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FACULTY SENATE
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MINUTES
FACULTY SENATE
THE UNIVERSITY OF ARIZONA®
Once approved, these
minutes may be accessed electronically at:
http://fp.arizona.edu/senate/minutes.htm
Visit the faculty governance webpage at:
http://fp.arizona.edu/senate/
CORRECTED
1. CALL TO ORDER
The meeting was called to order by Vice Chair of the Faculty Robert P. Mitchell at 3:02 p.m. in the College of Law, Room 140.
Present: Senators, Bergsma, Burd, Christenson, Conway, Corcoran, Cuello, Dahlgran, G. Davis, O. Davis, Green, Gruener, Hertzog, Howell, Jones, Kiefer, Marchalonis, McKee, Mitchell, Mitchneck, Murdaugh, Mutchler, Nolan, Pavao-Zuckerman, Pintozzi, Ranger-Moore, San Martin, Sarid, Schlager, Sebesta, Shelton, Smith, Songer, Spece, Sterling, Thorn, Ulreich, Willerton and Witte. C. Nagata substituted for B. Rodl. Robert Sankey served as Parliamentarian.
Absent: Senators Bruce, Chandler, Cromwell, Cusanovich, D. Davis, Estrada, Hildebrand, Jenkins, Joens, Mountford, Rodl, Ruiz, Salazar, Silverman, St. John, Strittmatter, Tabor, Tatman, Weinand and Zizza
2. OPEN SESSION
There were no speakers for the Open Session.
3. REPORTS
3A. ASUA President Erin Hertzog
ASUA President Hertzog reported that ASUA sent an electronic survey on textbooks to faculty on Thursday and she urged faculty members to complete it so the results will be complete and accurate. ASUA and Regent Gary Stuart are co-hosting a gala event, “An Evening of Enrichment” on Friday, April 27th at the Courtyard Marriott. The event will be business-casual with wine, appetizers and desserts and will include entertainment, a silent auction and a video about the high cost of textbooks. The funds raised will go for textbook scholarships. Arizona Students Association is still trying to push some of the stalled Legislative bills to increase financial aid and funding for the University. ASUA hopes to create a video to educate legislators about the issue of financial aid. They hope to include interviews from some college-bound students and parents in the lower-income school districts in Tucson. ASUA has hired a company to produce the video quickly so it can be shown at the press conference during Education Day of an upcoming Campaign Against Poverty week. About 200 invitations have been sent to potential speakers for a panel for this event, including every national Presidential candidate. The increased information technology fee is on ABOR agenda for this Thursday. ASUA/GPSC has submitted a proposal for a $21 increase.
GPSC President Paul Thorn described that GPSC is looking for funding to hire a permanent in-staff coordinator to help with things like institutional memory problems and training elected officers in basic administrative tasks. The Dean of Students office has promised to provide some funding but GPSC is continuing to seek more. In the next few weeks, GPSC is going to conduct a workload survey of graduate teaching and research assistants. GPSC is also looking at UA’s peer institutions to determine whether it is common practice to fund tuition waivers for graduate assistants through increases in the Employee Related Expense dollars. Burdening the ERE will increase, too, as GPSC continues to search for a better health insurance plan that includes prescription benefits.
Vice Chair of the Faculty Robert Mitchell reminded senators that the Senate will not meet in Law 146 until May due to a class scheduling conflict. He advised Senators to watch the packets for the room location. High weekend winds caused a tree limb to fall onto the power line at the Faculty Center, so the office is without power and staff are currently working offsite. It is hoped that TEP will restore the power by Tuesday afternoon. Vice Chair Mitchell called Senators’ attention to an information item from the Office of Curriculum in today’s packets entitled, “Guiding Principle on the Application of Graduate or Undergraduate Policies.” On senators’ desks today are the results of the Primary Faculty election that ended on March 2. The faculty officers congratulate the reelected and new senators and thank everyone for their continuing participation in the shared governance process. The faculty Bylaws stipulate that a runoff election must be conducted for the Strategic Planning and Budget Advisory Committee if more than four are nominated. This runoff election, as well as the election for Committee on Committees which was undersubscribed in the first election, will take place online from March 19-March 30. Today’s packets also include the Faculty Senate meeting schedule for next year, although the Law College’s renovation plan makes it uncertain where the Senate will actually meet next year. Chair Mitchell reminded the Senate that it has one more honorary degree to consider today so he will excuse all non-senators at 4:45 p.m. Finally, he advised the Senate that at the May 7 meeting the elections will take place for the Committee on Conciliation, the University Committee on Ethics and Commitment, the University Hearing Board, as well as for the Senate’s representative to the Senate Executive Committee, the Shared Governance Review Committee, and the Senate Committee on Budget and Strategic Planning. Senators interested in running for the last three committees are invited to submit a brief bio statement to the Faculty Center by April 15, 2007.
