Minutes AY 2011/2012

The Arts & Sciences Council (ASC) meets regularly every academic year, including eight times during the 2011 to 2012 academic year. The notes from said meetings are found below:

April 19, 2012

The Arts and Sciences Council Meeting Minutes

April 19, 2012, 3:30-5:00, UMC 415/417

Representatives present:  Mark Ablowitz, APPM; Daniel Barth, PSYC; Loriliai Biernacki, RLST; Cynthia Carey, IPHY; James Cordova, AAH; Damian Doyle, PWR; Elspeth Dusinberre, CLAS; Carla Farsi, MATH; Valerio Ferme, FRIT; Robert Ferry, HIST; Phillip Gilley, SLHS; Michael Greenwood, ECON; Alison Jaggar, WMST; Catherine Labio, ENGL;  Horst Mewes, PSCI; Matthew Pranter, GEOL Mike Radelet, SOCY; Mark Serreze, GEOG; Seema Sohi, ETHN; Andrew Stuckey, ALC

Representatives not present: Reece Auguiste, FILM; Giulia Bernardini, CLHM; Jack Burns, APS; John Cassano, ATOC; Markas Henry, THDN; Asunción Horno-Degado, SPAN; John Jackson, COMM; David Jonas; CHEM; Daniel Jones, HONR; Andrew Martin, EBIO; Alastair Norcross, PHIL; Scott Parker, PHYS; Robert Poyton, MCDB; Artemi Romanov, GSLL; Payson Sheets, ANTH;

Also in attendance: Darna Dufour, Todd Gleeson, Richard Nishikawa, Judy Packer

The meeting was called to order at 3:36.

The minutes of the March 15, 2012 meeting were approved: 18 yes, 0 no, 2 abstentions.

Dean’s Report, Todd Gleeson

An offer has been made to the finalist for the Arts and Sciences Dean position and a verbal agreement has been made. After a contract has been written and signed, a formal announcement will be made.

An announcement was made in the Daily Camera concerning a proposal coming out of the Provost’s office for a new college of Media, Design and Art. Dean Gleeson was not aware of this proposal prior to the newspaper article. This new college would incorporate the old School of Journalism and the departments of Communication, Film Studies, Art & Art History and Theater & Dance. David Boonin and Dean Gleeson met with the chairs involved and only one was consulted in a significant way. Katherine Eggert (ENGL) and Andrew Calabrese (School of Journalism), both from the committee that developed this proposal, have been invited to the Chairs and Directors meeting to give an executive summary and answer questions. After receiving feedback, Dean Gleeson will respond on behalf of the College of Arts and Sciences.

Dean Gleeson urged the faculty to pay attention and get involved with the issue of the new college. Discussions and decisions on this topic may be made in the summer.

The annual May 15 budget exercise will be announced next week. There are practically no continuing dollars and very little in the way of temporary dollars but the exercise is important as the requests will show the new dean where the needs are.

Many Boulder employees have recently received an invitation to participate in the capital campaign. Faculty, staff and their families have traditionally been an important part of any university’s capital campaign.

The Dean’s Fund for Excellence Committee needs new members; please e-mail Dean Gleeson if you have interest in joining.

Committee Reports

Personnel Committee, Anu Sharma

The Personnel Committee reviewed 83 cases: 35 comprehensive reviews (1 negative recommendation); 24 promotion and tenures (2 negative recommendations); 12 promotions to full professor; 2 hires with tenure; 6 instructor grievances (1 negative recommendation) and 4 nominations for Professor of Distinction (2 recommendations).

Grievance Committee, Loriliai Biernacki

The Grievance Committee reviewed 2 grievances, one in favor of grievant, one in favor of the department. Both grievances concerned salaries. This year the Personnel Committee took over the instructor non-reappointment grievances so the Grievance Committee’s load was lightened. Professor Biernacki is stepping down as chair and a replacement is needed.

Planning Committee, Mark Ablowitz

The Planning Committee met once with Associate Dean Keith Maskus concerning future space allocations; no decisions were made.

