Academic Senate Meeting
Minutes
February 8, 2006
Amended
Voting Members Present: Blue, Bohman, Cheever, Clark, D’Amore, Dowling, Erbe, Faraji, Fawver, Ferris, Ganezer, Gould, Han, Heinze-Balcazar, Herbert, Jacobs, Jones, Kaplan, Kowalski, Ma, Malamud, McClane, Moore, Newton, O’Connor, Pawar, Silvis, Sneed, Vanterpool and Zoerner.
Voting Members Absent: Butler, Christie, Ferrario, Frontela, Furtado, Gordon, Hollie, Johnson, Lewis, McCarthy, Papa, Park, Parker, Pu and Vasquez.
Ex-Officio Members Present: Bowman, Bradfield, Dote-Kwan, Gordon, M., Hohm, Maki, Pardon, Robles, Strong, Whetmore and Yao.
Guests: Betz, Bordinaro, Feuer, Lal, MacHarg, Martin, Niederman, Sanchez, and Wood.
Call to Order at 2:30p.m.
Approval of Agenda Approved M/S/P
Approval of Minutes Approved M/S/P
Chair’s Report-Blue reported that the Washington Center will be on campus next Tuesday. She asked faculty to have their students meet with them while they are here. The Washington Center is a great opportunity for students to serve as an intern in Washington D.C. and students can also receive University credit.
The President is at the Chancellor’s Office today and will not be able to join us for our meeting today.
There will be an emergency drill on February 21 at 4:30 p.m.
Parliamentarian Report-Blue reported that the Search Committee for the Vice President of Administration and Finance needs a faculty member to serve on the committee. Rudy Vanterpool was nominated and elected.
Second Reading Item
EPC 05-09 Revision of PM 98-02 Course Information/Syllabi-Jacobs introduced the resolution to the Senate. There was a discussion, #11 was added and #6 was changed from the previous version, and attendance requirements were added. Feuer said as a friendly amendment she would change #6 and change measurable to observable. There was discussion about measurable versus observable. Malamud said that part-time faculty are going to look at this and not even know what it’s about. Gould moved to change #6 to include the first phrase of the sentence and omit the second phrase containing the word measurable. There was a vote and 13 were in favor of the amendment and 2 were opposed to it. Malamud suggested omitting #4 and #11 because they are already in the University Catalogue, and it is confusing and redundant. Wood said that many students do not own a catalogue because of the expense. It was noted that the catalogue is available on the University Website for free. Malamud asked to withdraw his comments. Jacobs suggested adding the grading scale and the weight of assignments. Malamud said that there is a problem with the second and third paragraph being redundant. There was a vote to change #1 and the motion failed. The resolution passed MSP.
First Reading Item
EPC 05-08 Resolution on Required Minors
Jacobs presented the resolution to the Senate. Jacobs said that CSUDH is the only campus to require a minor and that the goal of this resolution would be to put the decision of whether to have a required minor or not into the hands of the individual programs. Moore said that the resolution is a revision to a previous PM on impact of minor with time to degree and impact of minor on programs. Jacobs put in a request to instructional research to get the data. Blue said that system wide CSUDH is the only campus that requires a minor. Many students do not declare a minor until they are almost ready to graduate and then they usually glob together what they have taken the most of rather than choose ahead of time what they want their minor to be. Rodney said that if the resolution passes it will impact the Theater Art Department because most of the programs in the department are minors, and many of the actors in our plays are pulled from the courses which are for minors. Wood said that we heard from Frontela last semester and she was a single field major but wanted a minor as well. Kaplan said that if the University does not require a minor students will not take a minor. Jacobs explained that it is not up to the students but the program as to whether they want to require a minor. Neiderman said that students are coming in from junior college with extra units they won’t be able to use toward the minor now, if this resolution passes. Blue said that was not true, students coming in from junior colleges only get to transfer 70 units and the brunt of those units are general education courses. Gould said that he would like to see data that shows how requiring the minor has affected students 10 years after they have graduated (did it make a difference in their lives?). Feuer said that she was concerned that the University would be in a race to the bottom eliminating units for the minor. Blue said that students will still be required to take the same amount of units; it was not a race to the bottom but a chance to give programs a choice as to what they would like. A program could use the extra 15 units and require students to take more courses within the major.
FPC 05-10 Policy on Cycle I and VI Tenure Track Working Personnel Action Files.