Provost Davis reported that Dean Marie Swanson of the College of Public Health will step down as dean and is going to the University of Indiana-Indianapolis to serve in a faculty position. She made this decision based, in part, on her brother’s health issues. Provost Davis met with the Dean’s Council and the Chair of the shared governance faculty committee in the college about a month ago to discuss challenges and opportunities and interim leadership for the college and to solicit names of potential interim deans. The Provost’s leadership team is helping to determine the finalists and the college itself will be provided with presentations from the final candidates. Once an Interim Dean is in place, President Shelton will then proceed with a national search. Provost Davis has also been working to describe the position/personnel characteristics to replace the IT Chief Information Officer. Provost Davis has been conducting 36 budget hearings with input from all of the colleges and academic support units with assistance from the Provost’s Leadership Team (PLT) which includes Gene Sander, the Vice President for Outreach; Leslie Tolbert, the Vice President for Research; Andrew Comrie, Dean of the Graduate College; Jacqueline Mok, Vice Provost for Programs; Jerry Hogle, Vice Provost for Instruction; Juan Garcia, Vice Provost for Academic Affairs. The individuals on the PLT are looking at different areas of the received information, for example: Andrew Comrie looking at interdisciplinary education; Leslie Tolbert looking at the research and economic development dimensions; and Jerry Hogle looking at the learning environments, enrollments and student credits hours. Joel Valdez, Dick Roberts, Ed Frisch, J. Mok and Provost Davis will now be reporting to President Shelton and then will report to SPBAC on March 21st. Then J. Valdez and Provost Davis will present one or more proposals to the Finance Committee about how the $10M can best be cut and reallocated and then President Shelton will make the final decision by the end of March.
3E. President Robert N. Shelton
President Shelton advised the Senate that the mandatory fees will be set at the Regents’ meeting this week. He has recommended a $35.00 increase in the Technology fee plus the $15.00 library fee for a total of $50.00. The Regents will also be discussing the implementation of Proposition 300. It appears that most students receiving financial aid who have completed the FAFSA are already verified at the federal level, so only about 12,000 continuing students will have to go through a process to verify Arizona residency, along with new freshmen entering in the fall. President Shelton commended Provost Davis on his herculean effort to gather input from all areas on the reallocation decisions. President Shelton has been spending quite a bit of time in Phoenix meeting one-on-one with senators and representatives and he thanked the students for their efforts to lobby and inform the legislators about issues of higher education. He described his outlook as one of “wary optimism” that the message of the importance of education to the future of Arizona is getting through. He said he has been asked by some legislative leaders to look for a different mechanism or approach to funding higher education that focuses on something other than the usual growth or size funding formulas. He’s been asked to propose a method that would factor quality into the UA’s continuation budget rather than arguing for decision packages that focus on our priorities and quality. The goal is to have a new approach by next fall to go before the legislature in January 2008. President Shelton recently spoke to the Association of Governing Boards in Phoenix about the importance of quality versus size, emphasizing that when a student graduates and is prepared to compete in the career path, no one is going to reflect on the size of their alma mater, but rather on the quality of their education. President Shelton thanked the faculty for the input on finding a successor for Provost Davis. He has written a personal message to all of the AAU presidents, the Pac-10 presidents and the University of California presidents and he is receiving names from places as diverse as Harvard, Michigan, Ohio State and Berkeley. He is particularly interested in bringing diversity into the upper administration.