Diversity Committee, Damian Doyle

The Diversity Committee currently has 4 members and is looking for additional members for next year. The diversity plans of Arts and Humanities and the Physical Sciences have been reviewed; the committee plans to review the Biological Sciences next. This year the EDAO (Establishing Diversity through Action and Outreach) Fellowship was established. Adam Bradley of ENGL was awarded a summer stipend of $5000 from the College of Arts and Sciences plus $3000 funding for development and implementation from ODECE to carry out his proposal to promote diversity on campus. Theresa Hernández, Robert Ferry and Alphonse Keasley reviewed the submitted proposals. This fellowship has been funded for 3 years.

Budget Committee, Matthew Pranter

The Budget Committee hasn’t been very active this academic year. Professor Pranter will be rotating off and the committee is seeking new members. Dean Gleeson has spoken to the new dean about the budget committee and feels this committee will be busier in the coming year. Dean Gleeson will be building the Budget, Personnel and Dean’s Fund for Excellence committees for the new dean.

Curriculum Committee, Valerio Ferme

The Curriculum Committee finished the review of the Natural Sciences courses and has started reviewing courses that previously failed and the departments want to re-submit. At Dean Gleeson’s request, a review of RAP and Honors courses will begin soon. Also, small academic courses, those 100 courses that don’t belong to a department, will be reviewed. The Curriculum Committee has been talking to with Continuing Ed to come up with appropriate ways to review online courses. Professor Ferme will be leaving the committee and asked the representatives to consider service with the Curriculum Committee. Social Scientists are especially needed.

New Chair Election, Loriliai Biernacki

There is one viable candidate for ASC chair, Robert Ferry. Professor Ferry was the ASC chair 2008-2010 and was nominated to run again. As Dean Gleeson resigned, Professor Ferry hopes to provide some continuity for the ASC with the new dean. He also doesn’t want the college to lose sight of the Critical Thinking component of the core that was dropped because of financial considerations.

Professor Ferry received 20 votes (no negatives or abstentions) to chair the ASC for the 2012-2013 academic year.

B.A. in Computer Science, Horst Mewes

“The Curriculum Committee of the College of Arts and Sciences met on Dec. 7th, 2011 to consider a proposal from the School of Engineering for a BA in Computer Science offered in the College of Arts and Sciences. After considering the materials and having received revised submission from the proposing committee, the Curriculum Committee voted 10 (yes) – 0 (no) – 1 (abstained) in favor of the proposal without an exemption from the Natural Science Core.”

Professor Ferme let the council know that, after the Curriculum Committee voted on this motion, they received word that that Applied Math did not support it. Mark Ablowitz relayed APPM’s concerns involving the department’s desire to develop a graduate program in computational science which would have a great deal of overlap with a computer science degree. Rather than hold the motion up, Professor Mewes suggested a vote. If the motion passed and APPM completed their discussion, changes could be proposed. Dean Gleeson will not let this degree go forward without funding.

There was no further discussion on this motion. 

The vote for the motion above concerning a BA in Computer Sciences was 14 yes, 1 no, 4 abstentions.

Administrative Salary Increases

At the previous ASC meeting, the Boulder Faculty Assembly Resolution on Reporting on How Tuition Increases are Used was reviewed and Professor Mewes asked the representatives to send in suggestions [Printed following minutes]. With input from the assembled representatives, Professor Mewes suggested the following compilation of remarks submitted:

The ASC recommends the BFA should press for faculty involvement in the merit raise process of top administration.

After review this will be e-mailed to the ASC representatives.

Issues with International Students, Elizabeth Guertin

Assistant Dean Elizabeth Guertin asked the assembled faculty for information on what they are seeing with international undergraduate students. Dean Gleeson empaneled a committee to make recommendations from the academic viewpoint on what needs to be in place to help these students transition to the university and succeed.

Problems mentioned:

  • Difficulty writing essays in class.
  • International students not joining study groups.
  • International and American students tend to socialize with their own groups.
  • International students often have different cultural expectations for writing assignments.
  • Lower speaking skills.

