UNIVERSITY
SENATE
Executive
Committee
A G E
N D A
March
4, 2016 - 1:10 p.m.
1. Chair’s Report - Ann Gould,
Senate Chair
2. Secretary’s Report -
Ken Swalagin, Executive Secretary of the Senate
- Approval
of Agenda
- Approval
of Minutes of February 5, 2016 Senate Executive
Committee Meeting
- Communications:
- The Web
Accessibility Policy has been finalized and approved for addition
to the University Policy Library. In a March 3 email from Bill Welsh to
Christopher Retzko, Welsh states that "The policy has not changed from
the draft format reviewed by the University Senate, except that the
approval authority changed from the Senior Vice President for
Administration to the Senior Vice President and Chief Information
Officer."
- In response to last month's discussion on the Distinguished
Professor job title, Barbara Lee has forwarded the following
information:
- "Each department has an HCM specialist that they need to go
through for those changes. As for phone number and email addresses you
can go into the HCM tab within RIAS and make those changes yourself. In
order for the phone number to be changed you need to fill it in under
the business phone number as well as the campus phone number which then
goes into the directory." [Forwarded from Catherine Battista, Senior
Confidential Administrative Assistant in SVP Lee's office]
- The Academic Appointments Manual is currently being updated.
It is not currently on the website. It should be updated and online by
the end of March. [per Lisa Bonick]
3.
Administrative Report -
Robert Barchi, University President
4. Standing
Committees
Issues/Charges:
Proposed
Charge to Academic Standards, Regulations and Admissions Committee
(ASRAC) on Religious Holidays, and Students Excused from Classes for
those Holidays - Suggested by
Barbara Lee during her February Administrative Report to the Executive
Committee
Rationale
(from the February EC discussion):
Diversity makes the list of religious holidays more extensive. Should a
public university recognize religious holidays? Instructors cannot
require a note, nor can they ask if a student is a practitioner of a
particular religion.
Proposed
Charge: Consider policies at Rutgers regarding excused class
absences for religious holidays.
Respond to Senate Executive Committee by [insert deadline].
Proposed Charge on Sale of Alcohol in
Stadiums - Submitted by New Brunswick Student Member of the EC
Justin Schulberg
Rationale:
"After RUSA passed a resolution
calling for the sale of alcohol in stadiums, specifically looking
at the Rutgers Athletic Center (RAC) and High Point Solution Stadium,
it is incumbent upon the Senate to also look into this matter. This
issue does not just affect New Brunswick students, which RUSA
represents, but it stretches to the domain of faculty, staff, alumni,
and countless others who attend Rutgers' athletic events. This
issue is heated and dynamic, as it has broad-reaching consequences.
As the most representative body at Rutgers University, it is necessary
for the University Senate to look into the sale of alcohol in the
stadiums and advise President Barchi on its investigation and
recommendations into the matter."
Proposal to Elect a Senator to be the
Official Representative to the NJ State Legislature - Submitted by
Senator David Hughes
[On
February 19], “in the faculty caucus, I proposed that
the Senate consider electing a senator to be the official
representative to the
NJ State Legislature. The Faculty Senate
of the University of Washington deploys such a person and he or she has
been
effective in securing state funds and in otherwise adding to the good
name of
the University. I request that the Executive Committee consider this
proposal
at its next meeting. Let me add that, as union president, I met with
State
Senator Ray Lesniak last month. He told me specifically that Rutgers
needs a
voice. Our administration has not done a good job of conveying the
depth and
breadth of what Rutgers does, especially what the faculty do. Other
legislators
in Trenton have expressed a similar sentiment. Even if the
administration was representing
Rutgers adequately, a voice from the Senate would strengthen our hand
in
legislative hearings and in regulatory processes. This person would not
serve
as a professional lobbyist - no one otherwise employed at Rutgers has
time for
that - but she or he would testify and meet informally now and then to
underscore the perspective of faculty, staff, students, and
alumni.”
Annual
Review of All Outstanding,
Pending Committee Charges: Charges issued to committees
lapse in March of the year following the
year in which the charge was issued. Ken Swalagin has emailed
all standing committee chairs to ask for a status report on pending
charges for EC review at this
meeting. [Hardcopies will be distributed at the meeting.]
5.
Old Business
Proposal
on "Senate Transparency" - Submitted by Justin Schulberg, New
Brunswick Student Executive Committee Member:
This issue has been
discussed by the EC at several meetings. The clicker and voting record
aspect of the proposal was deemed not feasible, but on the matter of
whether Senate meetings should be live webstreamed and archived, the EC
decided an ad hoc committee should be formed consisting of volunteers
from the Senate's standing committees. A possible charge to this
committee would be:
Consider the
feasibility and desirability of videorecording and live webstreaming
University Senate meetings, and archiving those videorecordings online
for later viewing. Include in discussions aspects of the issue as
transparency, technology, costs, benefits, audience, need, privacy of
participants, etc. Respond to Senate Executive Committee by [insert
deadline].
Proposed Charge on RCM and Allocation of
Faculty Lines - Submitted by Senator Karen Thompson: This issue was discussed at the
previous EC meeting. Budget and Finance Committee (BFC) Chair Menahem
Spiegel accepted the proposal as an addendum to ongoing work the BFC is
doing on RCM, but wanted to change the language of the charge. The
rationale and proposed charge below are as submitted originally by
Senator Thompson:
Rationale:
With student enrollment growing at Rutgers, and with Responsibility
Center Management (RCM) as our budgeting model, we increasingly notice
that departments no longer retain control over faculty lines and/or
have great difficulty obtaining a line when the enrollment and the
curriculum suggest a line is needed. Faculty in individual departments
who design courses/curricula are in the best position to determine the
need and allocation of lines.