4. QUESTION AND ANSWER PERIOD FOR AGENDA ITEM 3
Senator Witte asked President Shelton whether he might consider the term, “value” rather than “quality” when discussing the value of education, the value of faculty. He agreed the choice of word is very important and thanked Senator Witte for the suggestion.
Senator Howell asked President Shelton to review the timeline for the Provost search activities and whether UA will use an external search firm. President Shelton hopes to identify an interim provost by the end of March. He hopes to assemble an advisory search committee and appoint its chair by the end of this month. President Shelton said he has always operated on the premise that his default is to use no external search firm, but this position is of such high visibility and he believes that the individuals applying for this position, whether external or internal, may want the extra insulation that a search firm can provide. President Shelton recently conferred with one of the most productive placers of university president and provosts. This consultant advised him the search will take six months.
Senator Green inquired whether it would be appropriate for the faculty in general or the Faculty Senate, specifically, to participate in discussions with the legislators. President Shelton agreed that both the Senate or SPBAC could be a vehicle to help with this effort and he will consider the suggestion.
5. APPROVAL OF THE MINUTES OF FEBRUARY 5, 2007
The minutes of February 5, 2007 were approved.
6. APPROVAL OF CONSENT AGENDA ITEM FORWARDED AS A SECONDED MOTION BY THE INSTRUCTION AND CURRICULUM POLICY COMMITTEE (attachment)
The consent agenda item forwarded by the ICPC and detailed at the end of these minutes [Motion 2006/07-30] was approved unanimously.
7. INFORMATION ITEM: ASUA REPORT ON TEXTBOOK PRICING (attachment)
ASUA students Steven Gerner and Jennifer Dang distributed a flyer entitled “Soaring Textbook Costs Hurt Students – What Instructors Can Do to Help.” They explained that UA students spend an average of $27-30M on textbooks annually. The students acknowledged that faculty are not responsible for the soaring costs of textbooks—that is primarily due to commercial publishers’ marketing decisions to bundle textbook materials. Faculty can assist in lowering the cost of textbooks primarily by turning in textbook lists on time, which could amount to a savings of as much as $6M because of buyback and resale rates. An ABOR Task Force on Textbook Costs and an ASUA committee composed of students and faculty have been searching for ways to help reduce textbook prices. The BookStore is also going to offer a $1000 grant incentive to departments that submit 90% of their textbook orders on time. A long-term solution might be a state law requiring availability of non-bundled materials for college students. In the meantime, faculty can seek options for non-bundled materials. Refusing to adopt new editions without substantive changes is another way to reduce costs. Committing to using one textbook for two or three semesters can also help. The library provides E-Reserves and using customized textbooks can also produce significant savings for students, although these won’t be bought back. ASUA is conducting targeted visits to some departments. Faculty Senators were asked to share this information with two other faculty members in their departments. Senators’ questions and comments included: 1) What is the basis for the $6M in savings figure? ASUA used the average of $900 per year per student and compared it to what students pay at several schools where booklists are turned in on time. 2) Is there any possibility to exchange or trade books with other schools, such as ASU? The BookStore has begun trading with several institutions in the western region and across the U.S. If anyone knows of a specific institution that might be a good fit for his or her department, please let ASUA know. 3) It is unusual for faculty to teach the same class semester after semester, but some faculty might be willing to commit to using a text for two or three years in a row. Can the BookStore track this? Not at this time, but this is definitely something to work on. 4) What is the BookStore markup? The BookStore’s textbook markup is 30% but profits come primarily from the other sales, not from sales of textbooks. 5) Is there any distinction between volumes of textbooks and literature? There is no way to distinguish between those at this time. The literature is not the problem—it’s the “Intro to” texts that are the most price-gouging. 6) The issue with publishing companies’ manipulation is outrageous; refusing to offer a text in paperback, insisting on changing the cover and marketing it as a new book. Publishers sometimes practice predatory pricing by purchasing all the old editions just to take them off the market when releasing a new edition. 7) Faculty should be encouraged to develop and publish digital textbooks for half the price of a printed one. 8) How can a faculty member know if the BookStore has enough old editions of a book for a class when a new edition is out? Contact the BookStore about a month before the deadline and they will find out if there are enough used copies on the market; if there aren’t, they will suggest an alternate. 9) Whenever there is a choice of publishers, sometimes the smaller publishing houses are more responsible and responsive to consumer demand about second or third editions. President Shelton thanked the students for their research and for partnering with the faculty and the BookStore to seek solutions. He is reminded of discussions among faculty and scholars about the greed of professional and scientific journal publishers whose profits are going up by 20-40% per year and that are driving university libraries into the ground with high subscription costs. The faculty and librarians have joined forces to make a change in this practice. It appears that this similar effort on the part of students and faculty may help bring some reasonableness to the issue of textbooks costs, and that the conversation stretches beyond our campus to other campuses. Vice Chair Mitchell noted that this is an issue that has the attention of the Board of Regents. At one Board meeting it was reported that faculty at UA and ASU only had 2% of their textbook orders in on time, so he urged faculty to do better in this respect and asked college representatives to inform and advise their constituents of this issue. ASUA will be producing a color brochure to help advise the faculty of the problem and a textbook website will soon be mounted.