The assembled representatives suggested:

  • Student aides to help integrate international students with local students.
  • Encouraging mixture of additional contact with faculty and students.
  • Departments with clubs being asked to reach out to international students.

Professor Mewes announced it was the last meeting with Dean Gleeson; he was thanked for his excellent collaboration with the ASC.

The meeting was adjourned at 5:06.

Minutes submitted by Janice Jeffryes

BFA Resolution

Damian and I would like to propose the following addition to the BFA Resolution on Reporting on How Tuition Increases are Used, which is also to say that we support BFA’s resolution statement that Campus Admin should prepare and distribute this type of financial report on a yearly basis. The addition we propose complements Payson’s suggestion that a Staff column be added to Tables 1 & 2 on the current BFA Report #2.

We propose that the current single Faculty column be subdivided into two: Tenure Track Faculty and Non-Tenure Track Faculty. This would show the difference between Instructor salaries and Tenure-Track faculty salaries.

If others felt that other salary strata needed illustration, additional columns could be added. For example, Tenure Track could be sub-divided by College or Area of Discipline (e.g., sciences, humanities). It would just depend on whether people thought the salary stratification across such sub-divisions were noteworthy.

Daniel Jones & Damian Doyle

Below is a draft wording for the motion regarding faculty pay which was discussed at the recent A&S council meeting.

“The A&S council does not agree with the administration’s proposal to the regents that faculty raises be limited/frozen beyond the agreed percentage increase for all faculty. It will harm the faculty in numerous ways including difficulties involving faculty retention, salary compression, and recruiting of new faculty.

Thanks,
Mark

The BFA should press for increases transparency of the raise process. In doing so, however, the publication of the salary increases is not informative UNLESS it is accompanied by assessments of merit. In our department, there is a merit assessment process done by our peers and the results of the merit process are available for review by the department. The availability of both the merit allocation information and the information that underlies the merit allocation (namely the assessment of merit based on multiple measures of individual performance) are both necessary elements of the process. I would argue that both documents (raise and merit assessment) are required for transparency.

Andrew Martin

“Like the public, the ASC is surprised to hear of recent administrative pay raises. A&S faculty and staff are not taking part in these recent extraordinary pay raises. The ASC finds pay increases designed to inflate retirement benefits to be inappropriate and supports salary increases based on merit. However, the ASC wants to make clear that competitive salary is a very serious consideration in recruiting and retaining the most talented workforce.”

Scott Parker

Thursday, March 15, 2012

The Arts and Sciences Council Meeting Minutes

March 15, 2012, 3:30-5:00, UMC 415/417

Representatives present: Mark Ablowitz, APPM; Reece Auguiste, FILM; Daniel Barth, PSYC; Giulia Bernardini, CLHM; Loriliai Biernacki, RLST; Damian Doyle, PWR; Robert Ferry, HIST; Phillip Gilley, SLHS; Michael Greenwood, ECON; Alison Jaggar, WMST; David Jonas; CHEM; Daniel Jones, HONR; Andrew Martin, EBIO;  Horst Mewes, PSCI; Scott Parker, PHYS; Marcus Pflaum, MATH; Mike Radelet, SOCY; Artemi Romanov, GSLL; Mark Serreze, GEOG; Payson Sheets, ANTH; Seema Sohi, ETHN; Andrew Stuckey, ALC

Representatives not present: Jack Burns, APS; Cynthia Carey, IPHY; James Cordova, AAH; John Cassano, ATOC; Elspeth Dusinberre, CLAS; Valerio Ferme, FRIT; Markas Henry, THDN; Asunción Horno-Degado, SPAN; John Jackson, COMM; Catherine Labio, ENGL; Alastair Norcross, PHIL; Matthew Pranter, GEOL Robert Poyton, MCDB

Also in attendance: Todd Gleeson

The meeting was called to order at 3:41.

The minutes of the February 16, 2012 meeting were approved unanimously.

