Minutes of the University Senate, Wednesday, 12 May 2010
Present:
G. Baitinger, T. Bars, J. Bonine, C. Bybee, A. Emami, H.
Gangadharbatla, M. Henney, A. Hilts, J. Hurwit, M.A. Hyatt, M. Jaeger,
C. Jones, D. Kennett, P. Keyes, R. Kyr, A. Laskaya, K. Lenn, H. Lin, C.
McNelly, S. Midkiff, D. Olson, N. C. Phillips, M. Price, L.
Reichardt, Z. Stark-Macmillan T. K. Thompson, N. Tublitz, T.
Toadvine, L. Van Dreel, S. Verscheure, P. Walker, M. Williams
Excused: N. Gower, H. Khalsa, L. Middlebrook, T. Minner,
Absent: C. Bengtson, A.
Berenstein, , S. Chakraborty, E, Chan, K. Dellabough, T. Dishion, C.
Ellis, L. Forrest, K. Jensen, , J. Piger, N. Proudfoot, P. Southwell, ,
L. Sugiyama, P. Warnek,
CALL TO ORDER
University Senate President Nathan Tublitz called the regular meeting
of the University Senate for May 12, 2010 to order at 3:05 p.m. in the
Harrington Room of the Jaqua Center.
APPROVAL OF THE MINUTES
Minutes of the April 14, 2010 senate meeting were approved as distributed.
EXECUTIVE SESSION (Senate members only – no recordings)
Senate President Nathan Tublitz moved the meeting to Executive Session
at 3:09 p.m. for the purpose of discussing candidates for the
University’s Distinguished Service Award. The session was
adjourned at 3:25 p.m. and the regular meeting resumed at 3:30.
President Tublitz reminded everyone that the meeting is again being
recorded and streamed live by video.
STATE OF THE UNIVERSITY
Remarks from University President Richard Lariviere. The
president spoke about a newly released White Paper on a proposed new
funding model for the University of Oregon. He explained that a
website was created to give individuals an opportunity to comment and
exchange views of the proposal with others via the blog at the
website. The White Paper represents the university’s best
thinking regarding the changing relationship with the state relevant to
historic low levels of state funding (now at 9% ). He indicated
the proposal has three purposes: to start a conversation to change the
UO’s relationship with the state for governance, funding, and
accountability. Continuing, the president said the university
wants its own board of regents and the ability to govern itself through
that appointed board. Further, the university wants the state to
commit to subsidizing the university at its current funding level
(approximately $65 million) for the next 30 years by means of servicing
the debt on a $ 1 billion bond the university would incur, managed as
an endowment, and matched dollar-for-dollar with money raised by the
university through private sector fundraising. Lastly, the
university wants an accountability conversation with the state in which
it is made clear what the state wants from the university, that is,
shifting the conversation to a discussion of what the state and
university think is important.
The president opined that he has confidence in the proposal, saying to
the state that here is our idea of how to preserve the university as a
top level public university, and if not this idea, then what is the
state’s idea. He asked for feedback and input from faculty
regarding the White Paper over the new few weeks.
During a series of questions, the president made clear that he is
proposing that the UO have its own board of governors appointed, in
part, by the governor. There will be 15 members: 7 voting members
appointed by the governor, 1 voting member from the U of O Foundation,
1 voting member from the Board of Higher Education, 3 voting members
chosen by the board itself, and 3 non-voting ex-officio members
consisting of the president, a student, and a faculty member. The
board would be approved by the state legislature (the senate).
The board would coordinate with the Higher Education Board to approve
new degree plans, and the board of governors would pay attention to the
UO and its problems and issues.
The president acknowledged that it would be a difficult campaign to
pass the proposal; the primary feedback to date from the legislators is
concern that if they approve this proposal for the UO, then what about
the other institutions in the system. Further, the bonding effort
would have some impact on the state’s budget capacity. However,
by bonding, the UO would not ask for any more money from the state for
30 years beyond the current funding level each of the 30 years which
would pay for the debt service on the bond. The president also
stated his preference for the U of O Foundation to manage the bonds and
funds raised privately because they have a very good track
record. But the state may not be comfortable having the UO
Foundation as manager, and this would need to be negotiated.
President Lariviere concluded his comments by saying the other OUS
institutions are devising plans similar in focus in various degrees;
Portland State has its own White Paper and set of suggestions, we are
still waiting to hear from Oregon State, and Western Oregon has plans
that they have not yet presented, while the other regional universities
are watching to see what happens.