8. SECOND READING AND POSSIBLE ACTION: REVISED UHAP 2.13.09 POLICY AND PROCEDURES FOR INVESTIGATIONS OF MISCONDUCT IN SCHOLARLY, CREATIVE AND RESEARCH ACTIVITIES AT THE UNIVERSITY OF ARIZONA. (attachment)
Research Policy Committee member and Senator Charles Sterling, substituting for RPC Chair Michael Cusanovich who could not attend today’s meeting, introduced the revised University Handbook for Appointed Personnel Chapter 2.13.09 for a second reading. This item is still a seconded motion from the RPC [Motion 2006/07-22]. Senator Sterling advised the Senate that all of the changes showing in this policy revision have been made by the University attorneys in response to the Federal Register of May 2005, which dealt with public health service policies and research misconduct final rulings. Today’s version has several yellow highlights which Chair Cusanovich has inserted. The link to the whistle blower policy will be added on page two. In the third yellow highlighted section on page six, Senator Sterling advised the Senate to cross out “from making” and replace it with “to make.” Senator Witte said she has never seen a document from the federal government that requires us to listen to anonymous allegations. Senator Sterling read from a highlighted section of the Federal Register provided by Chair Cusanovich that says, “It has been a long-standing ORI (Office of Research Integrity) practice to accept oral allegations including anonymous oral allegations. Experience has shown that oral allegations may contain relatively complete information, but if they do not, they are often followed by more complete allegations or lead to more complete information.” Senator Sterling said the US Public Health Service accepts this language. If someone made an anonymous allegation and the University didn’t investigate it, and the person went to the National Institutes of Health and this agency began an investigation and wondered why the University hadn’t investigated the allegation, the effects on the University could be serious. Senator Spece commented that the fact that ORI does something doesn’t mean that it is required by law. Senator Spece said he called the ORI to ask about this issue and was advised that they do have some ambiguous interpretations about the provision. They said they interpret some provisions that are ambiguous to mean “require.” Senator Spece proposed adding language to read: “A person with tenure or continuing status shall not make an anonymous report.” He contends that persons with tenure or continuing status have enough protections in place that they do not need to make anonymous reports. Senator Sterling said that ultimately, any anonymous allegation that is investigated is not going to remain anonymous for long. Senator Witte argued that the ORI is not a good example because that office has made multiple mistakes and many of its decisions end up being reversed or go to a lawsuit. She emphasized the distinction between confidentiality and anonymity noting that an untenured or non-continuing status employee is more vulnerable and that person’s confidentiality should be protected because criminal penalties can be leveled. Senator Sterling said that the issue of protecting confidentiality is also raised in the rather extensive Federal Register report and that this language has been incorporated into the University Attorney’s revisions to the policy. Senator Green commented that he supports the distinction between confidential and anonymous. Anonymous should not play a role here. The other aspect of confidentiality, which is totally different, has to do with the types of records that might be turned over to an investigative body. Senator Green maintains that the policy ought to specify that records involving human subjects must have personal identifiers removed in order to comply with HIPAA and other rules of confidentiality including even an informed consent form that was signed by a participant in the study. He would like to see language added to this effect. Senator Sterling noted that removing personal identifiers is required by law and that Chair Cusanovich has added language which should cover almost any situation including human subject research on page 8 to read, “To the extent permitted by law or required by the sponsor.” Senator Green suggested that situations might exist where an informed consent document with the promise of money wasn’t covered by HIPAA. For instance, within the institution it is all right to share data, but HIPAA often focuses on the shared data outside the institution. Senator McKee added that some human subjects projects do not have sponsors. He believes the policy should clearly state that it will protect subjects’ identities. Vice Chair Mitchell asked Senator Sterling to take this feedback back to the RPC for further discussion