Dean’s Report, Todd Gleeson

The campus is involved in discussions on the budget and merit increase issues. A proposal has been widely circulated limiting salary increases; under the proposal, employees earning $175,000 or more won’t qualify for raises from the tuition-funded salary pool, and raises will be capped at $3,000 for employees earning between $100,000 and $175,000. There are no outlined limitations for those earning $100,000 or less. Dean Gleeson e-mailed the Provost to request a discussion of this issue at the next dean’s meeting as this proposal would unfairly penalize senior faculty and full professors.

The faculty Town Hall meetings to meet the Arts and Sciences Dean candidates have been poorly attended; Dean Gleeson urged the ASC members to attend the meetings for the final two candidates.

Chair’s Report, Horst Mewes

The Provost accepted the four finalists for the Dean of Arts and Sciences that the search committee selected. The committee will stay intact after candidate interviews and meet again on April 2 to decide on a final recommendation. The search committee chair, John Stevenson, sent links to websites that will collect feedback. Professor Mewes suggested ASC members use those websites or call or write a committee member with feedback on the candidates. If representatives are not able to attend a Town Hall meeting, the candidates will also be at the Chairs and Directors meetings and all are welcome to attend.

Administrative Raises/BFA Budget Committee Resolution

Professor Mewes directed the representatives to the BFA Resolution and suggested the conversation on administrative raises use it as a focus; does the ASC want to endorse this resolution?

Whereas the BFA Budget and Planning Committee has authored a report of how this year’s tuition increases were used; and 

Whereas the Budget and Planning Committee would like to support Administration’s efforts to communicate with faculty about the Campus budget; 

Therefore resolved that the BFA expects Campus Administration in the future to prepare analyses of this type every year, share the analyses with the appropriate BFA Committees, and distribute the reports to the Campus.

Approved by the BFA on March 1, 2012.

Comments from the ASC representatives:

  • The accuracy of the figures was questioned.
  • A portion of the tuition increases go to the President’s office. Each campus contributes to the President’s office operations; the Boulder campus’ contribution was about $780,000.
  • Why were these administrative raises called merit raises when, in at least one case, they appear to be given to boost a salary before retiring? There is an issue concerning merit increases versus a raise just prior to exiting into a retirement program.
  • Faculty and professional exempt participate in the 401 program; classified staff participates in PERA. If a faculty member or professional exempt staff person begins their career as a classified staff member, they may opt to remain in the PERA program.
  • Professor Mewes asked the ASC representatives if they would like to compile a list of questions to send to the administration. There was no answer.
  • The campus’ poor public relations were remarked on and representatives questioned the ASC’s ability to help.
  • A representative expressed support for Phil diStefano and suggested the ASC send a letter of support, acknowledging his leadership.
  • The BFA Executive Committee is meeting almost weekly to see how the faculty can be more involved, to be consulted before issues like the administrative raises come up rather than being informed after the fact. The entire BFA supports yearly reports on salary allocations.
  • A representative noted that, because of a handful of administrative raises, the campus is now talking about limiting 100’s of faculty salaries, many of whom bring a lot of money to the university. Many other universities, even some public, are raising salaries.
  • The conversation on raises not only affects the $100.000 and above group but the Regents are now talking about a lower tuition increase and a lower pool for general faculty increases, if there will be increases.
  • It was noted that the Regents’ current conversations about freezing salaries seems like collective punishment. A segment of the Regents campaigned on the philosophy that faculty is overpaid and underworked and may be using this issue to push their political agenda. While some Regents feel their role is to support the university, others feel their role is as an outside watchdog. Bruce Benson is being brought into a political ideological battle by being attacked in public.
  • The Regents have a right to feel blindsided and their response is a predictable consequence to the administrative raises. Even though freezing salaries of those faculty members making over $100,000 may be damaging to the university, it will probably have public support.
  • The conversation is focused on the reaction of the public but the more painful reactions come from staff members, many of whom make less in a year than the amount of the administrative raises. They have been excluded from this conversation.
  • There is an international aspect to limiting salaries; faculty members, unlike administrators, often come from other countries and leave for other countries when a better offer is received. The university is competing with universities around the world. The ASC should be aggressive in making the administration and public aware of this and the possible long term effects as they don’t appear to know.
  • Distribution of salary amounts don’t make sense unless accompanied by some measure of what we base merit on. It makes the figure more inflammatory than informative.
  • Retention of research and clinical faculty is a tremendous issue. It’s becoming impossible to keep them from moving to the private sector because of salary issues.
  • Is there a process in place at the Provost and Chancellor level for measuring merit at review time? Are those individuals part of the same merit evaluation procedures as the rest of the staff and faculty?

