Academic Senate
Meeting of October 15, 2003

 

Minutes

CHP 101

HSC

2:45 – 4:30 p.m.

 

 

Present: M. Afifi, D. Ann, J. Brown, P. Conti, R. Garet, J. Gates (alternate for W. Mack), J. Glueckert, H. Hansen (alternate for R. Cole), E. Heikkila, E. Hollins, P. Levine, O. Mayer (alternate for M. Apostolos), E. McCann, J. Moore, M. Nichol, J. Nyquist, G. Painter, M. Safonov, G. Schierle,  K. Shing, P. Shrivastava, P. Starr, D. Stram, M. Weinstein, W. Wolf, R. Zemke

 

Absent:  C. Betts, E. Cray, G. Davison, C. Fogu, E. Forrester, E. Garrett, D. Larsen, N. Lutkehaus, S. Montgomery, R. Nishimoto, M. Omar, P. Pattengale, M. Renov, P. Vorderer, J. Walsh, W. Weber

 

Guests: I. Bordiujevici, S. Gupta, H. Kaslow, B. Kosko, C. Sullivan, E. Talley 

        

 

The meeting was called to order at 2:45 pm by President McCann at the Center for Health Professions on the Health Sciences Campus.

 

 

1. Approval of September Senate Meeting Minutes

The September minutes were approved unanimously with no abstentions.

 

 

2. Nominating Committee election

 

President McCann introduced the need to obtain four additional nominations for the Nominating Committee for the 2003-2004 election process.  He opened the floor for nominations.  Senators Pattengale, Safonov, Mack, Davison, Schierle were nominated from the floor.  Senators Pattengale, Mack, Davison, and Schierle were elected.



3. Announcements

President McCann announced information on the mini-retreats, email retention, and calendaring.

 
a)   The two mini-retreats have been scheduled for December 10, 2003 and May 12, 2004.  The meetings will be held from 1-5 pm.  It was noted that the Senate may choose to permit voting issues (particularly in the May meeting) depending on the Senate policy issues pending at the end of the academic year.
b)   President McCann announced that the E-mail Retention Task Force is presently underway and will report back to the Senate in the near future.  President McCann has asked Provost Armstrong to delay implementation of this policy until the task force and the Senate can provide input.
c)   President McCann reported that he has requested Registrar Servis to initiate a Calendar Committee to review the academic calendar schedule.  It was reported that the next two academic years have been confirmed, but that future schedules will be reviewed by a committee including representatives from the Academic Senate.


4.  Handbook revision process (3:20 - 4:10)                                        E. McCann
President McCann introduced the report of the 2002-2003 Handbook Committee.  This report recommends editorial changes, substantive changes, and reorganization proposals.  The purpose of this agenda item was to ask the Senate whether there is an interest in acting on these recommendations over this academic year.  It was noted that significant policy changes, such as dismissal language, would be voted separately.

 

Senators asked what prompted the proposed re-organizational changes?  It was noted that members of the Handbook Committee, as well as other committees, had identified the disparate nature of the policies within the Handbook.  In some cases, the Handbook policies appear to be in conflict.  In other cases, confusing passages make interpretation difficult.  It was noted that there were previously disputes on issues as simple as punctuation that created considerable problems in interpretation, and that it was not useful to revise the Handbook in total.  President McCann mentioned that as he has used the Handbook more frequently, it has become apparent that it is difficult to use.

 

Public hearings to discuss general sections of the Handbook and revisions that could be made prior to consideration by the Senate were introduced.  It appeared that the Senate considered a public process to be a positive method to encourage full disclosure of the key revisions that have been proposed by the Handbook Committee, and to allow the Faculty to consider the ramifications of revision.

 

Professor Talley, the past Chair of the Handbook Committee, was introduced and he explained that the interest of the Handbook Committee was to reconcile the conflicts included in the present Handbook, and to improve the accessibility of the document.  It was noted that we could certainly improve the U.S. Constitution, but that there would be risks associated with such an enterprise, even though it may be made more efficient.  The previous Handbook Committee considered that there were sections that were directly contradictory that should be resolved.  It was felt that the Senate should consider reviewing these sections because legal implementation of such handbooks have sometimes considered sections in contradiction to be ‘languished’ and therefore waived for practical purposes.   The proposed changes include replacement of some procedural sections with statements of overall principles.

 

A critical element of the discussion is the impact of policy formation and a method for formally reviewing proposed policies.  It was argued that our efforts would be more usefully engaged in the consideration of University policy-setting rather than streamlining the Handbook.

 

It was generally agreed that faculty should have adequate opportunity for early consideration of proposed changes.  The Executive Board recommended that hearings be conducted in conjunction with regularly scheduled meetings of local units and assemblies. 

 


5. Vice Provost’s Comments

 

Vice Provost Sullivan represented Provost Armstrong at the meeting and remarked about several areas:  support for encouraging research; interdisciplinary research; and, grants mentoring. Vice Provost Sullivan also announced the recent NSF award of $17 million to establish an engineering research center through collaboration of the Engineering and Medical schools.

a.  Research support—Research Committee of the Senate makes recommendations to the Vice Provost regarding applicants for the James Zumberge Research Fund.  The Provost’s office will continue to work with faculty to ensure that high quality proposals are encouraged and funded.

b.  Center for Interdisciplinary Research (CIR)—an ad-hoc committee comprised of University Professors review applications for inter-disciplinary support up to $50K.  This Center is intended to encourage innovative approaches in collaborative research.

c.  Grants laboratory—Vice Provost Sullivan has been authorized to develop such a laboratory to increase the likelihood of funding for faculty who seek mentoring and collaboration.  The initial workshops will focus on new faculty, as well as those who may wish to obtain assistance in the grant process.

 

Vice Provost Sullivan noted that the University is approaching $400 million in sponsored research and $300 million in federal research.  This places USC as 9th among all private universities, and 18th among all universities.

 

Vice Provost Sullivan also made mention of the importance of reviewing new federal regulations regarding the use of foreign nationals in research enterprises.  He will be involving the faculty in a review of these regulations.  He has also heard the faculty concerns regarding institutional review boards (IRBs) and their procedures.  The design of the policies internal to the University is intended to assure compliance and sanity, and he expressed a willingness to engage the Senate in a discussion of areas in which policies have created potential problems.

 


6. New Business  

 As there was no new business, the meeting was adjourned at 4:27 p.m.

 

 

Respectfully Submitted,

 

 

 

Mike Nichol, Ph.D.

Secretary General of the Academic Senate