and possible revision. Senator Ranger-Moore argued in favor of anonymity because a truly anonymous complaint would be very self-contained. Some of the most vulnerable employees who are likely to catch research fraud might be a graduate student or a staff member, but if they don’t believe in the whistle blower protections, they may be reluctant to report without the protection of anonymity. If such fraud came to light later, it could have implications for the UA’s entire research program. Senator Cuello spoke against protecting one party at the expense of another and inquired what University policy offers protection from reprisal. Vice Provost Mok explained that the whistle blower policy in the ABOR Policy Manual clearly offers protection for persons who make an allegation in good faith. Vice Chair Mitchell suggested sending the link to the online whistle blower policy to the senators. Senator Sterling asked any Senator who has strong feelings about the language in the policy, particularly the section on anonymous allegations, to please suggest what s/he might consider to be more appropriate language for the RPC’s consideration. He asked that these suggestions be sent to Chair Cusanovich directly. Senator Witte noted that the whistle blower protection was a part of the original document and that disciplinary actions should be taken against allegations that are not made in good faith. Motion was not acted upon.
9. SENATE DISCUSSION OF CRITICAL ISSUES FACED BY THE UNIVERSITY OF ARIZONA (attachment)
Chair of the Faculty Howell advised the Senate that she has distilled the ten critical issues identified and ranked by the Senate into four clusters: 1) resources, financial planning, right-sizing; 2) admissions and recruitment policies, student preparedness, undergraduate education, general education; 3) faculty roles; and 4) administration evaluation and accountability. Although the resource priority is ranked first, she will open today’s discussion with the second priority: the level of student preparedness and recruitment. She provided Senators with two handouts of data tables prepared by Rick Kroc indicating the level of preparedness of resident and non-resident students. The Academic Index (AI), which is explained on the handout, includes many measures such as high school rank, grade point average and SAT/ACT scores. The AI of UA’s incoming freshmen forms a bell curve indicating that UA freshmen reflect a normal distribution of academic preparedness. Chair Howell asked the faculty senators what they believe our students should look like and whether the UA should be recruiting the highest level of academically-prepared students and what percent of the freshmen ought to be at each level. She invited some guests to attend and participate in today’s discussion: Vice President for Enrollment Management Patti Ota, Assistant Vice President of Admissions Paul Kohn, Assistant Vice President for Enrollment Management and Operations Rick Kroc, who is unable to attend today’s meeting, and the associate deans from the arts and sciences colleges. Associate Dean Chanda from the College of Fine Arts, Associate Dean Shockey from the College of Social and Behavioral Sciences and Senator Gail Burd, Associate Dean of the College of Science are in attendance today. The second handout shows that UA ranks dead last in both the AAU and public universities for retention and graduation rates. Vice President Ota spoke to the retention and graduation rates rankings, noting that UA students rank at the bottom in most categories based on entering students’ test scores. UA is different because up until the past few years, we had no flexibility over AI for the resident students’ admissions. In the public universities’ data, Dr. Ota pointed out that some schools such as Oregon State, Washington State, or West Virginia have lower SAT/ACT scores but higher retention and 6-year graduation rates. Her office gives two explanations: 1) these institutions are much less diverse than UA and 2) these institutions have a higher proportion of residents, almost 80-90%. There is a saying, “the greater the diversity, the greater the number of non-residents.” Senators’ comments and questions included: 1) Outliers shouldn’t be the beginning of this discussion. If you plot SAT scores against retention/graduation rates over ten years, there is no question that there is a clear relationship. We should simply accept this and ask “What can we do to change retention/graduation rates.” We should formulate a program to address “No student left behind – what does it take?” The first thing it takes is resources, so the next step is to direct our Foundation to raise money to deal with this and now we have a framework under which we can apply new resources and ideas and we don’t have to worry about outliers. We don’t even have to worry about diversity because diversity already exists within the institution. 