NEW BUSINESS
Confer Degrees. Ms. Heather Bottorff, business, and chair of the Academic Review Committee moved to confer degrees as follows:
Moved that,
the
Senate of the University Oregon recommends that the Oregon State Board
of Higher Education confer upon those persons names are included on the
official degree list, as compiled and certified by the University
Registrar for the academic year 2009-2010 and Summer Session for 2010,
the degree in which they have completed all requirements.
The motion passed unanimously by voice vote.
Preliminary Spring 2010 Curriculum Report.
Committee on Courses Chairman Paul Engelking, chemistry, provided
several revisions to the preliminary report distributed earlier.
To a question regarding “administrative actions” noted in the report,
Mr. Engelking clarified the term administrative action is used in
reference to changes made by department; the term allows the
departmental changes to be recorded and codified in the report.
The items included have been approved by the department and then the
committee approves, so they are part of the overall curriculum
process.
President Tublitz brought the Spring Curriculum Report, with amendments
and corrections as noted, to a vote. The report passed, as
amended. (For the final amended version of the Spring Curriculum report
see http://www.uoregon.edu/~uosenate/dirsen090/Spring2010FinalReport.pdf.)
Committee on Committees nominations and election.
The Senate Nominating Committee presented the following slate of
nominees for election to the Committee on Committees: Shaul Cohen,
geography, Eric Mentzel, music, David Tyler, chemistry, and Lisa
Wolverton, history. The slated of candidates met with unanimous
approval.
As a follow-up to a previous meeting’s legislation to create an ad hoc
Committee on Academic Freedom, President Tublitz announced the
following people have agreed to serve on this committee: Carl Bybee,
journalism and committee chair; Heather Briston, University Archivist;
Franklin Stahl, biology emeritus; Jean Stockard, PPPM; Theodore Ko
Thompson, classified staff representative; Debra Thurman, officers of
administration representative, a student (TBA); and a Law School
representative on a consultant basis (TBA). The president asked
for approval of the committee, which was accepted unanimously.
List of Nominations for University Committee appointments.
President Tublitz asked Vice President Peter Keyes to preside over the
meeting while he presented, on behalf of the Committee on Committees,
the list of nominees recommended to the University President for
appointment to university committees (see http://www.uoregon.edu/~uosenate/dirsen090/CoCAppointmentRoster2010_2011r20100507.pdf
for full list of recommended appointments). President Tublitz
commented on the success of the on-line solicitation for committee
service preferences and thanked webmaster Marilyn Skalberg for her
excellent work on the project. Vice President Keyes asked for a
voice vote to confirm the list of recommended nominees which met with
unanimous approval.
Motion US09/10-17 to disband the Child Care and Family Services Committee.
On behalf of the Committee on Committees, President Tublitz moved to
disband the Child Care and Family Services Committee on the advice and
request from members of that committee.
Moved that,
The University Senate moves to disband the Child Care and Family Support Committee effective immediately.
Committee Chair Karen Logvin explained that her committee instigated
disbanding the committee because a separate committee structure is no
longer needed to promote issues surrounding child care and family
services. Other suitable and further reaching venues now exist on
campus to raise and address issues related to child care and family
services, and the committee’s usefulness was no longer apparent thus
interest in attending meetings has fallen off sharply in recent
years. A broad range of committee members agreed that disbanding
the committee was appropriate.
Vice President Keyes brought the motion to a vote which passed unanimously (see http://www.uoregon.edu/~uosenate/dirsen090/US090-17.html for background information).
Motion US09/10-7 – to establish a senate public records review committee.
Mr. Bill Harbaugh, economics, moved the following motion to establish a
means of improving faculty access to university information (seconded
by Chris Phillips):
Moved that,
Since
shared governance requires shared access to information, the Senate
establishes a three person "Transparency Committee" with the following
charge, membership, and reporting:
Charge:
The Committee shall;
a)
Review UO's procedures regarding access to public records and financial
information, and evaluate the effectiveness of those procedures. The
Senate requests that the administration give the committee free and
unfettered access to a listing of public records requests and their
status, and to any reports by the UO public records officer to the
administration regarding public records.
b) Accept and
review complaints from faculty, staff, or students regarding access to
public records and financial information, and make suggestions to the
UO public records officer and President's office on resolving such
complaints.
Membership:
Voting: 3 tenured faculty members, not more than 2 from CAS, not more than 1 from any 1 other college.
Ex officio non-voting member: UO Public Records Officer (currently Doug Park, GC's office).
Reporting:
The committee shall make a written
report to the Senate once a year describing the state of access to
public records and financial information and describing any complaints
and their resolution.
During a discussion period when questioned about the membership, Mr.