Professor Mewes asked that any ASC representative who has a comment they would like incorporated into a motion or correspondence to the Provost, please forward to him.

The meeting was adjourned at 4:55 PM.

Minutes submitted by Janice Jeffryes

Thursday, February 16, 2012

The Arts and Sciences Council Meeting Minutes

February 16, 2012, 3:30-5:00, UMC 415/417

Representatives present: Reece Auguiste, FILM; Daniel Barth, PSYC; Giulia Bernardini, CLHM; Loriliai Biernacki, RLST; James Cordova, AAH; Damian Doyle, PWR; Elspeth Dusinberre, CLAS; Robert Ferry, HIST; Michael Greenwood, ECON; Asunción Horno-Degado, SPAN; Alison Jaggar, WMST; David Jonas; CHEM; Daniel Jones, HONR; Keith Julien for Mark Ablowitz, APPM; Catherine Labio, ENGL;  Horst Mewes, PSCI; Scott Parker, PHYS; Marcus Pflaum, MATH; Matthew Pranter, GEOL; Mike Radelet, SOCY; Artemi Romanov, GSLL; Mark Serreze, GEOG; Payson Sheets, ANTH; Seema Sohi, ETHN; Andrew Stuckey, ALC

Representatives not present: Jack Burns, APS; Cynthia Carey, IPHY; John Cassano, ATOC;  Valerio Ferme, FRIT; Phillip Gilley, SLHS; Markas Henry, THDN; John Jackson, COMM; Andrew Martin, EBIO; Alastair Norcross, PHIL; Robert Poyton, MCDB

Also in attendance: Todd Gleeson

The meeting was called to order at 3:34.

The minutes of the January 19, 2012 meeting were approved with one abstention.

Dean’s Report, Todd Gleeson

The College’s budget is balanced but there is no continuing money and little temporary money available. As the temporary money is limited, leave and replacement money is also scarce; Associate Deans are being less generous giving it out.

A&S is doing very little faculty hiring as no continuing money is available and fewer people are retiring.

The College is getting no new money next year; the freshman class may only be 50 more than last year and next year’s sophomore class is very small. Student credit hour production is down 2 percent this year compared to last and will probably be the same next year.

Dean Gleeson is trying not to encumber the new Dean by spending money into the future.

Dean’s Search 

Four finalists have been announced, Jeff Cox and Paul Beale from Boulder, Steven Leigh, a biological anthropologist from Illinois, Urbana-Champaign and Antonio Cepeda-Benito, a neuroscientist from Texas A & M. The search committee will be looking at the materials the candidates sent and calling the references the candidates provided. Dean Gleeson urged the representatives to speak to their colleagues in the academic community to make sure the candidates meet their expectations. Department chairs and Horst Mewes should be contacted with specific information gathered concerning the candidates.

The dates the candidates will be on campus are: Jeff Cox – February 28 to March 1; Paul Beale – March 12 to 14; Steven Leigh – March 18 to 20; Antonio Cepeda-Benito – March 21 to 23.

In response to a question, Professor Mewes said there were not many female candidates; two women made the semi-finalist list but the top ranked female candidate bowed out after receiving other offers.

