Board Presentation 20 June 1997

President Aschkenasy, Members of the Board, Chancellor Cox

The Interinstitutional Faculty Senate held its June meeting at the Oregon Institute of Technology on the 6th and 7th of June.

The IFS began its investigation of faculty reviews but came to the conclusion that we need more information to develop an IFS stand on the issues. The following points are arising out of our discussion.

• All campuses in the system have annual pre-tenure reviews plus one or two major reviews before moving an assistant professor toward tenure.
• Those faculty hired at this level are mostly of strong promise, highly trained and highly recommended.
• The pre-tenure period is a time of intense overview
• Productivity in teaching and research is under close scrutiny.
• Even from this select population, those promoted and tenured must meet high standards of performance.
• It is a carefully screened group of professors that is then reviewed periodically after tenure is granted.
• Post-tenure reviews are conducted on all campuses at intervals of 3-5 years.
• The IFS is gathering further information before presenting a detailed report to the board with recommendations.
• A review of the effectiveness of the systems in
promoting strong faculty careers is planned.



The other major business of this meeting involved a resolution on benefits for domestic partners. The senators passed the following resolution:

RESOLUTION OF THE
INTERINSTITUTIONAL FACULTY SENATE

"We, the senators of the Interinstitutional Faculty Senate of the Oregon State System of Higher Education, hereby resolve that the Oregon State System of Higher Education seek to provide employment insurance benefits to the domestic partners and children of system employees in domestic partner relationships in the same fashion as is provided for married employees, and we respectfully request that the Oregon State Board of Higher Education and the Chancellor actively pursue and advocate for the timely extension of such employment insurance benefits with all public entities having jurisdiction in this matter including, but not necessarily limited to, the State Employees Benefits Board (SEBB), and the Oregon Legislative Assembly."

We would like the board to take note that all faculty now receive a lump sum which they allocate into the various categories of health insurance, life insurance and related benefits. The change in policy would simply allow employees to make choices that included domestic partners and would not increase the size of the fund available for allocation. This change in policy should not produce a change in the funding of employee benefits.