Harbaugh explained that the membership was limited to tenured faculty
members because some issues may be contentious or confidential, such as
personnel records, and tenured faculty are protected. In a
similar vein, Senator John Bonine, law, asked whether meetings of the
proposed “Transparency Committee” would be open meetings. He
expressed concern if the committee meetings were closed.
President Tublitz interjected that, generally, campus committee
meetings are open to the campus community. Senator Bonine went on
to suggest that the committee likely would not have access to
confidential personnel records, thus the committee meeting should be
open. He suggested amending the motion to add: “c.) Hold only open meetings”.
This change was agreeable to the maker of the motion and the text was
added to the motion. President Tublitz noted that beginning with
the next academic year, he intends to have all meetings of committees
posted on the senate web site to promote greater awareness of committee
meeting schedules.
Two other discussion points raised were that it was unusual to have a
named individual listed in legislation, and also that the length of
service on the committee was not provided. A motion was made
(second Phillips) to amend the main motion by striking the
parenthetical text “(currently Doug Park, GC's office)” related to the
ex-officio non-voting member, and also adding: “d.) Have terms of appointment for two years, staggered.” This amendment was put to a vote and passed unanimously.
Lastly, the discussion came to a close when it was clarified that, as a
university committee reporting to the senate, other members could be
added in the future using the same procedures for changing membership
used by all university committees, that is, by request to the Committee
on Committees and approval by the senate. President
Tublitz put motion US09/10- 7 establishing a public records review
committee, as amended, to a vote which passed unanimously. The
final version of US09/10-7 reads:
Moved that,
Since
shared governance requires shared access to information, the Senate
establishes a three person "Transparency Committee" with the following
charge, membership, and reporting:
Charge:
The Committee shall;
a.) Review UO's procedures
regarding access to public records and financial information, and
evaluate the effectiveness of those procedures. The Senate requests
that the administration give the committee free and unfettered access
to a listing of public records requests and their status, and to any
reports by the UO public records officer to the administration
regarding public records.
b.) Accept and review
complaints from faculty, staff, or students regarding access to public
records and financial information, and make suggestions to the UO
public records officer and President's office on resolving such
complaints.
c.) Hold only open meetings.
d.) Have terms of appointment for two years, staggered.
Membership:
Voting: 3 tenured faculty members, not more than 2 from CAS, not more than 1 from any 1 other college.
Ex officio non-voting member: UO Public Records Officer.
Reporting:
The committee shall make a written
report to the Senate once a year describing the state of access to
public records and financial information and describing any complaints
and their resolution.
Notice of Motion US09/10-19 regarding facility use policy.
Senior Vice Provost for Academic Affairs Russ Tomlin gave notice that
he intends to bring a motion to the senate that is a companion piece to
the motion regarding freedom of inquiry, and which addresses use of
campus facilities (see http://www.uoregon.edu/~uosenate/dirsen090/US090-19.html).
Vice Provost Tomlin noted that there have been some issues on campus
regarding how individuals or various groups have access to the use of
the university’s facilities. With a request from the provost, a
small working group reviewed policies on the matter and found a
considerable amount of scattered information that was often unclear,
out-of-date, and otherwise problematic regarding who and how people can
use campus facilities for meetings and events. The proposed
revised policy has been posted on the provost’s website and Senate
website, has received feedback regarding the policy, and suggestions
have been incorporated in the policy now posted; it focuses on the
nature of the university’s recognition of entities involved in the
requested event or meeting and how to manage facility use. The
policy proposes establishing a university scheduler that will be the
designee of the provost to serve as an overall coordinator of
university facility use. The facilities would have locally
managed spaces with a local coordinator and would be coordinated
through the university scheduler for those local events. The vice
provost concluded his remarks by saying the plan is to have the policy
approved and operational fall term 2010.
Senator Bonine requested that Vice Provost Tomlin provide a web posting
indicating what changes to existing policies are proposed so that
senators can more readily compare the previous policy(ies) with the
proposed new policy. Mr. Tomlin replied that he would do
that. Senator Ted Toadvine, environmental studies, asked who
would ultimately make the decision to cancel an event or meeting.
Mr. Tomlin answered that the local manager or scheduler could make that
decision; if there is something problematic about the request, the
university (provost or vice president for finance and administration)
could intervene for the final decision.
Senator Bonine expressed concern that when looking at policies on the
web, there is no indication that the senate had anything to do with the
policy or the legislation that prompted it. He gave notice that
he would make a motion at the next meeting requesting that items in the
policy library specify the type of policy; that is, policy generated by
senate legislation or by the administration, and that it be clearly
identified with signatures of the adopters (see http://www.uoregon.edu/~uosenate/dirsen090/US090-21.html).