[The ASC representatives were curious as to the composition of the Search Committee. The following list of members was sent to the ASC the day following the meeting: John Stevenson, chair; Janice Brown, professor and chair of Asian Languages and Civilizations; Jane Butcher, chair of the Arts and Sciences Advisory Board; Carroll Christman, senior development director of the Foundation; Jennifer Coffin, undergraduate student in Economics and International Affairs and director of the Student Government’s Volunteer Resource Center; Andrew Cowell, professor in the departments of French and Italian and Linguistics; Kimberly Dickey, professor of Art and Art History; Monika Fleshner, professor of Integrative Physiology; and Nick Flores, professor and chair of Economics and fellow in the Institute of Behavioral Science; Theresa Hernandez, associate professor and associate chair of Psychology and Neuroscience; Keith Julien, professor of Applied Mathematics and associate chair of Graduate Studies; Horst Mewes, chair of the Arts and Sciences Council and associate professor and chair of Political Science; Helmut Muller-Sievers, director of the Center for Humanities and Arts and professor of German and Slavic Languages and Literatures; Gail Ramsberger, professor and chair of Speech, Language and Hearing Sciences; Richard Rogers, professor of Sociology and fellow in the Institute of Behavioral Science; Bryan Taylor, professor and chair of Communications; and Margaret Tolbert, Distinguished Professor of Chemistry and CIRES Fellow.]

Provost Russell Moore asked the search committee to meet with each candidate during their visits and give a final recommendation.

Diversity Committee Announcement, Daniel Jones

The Diversity Committee is gathering information for graduate student funding. If the departments have information on funding sources, internal (i.e. AGEP or Colorado Diversity Initiative) or external sources (Ford Foundation) pass that information to Janice.Jeffryes@colorado.edu with any contact information you have. The Diversity Committee hopes to compile a list and post it on the ASC website to help departments looking for help in funding graduate students from under-represented groups.

New Chair Election, Loriliai Biernacki

Please send Professor Biernacki your nominations for ASC chair. The election will take place at the April meeting.

Resident Academic Program ASC Representation 

Darna Dufour, the Associate Dean who oversees the RAP’s, consulted with the RAP directors and they will form one unit for the purpose of ASC representation; one representative will be elected. 

Report on University Rankings

Recently, it appears Boulder has been ranking lower in published college lists. Mark Ablowitz, Daniel Barth and Horst Mewes looked into the various rankings to assess its value to the University. Keith Julien spoke for Professor Ablowitz noting that while has dropped 8-17 points in different rankings in the last four years, other colleges remain relatively stable. Items taken into account were student retention rates, faculty resources, class size, compensation, student-faculty ratio, student selectivity and alumni giving. It appears our lowered ranking had much to do with ’s class sizes and student teacher ratios.

Professor Mewes looked into the Shanghai Ranking of World Universities; it depends almost exclusively on research, citations and how many faculty members have won a Nobel Prize in the last 5 years.  fares better in this ranking which focuses primarily on graduate education.

Professor Barth was invited to a meeting with Bruce Benson to discuss ways to improve undergraduate teaching. He noted that is at about an 85 percent admission rate and thought this would be more important to discuss rather than pedagogical theory. It didn’t appear that administration was concerned with high acceptance rates. Some students, advisors and faculty feel is running a Junior College and University in parallel. Professor Barth feels if faculty begins to talk honestly about the problem it is possible they can come up with a solution.

Colorado has more 4-year colleges per capita than most states and must admit 55 percent in-state students. Dean Gleeson doesn’t feel that tuition dollars are driving our retention policies. Freshman retention and graduation rates are not generally affected by faculty. ’s Core Curriculum is very difficult. The quality and quantity of advising also affects retention and has had to take budget cuts in advising. If PWR classes were smaller that could also improve the class size statistic; all these changes are expensive and decisions are usually made to spend money on faculty lines rather than improving these statistics.

The representatives spoke on several ideas for improvement and problems in the classroom. Professor Mewes suggested the representatives send ideas for how to continue on this the subject of improving university rankings.

Report on BFA Action Regarding Recent Top Administrative Raises

BFA Budget and Executive Committees met last week to discuss the Daily Camera article concerning administrative raises. Many university faculty members are outraged over the way publicity was handled and the lack of transparency in the allocation of the raises. It is felt the negative publicity could affect the Regent’s decision making on future faculty raises and tuition increases.

