SAC believed that issues of fundamental fairness would
be better served if a student served on the panel, the advantages of this
far outweighing any drawbacks. A student representative could act as advocate,
lend an alternative voice, and render the whole process less intimidating
to the grievant.
The disadvantages
appear to be more logistical, and SAC suggested the following:
- The student representative
should not be made a permanent position.
- The selection of the student
representative would conform to the general norms of arbitrations.
- The petitioner would submit
the names of three students to the Chair or Dean, who would then select
one of the nominees within five calendar days.
- After receipt, the names would
be delivered to the petitioner and the representative.
- If the Chair/Dean had any objection
to all the nominees, this could only happen within five days.
- The petitioner could then elect
to nominate three additional students to the Dean/Chair in writing within
10 days.
- The Dean/Chair would then select
a nominee from this second list.
At
all times, the faculty and the Dean/Chair would need to disclose any conflict
of interest to the petitioner. In the event of any controversy/conflict should
arise at this point, the student could opt to bring the matter to the appropriate
administrative level, i.e., the Office of the Provost.
The student
nominees should be from the class where the petitioner received the deficiency
or a major in the discipline under which the class is generated.
In order
to protect the privacy and confidentiality of the matter, the petitioner would
execute a waiver of privacy, in writing to be kept as a permanent part of
the file. Conversely, the student representative would also execute a non-disclosure
statement, with University Counsel providing the appropriate forms.
Meredith indicated that this would not be
accepted as friendly amendment.
Gerson moved the amendment, seconded by
Steier.
Senator
and Chair of FAC Jerris
spoke against the amendment, indicating that FAC
felt unanimously that faculty alone have the right to assign grades, and that
the final determination is done by faculty. Students do not belong in deliberations
about grades.
Meredith indicated that APC had sought the advice of the University Counsel and that
this was reflected in the proposed policy. As for the amendment, he thought
the means by which a student representative was selected was still insufficiently
clear.
Senator
Williams indicated that the theory of
postmodernism allowed for student involvement, and pointed out that this process
was an unusual circumstance, with very few situations every year. He suggested
that it was important to respect that adding a student representative might
have significance.
Steier observed that AAUP is not a neutral organization. He was not keen on having
students see his own flaws but they could. It seemed clearly the case that
it was possible for a professor to make a mistake, have it pointed out and
rectified.
Senator
Vaughn noted that at the University of California, Berkeley three student representatives were
required on such committees. She thought it necessary to have more details
and would need to know what limits there were to the process.
State
Senator Gregory observed that AAUP policy on grading was directed against the excesses of
administrators, not students. Past practice on our own campus did involve
students, although rarely. She saw no need to imitate UCB.
State
Senator Cherny thought it necessary
to see the proposed amendment in writing, and that the senate needed to delay
consideration on this item until the next meeting.
State
Senator Cherny moved to delay consideration
to next meeting to hear the written amendment by SAC.
Cherny Chelberg m/s/p to postpone discussion until April 27th.
AGENDA ITEM #6 - RECOMMENDATION
from the EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE - RESOLUTION on BLOCKING SPAM
Senator
Carrington had two comments, the first
concerned with the apparently flippant language of the resolution, which he
did not feel was appropriate for the topic. He expressed deep concern about
IT individuals making the decisions about the criteria for screening email.
He thought that there were issues of scholarship in areas such as sexuality
studies where IT criteria would be inappropriate.
AVP
Rood replied that spam takes up
huge amounts of resources, and that campus needed to handle this. He had confidence
in the ability to address individual problems, but thought that the resource
drain was paramount.
State
Senator Gregory apologized for
not revising the resolution. She suggested deleting the mention of media outlets,
and that perhaps faculty oversight should be delegated to ETAC.
Senator
Vaughn supported the sentiment of resolution,
but pointed out that it did not outline any process.
Senator
Williams expressed concern with IT solutions
and was not sure why sexuality studies faculty should need to give extra search
terms to campus for purposes of customizing spam protection. He was worried
about disenfrancishisement of this group.
Senator
Vaughn desired to see this discussion
expanded to include students and staff.
Senator
Ulasewicz asked if this meant blocking
spam for students and faculty. She expressed concern about the time necessary
to deal with spam, and felt concern for the students as well.
AVP
Rood indicated that the majority
of comments he received were about the need for aggressive spam suppression.
Senator
Meredith wanted to know if the blockage
had to be university wide.
Rood responded that currently the answer
was yes. Alternatives might be possible but these would require commercial
software at an added expense.
Senator
Mak observed that the federal government
allowed the use of a “do not call” list for telephone marketing, and wanted
to know if that were possible on this campus for spam.
Rood responded that the best solution
was legislation.
Senator
Mak asked if there was a spam registry.
Rood responded that this was possible
only with new commercial software.
Senator
Heiman asked for clarification of what
was being blocked and saw odds in favor of spam blockage.
Rood spoke to highest level spam blockage.
Senator
Carrington asked if it was currently possible
for those using email software to forward or delete spam, and what efforts
were being made to send how to the campus.
Rood responded that email coming in
would still be a burden, even if individual decisions were made locally. He
thought we had a major problem with the sheer volume of spam and that he was
getting the majority of comments about riddance.
State
Senator Cherny asked about the
technical nature of spam filtering and servers.
Rood clarified the situation, and indicated
that one major server handles all incoming mail.
Senator
Steier observed that he belonged
to a number of political and film groups that generate high spam scores, and
asked how certain emails could receive high spam scores.
Rood responded that the combination
was not set by SFSU but by the open source program “spam assassin” which included
a number of criteria. The formulas written were technical, and included not
just words or phrases, but other indicators that identified spam.
Senator
Mak did not use Eudora or Outlook and
had virus worries.
AGENDA ITEM #7 - RECOMMENDATION
from the EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE - PROPOSED RESOLUTION on REVENUE ENHANCEMENT
Chelberg, Carrington m/s
Chelberg
supported this with recognition that the resolution was urging other sources
of revenue. He recognized that we were still in treacherous waters and that
this had direct impact on business here and our general fund.
State
Senator Gregory mentioned that
the resolved clauses involve consideration of social issues and was urging
citizens to play the role they should be playing.
State
Senator Cherny commented that the
Wall Street Journal had compiled a list of state taxation and that California ranked 26th in the nation.
Senator
Suzuki asked regarding the last resolution
clause if there was any reason not to forward the resolution to the Governor.
Meredith, Steier m/s/p to 2nd reading.
Senator
Williams asked to have the friendly amendment
added to the final resolve clause so that the resolution would also be sent
to the Governor.
Palmer, Houlberg m/s/p
AGENDA ITEM #10—Adjournment— 4:00 p.m.