2) First-year UA students do not receive adequate help or mentoring. 3) What is the difference in retention rates between residents and non-residents? P. Ota responded that the difference in retention of residents versus non-residents is negligible, about 1%. Among the ethnicities, retention is highest for the Asian-Americans, followed by Caucasians, Hispanics, African-Americans and Native Americans. 4) Does ABOR know about this ranking and how do they feel about it? President Shelton responded that it is not a primary concern to the Regents. 5) If we are allowed to admit the top 25% of high school graduates with 16 competencies and no deficiencies, why are we still admitting under-prepared students? Dr. Kohn noted that UA does not cap enrollment and that up until two years ago the UA was obligated to accept the top 50% with no flexibility. Since the changing directions/focused excellence directives, UA is allowed to focus on the top 25% but many of those students are not staying in Arizona. ASU and NAU spend resources to recruit these students and if UA were to stop admitting below the top 25%, it would close down for lack of students plus it would be betraying the land grant mission. Furthermore, there are many students who are outside the top 25% who are very well-prepared and very desirable students. There are also students coming from schools, small charter schools, for example, that are in the top 25%, but those schools’ top 25% are held to the same standards as University High’s top 25%. 6) If a significant number of the top 25% of Arizona students are not choosing to stay in Arizona, we should be doing better to recruit them. 7) What programs does UA currently have in place to recruit these students, and how does UA compare with peer institutions in recruiting/retention practices? 8) How many full rides are given to non-athletes? Dr. Kohn said that mostly the National Merit Scholars receive this type of award, amounting to $50K for resident and $80K for non-resident Merit Scholars over four years. UA hopes to attract 100 National Merit Scholars each year. Dr. Ota said we also attract about forty National Hispanic Scholars and about ten National Achievement Scholars for African-Americans. 9) How much would it cost in financial aid to double these numbers? In terms of true excellence, it might be worth it to pay a critical mass of really top students to come here. Dr. Ota said that such an effort would mean expenditures of significant resources for recruiting. 10) The ranking of ASU and UA at the bottom is some sort of indictment of public education in Arizona. 11) We should remember to look at students who excel in other ways besides grade point and not lose those other significant qualities of human beings that we value. Dr. Kohn agreed and responded that one of the compelling reasons to go to the 25% threshold for admissions was to allow for the holistic, comprehensive admissions process. 12) What happens to those students once they are admitted here? A most important part of retention that we need to consider is the advising, the resources to educate the students, and the classes to which they are admitted.
10. EXECUTIVE SESSION
The Senate recessed at 4:45 p.m. to go into Executive Session.
11. NEW BUSINESS
Senator Green suggested that the Senate consider how it might participate in discussions with legislators in Phoenix.
12. ADJOURNMENT
There being no further business, the meeting was adjourned at 4:58 p.m.
Jennifer L. Jenkins, Secretary of the Faculty
Pamela S. Bridgmon, Recording Secretary
1. ASUA’s “Soaring Textbook Costs Hurt Students – What Instructors Can Do to Help”
2. Consent Agenda forwarded from the Instruction and Curriculum Policy Committee
3. UHAP Policy 2.13.09 showing revisions with strikethrough deletions and highlighted additions
4. W. H. Howell’s Critical Issues for the University of Arizona, Feb 23, 2007
5. First-Time/Full-Time Freshmen by Academic Index
6. Retention and Graduation Rates – AAU Public Universities
7. Retention and Graduation Rates - Public Universities
*Copies of material listed in the Appendix are attached to the original minutes and are on file in the Faculty Center.
Motion 2006/07-30 Seconded motion from the Instruction and Curriculum Policy Committee approve the graduate certificate in water policy. Motion carried.
Motion 2006/07-22 Seconded motion (carried over from January 22, 2007 meeting) from the Research Policy Committee to approve revisions to the University Handbook for Appointed Personnel 2.13.09, “Policy and Policy and Procedures for Investigations of Misconduct in Scholarly, Creative and Research Activities at the University of Arizona.” Motion not acted upon.
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