The discussion will continue next month.

The meeting was adjourned at 5:00 PM.

Minutes submitted by Janice Jeffryes

Thursday, January 19, 2012

The Arts and Sciences Council Meeting Minutes

January 19, 2012, 3:30-5:00, UMC 415/417

Representatives present: Mark Ablowitz, APPM; Reece Auguiste, FILM; Daniel Barth, PSYC; Giulia Bernardini, CLHM; Cynthia Carey, IPHY; James Cordova, AAH; Damian Doyle, PWR; Valerio Ferme, FRIT; Robert Ferry, HIST; Phillip Gilley, SLHS; Michael Greenwood, ECON; Markas Henry, THDN; Asunción Horno-Degado, SPAN; Alison Jaggar, WMST; David Jonas; CHEM; Daniel Jones, HONR; Catherine Labio, ENGL; Andrew Martin, EBIO;  Horst Mewes, PSCI; Scott Parker, PHYS; Marcus Pflaum, MATH; Matthew Pranter, GEOL; Artemi Romanov, GSLL; Payson Sheets, ANTH; Andrew Stuckey, ALC

Representatives not present: Loriliai Biernacki, RLST; Jack Burns, APS; John Cassano, ATOC; Liam Downey, SOCY; Elspeth Dusinberre, CLAS; John Jackson, COMM; Doreen Martinez, ETHN; Alastair Norcross, PHIL; Robert Poyton, MCDB; Mark Serreze, GEOG

Also in attendance: Darna Dufour, Todd Gleeson

The meeting was called to order at 3:36.

The minutes of the December 8, 2011 meeting were approved with one abstention.

Dean’s Report, Todd Gleeson

The search for the new dean of the College of Arts and Sciences continues. There were over 100 applications from internal and external sources. Requests for off campus interviews were extended to 12 candidates. The final candidates will be made public in the next few months and asked to come to for formal interviews the week before spring break. Dean Gleeson encourages an active role for the ASC and faculty in the search.

Dean Gleeson has spoken to the Chairs and Directors recently concerning the progress being made reorganizing the School of Journalism. Starting with students admitted spring semester ’12 and later, Journalism students are required to declare an additional field of study, 30-33 hours of coursework. Most Journalism students are migrating to Communication, Political Science and History. When Journalism students declare an additional field of study, they will have an equal status when it comes to access to classes, as students in the major.

The Buffalo Bicycle Classic is adding an additional route; Boulder County has approved the closing of Boulder Canyon up to Nederland and north. A different caliber of rider will join; more money will be raised for the need-based scholarships for Colorado students that the BBC funds.

Recently there was a fundraising effort to raise money for an endowed chair for conservative thought. Fundraising was slower than expected but currently, $1,000,000 has been raised for a 3 year trial. A visiting scholar, non-tenure track, will be brought in to speak on campus and throughout the state. A five member faculty team and 5 more people from the community will select the scholar; the dean will appoint. Dean Gleeson said the five major donors are interested in public discourse and not a political agenda.

Chair’s Report, Horst Mewes

Professor Mewes will make certain there are opportunities for ASC representatives to attend interviews for the new A&S dean.

Mark Ablowitz and Dan Barth are putting together information on college rankings and plan on reporting to the Council next month.

The process to elect a new ASC chair will begin soon and the council members are asked to begin thinking about nominees. As there will be a new dean it will be doubly important to have a strong chair who knows how the administration works and keeps up a major involvement with governance.

James Cordova was introduced as the new representative from Art and Art History.