Proposed
Charge: Investigate policies at Rutgers regarding allocation and
retention of faculty lines, especially in comparison with peer or
aspirant institutions. Consider how these policies have changed over
the years and to what extent faculty have been involved in the
decision-making process concerning line allocation. Make
recommendations about how to ensure that lines are preserved, grow as
enrollment does, and that decisions are based on academic priorities.
Respond to Senate Executive Committee by [insert deadline].
Charge Revision Request -
Submitted by Senator Joseph Markert, Faculty and Personnel Affairs
Committee (FPAC) Co-chair: FPAC requests deletion and resubmission of
Charge A-0812-3 to indicate a focus on chancellors only:
Evaluation
of Administrators, Part II: Evaluation of Chancellors: Reconsider the
process for evaluating upper administrators recommended by the
University Senate in 2012, focusing on a process for evaluating the
chancellors. Respond to the Senate Executive Committee by [insert
deadline].
Proposed Charge on Test-Optional Admissions
- Submitted by Senator Robert Boikess: "Dear EC Members, Perhaps it
might be appropriate for you to issue a charge related to 'test
optional admissions' in light of this new
information from today's [January 26, 2016] Inside Higher Ed."
This issue was discussed at the previous EC meeting, during which ASRAC
Co-chair Martha Cotter said she would consult with Vice President for
Enrollment Management Courtney McAnuff on the matter before the EC
considers issuing a charge to the ASRAC.
Instruction,
Curricula and Advising Committee (ICAC) Response
to Charge S-1504 on Determination of Student Attendance -
Natalie Borisovets, ICAC Chair
This
report was postponed at the February Senate meeting. The
ICAC was charged as follows: "Develop guidelines that would allow units
and individual instructors to comply with U.S. Department of Education
requirements that Rutgers keep records for students receiving federal
financial aid that substantiate students' participatory attendance in
the classes for which they are registered."
NJPIRG Student Chapters Concept Plan
Review - Addendum
to Concept Plan: NJPIRG Student Chapters submitted their
Concept Plan
and
audit
reports to the Senate office and directly to the Student Affairs
Committee during the first week of this semester, in preparation for a
Fall 2016 referendum. A
cover memo
was submitted later when Ken Swalagin requested it. The Student Affairs
Committee (SAC) met with NJPIRG representatives and discussed the
documents at the January 22 SAC meeting, and submitted the following
response to the Executive Committee:
"There is no doubt that the presence of
NJPIRG on Rutgers campuses provides educational value. While the
students do express some concern about the eventual fate of the funds
provided by the student body and the formal wording of the proposed
resolution, NJPIRG is welcome to continue to work with the Rutgers
community."
On January 26, Nick Jermer, a member of the Executive Committee of the
NJPIRG Students Board of Directors, sent a
"NJPIRG
Budget Shorthand" email directly to Ann Gould.
Ken Swalagin sent a detailed list of concept plan deficiencies, with
citations from the policy, to NJPIRG Student Chapters, and they
responded with the
Addendum.
The policy on
funding for special student organizations is online
here.
Timelines for Commencement
Panel/Committees - From Kim Pastva, Interim Secretary of the
University:
"We
are in the process of getting the call [for
honorary-degree and commencement-speaker nominations] out to the
community. My suggested
timeline is:
- March
11, 2016 - Call for Nominations for Commencement 2017
goes out to Rutgers Community. I hope this will give the student some
time
during spring break to write a nomination, if they want to do it then.
- April
15, 2016 - Call for Nominations Closed
- April 19, 2016 - All
Nominations submitted to Senate for committee review.
"After
the Senate receives the nominations, how much time do
you think you will need for review and ranking? Do you think we could
have the
results by the end of May (after graduation?) Then the administrations
can meet
and start making offers over the summer. I think we
should then do a call in September 2016 for
2018's commencement. Barbara Lee suggested that, and that would
certainly give
us a lot of time to get on people's calendars."
Addendum to Charges S-1510 (to ICAC on Student Teaching Evaluations,
and Best Practices in Evaluation of Teaching 2015) and S-1511 (to FPAC
on Personnel Considerations Related to Student Teaching Evaluations,
and Best Practices in Evaluation of Teaching): Senator Boikess has
forwarded a
New
Brunswick Faculty Council Resolution on this matter. He also asks
that the ICAC and FPAC "Consider how the Senate could extend the
planned actions on the New Brunswick campus concerning evaluation of
teaching to the other three campuses as well."
6.
New Business
Nominating Panel 2016: An
email was sent by Ken Swalagin to all current Senators on February 24
announcing the opportunity to submit self-nominations or nominations of
others for 2016-17 Senate officer and board representative positions.
The email directs Senators to nominating instructions and the Nominating
Panel Charge. The Executive Committee is asked to suggest Senators
to serve on a Nominating Panel that can be called upon to suggest
additional nominees in categories not sufficiently populated within the
next several weeks. Jon Oliver and Robert Puhak have again agreed to
chair the panel and present the slate and election process at the April
29 Senate meeting. [Senate rosters will be distributed in hardcopy at
the meeting.]
7.
University Senate Agenda
April 1, 2016 Senate Meeting:
8.
Adjournment