Dowling presented the resolution to the Senate. Whetmore wanted to remind the Senate that similar policy was passed by the Senate when he was the chair. Moore wanted to know how point #4 worked. Gould suggested that provisions be made at earlier levels for consultation with faculty members and revision of plan. Weber wanted clarification about what year in the cycle this would be for and Blue said that it was for year one. Blue asked about publishing that faculty have done prior to employment with the University and would that be included in the RTP process and Martin said that the RTP committee wants to look at what faculty have done since faculty have arrived at the University. Fawver mentioned that it would be nice to hear from the committee or the dean or whomever is involved…no one talked to her she just got a letter. The resolution will be taken back to FPC for more work.
Time Certain
2:45 p.m. Mark Seigle Summer Work Schedule Surveys-Seigle passed out the summer modified work schedule and wanted to get the Senates input as to whether there have been any problems. Malamud said that it was not relevant to what we do but it may affect our support staff. Seigle asked if it had been an adverse impact. Betz said that for 12 month employees in Student Health, Student Development, Library and Nursing there is a negative impact. Betz said that they feel this issue should be contracted with the union because there is a problem with ½ day on Fridays and longer days Monday through Thursday. The question was also raised if it was smart to close offices down given we have such an enrollment problem. Sanchez is a psychologist and said that her toddler was de-stabilized and that she did not get to see her child; the day care centers close at 6 p.m. which is hard on children and it forces them to be in daycare 10 to 12 hours a day. It forces older kids into the latch key situation. She said that her small children cannot wait until Friday afternoon to see me. Neiderman said that we all have an interest in how these issues affect our families as well as ourselves. Bordinaro said that there were many complaints from students and they did not like the library closing, also the library is dependent on their staff support. Seigle said that they had anticipated problems with day care for some and in those cases they do not have to do the modified schedule, but then there is the problem of being in a building or office all alone on a Friday afternoon (security issues). Yao said that there was a big issue the last two years of students wandering around on Friday afternoons looking for people to assist them. The other issue is that we have a serious enrollment problem and we should consider staying opened for our students. Feuer asked what the reasoning was behind the modified schedule and Seigle said it was a morale issue, there had been no raises and this is a way to let staff know that they are appreciated. Feuer said that we need to let students know they are appreciated. MacHarg wanted to reiterate Yao’s statement and also added that it was hard to conduct business with other faculty with no support staff. Dowling said that we have an obligation to serve students and that it should be left up to the units and managers to work out what is best. Gould said that the survey should go to the ASI for their input. Gordon said that Extended Ed is always receiving large numbers of students on Friday afternoons wanting assistance. MacHarg said that given the enormity of morale problems, it is not right to allow some staff to be off and not other staff members depending on where they work. Malamud wanted to know why it took the administration two years to ask our opinion.
EPC Report-Cathy Jacobs-None
FPC Report-Rod Butler-None
Statewide Senate-Rudy Vanterpool/Donn Silvis-Moved to Next Meeting
Vice Provost’s Report-Dote-Kwan gave a presentation to the Senate for Capacity FTES Analysis for Spring 2004, 2005, and 2006 and Enrollment Management Peer Review and totals for Applications, Admission Status, and Enrollment Yields, Fall 2001 to Fall 2006.
Open Forum-Amendment-David Bradfield spoke regarding: E-MAIL CENSORSHIP, FREE SPEECH, & ACADEMIC FREEDOM AT CSUDH-below is what he read to the senate:
Have you noticed the CFA Headlines are no longer being forwarded to the DH Email?
That's because on Jan. 12 the Administration issued a memorandum to CFA declaring that the "CFA HEADLINES must not be disseminated campus-wide via DH Email or any other medium, and must be restricted to the faculty listserv for electronic communications." (which does not exist)
The letter from the University alleged that the Jan. 5 Special Edition CFA Headlines engaged in political advocacy. This edition of "Headlines" was critical of the governor's State of the State speech. The University Administration did not cite which portions of the Jan. 5 Headlines were, in their opinion, "partisan." The memorandum also failed to cite any contractual, legal authority bases, or reasoning for the University's action. It did not cite which portions of the Jan. Headlines were, in their opinion, "partisan." They cited no contractual or legal basis for the University's position.
Criticizing the governor for his policies is not a "partisan" purpose. Clearly, some CSUDH administrator(s) are attempting to use their power to impose restrictions on any opinions they view as critical or contrary to their own.
This is an alarming attack on academic freedom and free speech at CSUDH. What the administration imposed is censorship, plain and simple.
The University Mission Statement says, "We are committed to quality and pluralism in higher education to further the goals of a democratic society through wide participation and civic responsibility in community, social, and economic affairs." In our opinion, with this action the administration appears to be operating in direct conflict with the campus mission statement.
Meeting Adjourned at 5:10 p.m.
Respectfully Submitted By
Mary Brooks, Chair’s Assistant Margaret Blue, Chair