Further, he will request a PDF formatted copy showing the signatures of
approval of policies be archived and available for viewing.
President Tublitz acknowledged Senator Bonine’s notice of motion for
the May 26th meeting.
REPORTS
Undergraduate Council – grade inflation report.
Undergraduate Council Chairman Ian McNeely, history, provided an
outline of a preliminary report reflecting discussions in the
Undergraduate Council this past year on the topic of the UO culture and
grade inflation. The report outlined information regarding a
study of grade inflation (2006), other problems with the grade culture,
guiding principle of the Undergraduate Council, proposals made,
feedback received, and a sample of issues raised so far. The
outline reads as follows:
Study of grade inflation (2006)
- Sample of regularly offered UO courses in a range of disciplines and levels, 1992-2004
- Percentage of As went up 10 points, percentage of As + Bs went up 7 points
- Average UO GPA went up by 5%; average high school GPA also went up by 5%
- SAT-M rose only slightly, SAT-V not at all
- UO comparable to other flagship state universities
Other problems with grade culture
- Compression at the top
- Discrepancies across departments
- Migration from “hard” to “easy” classes & majors
- “Grade grubbing” and anxiety over GPAs
- General loss of meaning
- Increased reliance on standardized testing, “assessment rubrics”
UGC guiding principles
- Respect instructors’ freedom and disciplinary differences
- Do not put the students at a disadvantage
- First act locally to improve the culture, then consider contacts beyond UO
- Provide information and start conversations rather than dictate deflationary solutions
Proposals
- #1: Discipline-specific grading standards
- #2: Comparative statistics for instructors
- #3: Contextual information on transcripts (e.g. %As)
Feedback
- UO leadership
- Departments
- ASUO Senate
- Blog (http://gradeculture.uoregon.edu), email address (ugcproposals@uoregon.edu)
- Digest of confidential emails to Senate President
- Town halls
Sample issues raised so far
- UO should not “deflate” unilaterally
- Generate statistical comparisons across departments
- GTFs pressured, overworked, inconsistent, untrained
- Faculty (especially new faculty) grade in a vacuum
- Lax/inconsistent use of the A+
- Contextual information will hurt students, make inflation worse
- Recommend university-wide targets for Gen Ed courses
- Grades are an obstacle to true learning and knowledge
Mr. McNeely indicated that a full report would be forthcoming and that
the listed items were simply highlights of the council’s
discussions. A few senators commented on the information asking
several questions: if the number of A’s went up, did the other grades
go down; are there some classes that students flock to (because of
inflated grade results); and how grading policies are influenced by
scholarship pressures to maintain certain grade levels. Mr.
McNeely answered that some grades went down as A’s went up, but it was
not universal, and that there was not a lot of information regarding
students selecting classes on the basis of perceived (or real) grade
inflation, but the council is attempting to gather such
information. Further, Mr. McNeely acknowledged that some students
take “easy” classes to hedge the risk of losing a scholarship, but the
hope is that the council’s policies will be gradually implemented so
that students can adjust accordingly. Mr. McNeely asked that
senators review the report and provide feedback to the council.
ANNOUNCEMENTS AND COMMUNICATIONS FROM THE FLOOR
Spring 2010 election results for the University Senate and elected university committees.
The secretary thanked everybody who participated in the spring
elections as voters and/or candidates. The overall response rate
generated more candidates for various committees was higher this year
as was voter participation. Election results were emailed earlier
in the week to the campus community and are posted (at http://www.uoregon.edu/~uosenate/dirsen090/ResultsSpring2010FacultyStaffElections.pdf) on the senate webpage.
Report on non-smoking policy.
President Tublitz noted that a report on moving the campus toward a
non-smoking policy was now posted on the web (see item number 120,
Letter, at http://www.uoregon.edu/~uosenate/dirsen090/letters090.html). The letter is a follow-up of legislation passed last spring.
Secretary of the Faculty opening. President
Tublitz noted that the secretary is retiring in June and that people
interested in the position should contact him before the end of the
month. He also reminded senators of the extra senate meeting
scheduled for May 26th.
Notice of motion. Senator
Chris Phillips, mathematics, gave notice of motion that he intends to
introduce a motion that will ask IT services to provide a stronger
level of “spam” blocking, and added that he will try to have this
request managed without the need for senate legislation, if
possible.
Statutory Faculty Meeting.
Mr. Frank Stahl, biology emeritus, reminded the senators of the
importance of attending the Statutory Faculty meeting scheduled for
Wednesday, May 19th.
ADJOURNMENT
With no other business at hand, the meeting was adjourned at 5:04 p.m.
Gwen Steigelman
Secretary of the Faculty