Admissions Standards for the University, Kevin MacLennan, Director of Admissions

The Admissions Office tries to fill the university with the best students possible. Mr. MacLennan has been with Admissions for 20 years and has spent the last 6 as director. There are 2 sides to Admissions: the recruitment side and the “decisioning” side. Admissions takes a holistic approach to the process, looks at all evidence to make a good decision. MacLennan showed a PowerPoint with admissions information, some highlights:

  • 16,000-17,000 admitted students are needed to get the 5,600 who will actually attend the university in the fall.
  • Last year we has 170,000 senior prospects; expect 22,000 applications; 16,000-17,000 students will be admitted; 6,300 students will confirm attendance; 5.600 students will attend the first day of classes.
  • The average applicant in Boulder’s applicant pool has applied to 6-8 universities.
  • To get one in-state student, two need to be admitted. In a poor economy we need five out-of-state admits to get one student.
  • Admissions recruiters made 900 high school visits last year nation-wide.
  • Each of the 50 states is represented by our freshman class.
  • The freshman class is at 20 percent minority representation. This figure includes students of Asian background.
  • 86 percent of Boulder’s students have a CCHE index of 103 or higher.

55 percent of our students must be in-state. The readers look at core values and secondary factors as well as GPA and class rankings and test scores. Currently, Admissions is surveying admitted out-of-state students who didn’t choose Boulder; the top students can’t put academic next to the cost of attendance. The lack of scholarship money hurts the University.

The ASC representatives had questions and opened discussion on recruitment videos, admission rates, retention rates, and academic support of foreign students.

Curriculum Committee, Valerio Ferme

The Curriculum Committee meets 8-9 times a semester for 2 hours and reviews courses that pertain to the core; recently they finished a review of the Natural Sciences core. Courses are being sent back to the department for more information as the Curriculum Committee tightens up the process. Guidelines have been written on how to submit classes to be included in the core. Currently the committee is looking at “orphan” courses, those that have no department. Following this, the committee will be looking at RAP courses. In addition, the committee looks at new majors, new minors, certificate programs and they are heavily involved with the Program for Writing and Rhetoric. If anyone is interested in joining the Curriculum Committee, please contact Professor Ferme; it gives the members an in-depth look at curriculum development. In addition, if faculty members have concerns about the committee; Professor Ferme invites them to contact him.

RAP Representation on ASC, Darna Dufour, Horst Mewes 

Some faculty members of the RAP’s have shown interest in having ASC representation.

Dean Dufour recommends the RAP’s elect one person to represent all the RAP’s as a group as they share a common mission.

The meeting was adjourned at 5:02PM

Minutes submitted by Janice Jeffryes

Thursday, December 8, 2011

The Arts and Sciences Council Meeting Minutes

December 8, 2011, 3:30-5:00, UMC 415/417

Representatives present: Mark Ablowitz, APPM; Albert Alhadeff, AAH; Reece Auguiste, FILM; Daniel Barth, PSYC; Giulia Bernardini, CLHM; Loriliai Biernacki, RLST; Liam Downey, SOCY; Valerio Ferme, FRIT; Robert Ferry, HIST; Phillip Gilley, SLHS; Michael Greenwood, ECON; John Jackson, COMM; Alison Jaggar, WMST; David Jonas; CHEM; Catherine Labio, ENGL; Doreen Martinez, ETHN; Horst Mewes, PSCI; Bhuvana Narasimhan, LING; Alastair Norcross, PHIL; Scott Parker, PHYS; Lonni Pearce, PWR; Marcus Pflaum, MATH; Matthew Pranter, GEOL; Mark Serreze, GEOG;

Representatives not present: Jack Burns, APS; Cynthia Carey, IPHY; John Cassano, ATOC; Elspeth Dusinberre, CLAS; Markas Henry, THDN; Asunción Horno-Degado, SPAN; Daniel Jones, HONR; Andrew Martin, EBIO; Robert Poyton, MCDB; Artemi Romanov, GSLL; Payson Sheets, ANTH; Andrew Stuckey, ALC;

Also in attendance: Todd Gleeson

The meeting was called to order at 3:39.

The minutes from the November 17, 2011 meeting were approved unanimously.

Chair’s Remarks, Horst Mewes

The search committee charged with finding the new dean of Arts and Sciences has met. There were over 80 applications, most of which were eliminated at that meeting. There will be an all-day meeting on December 19 to narrow the list further. Private interviews will follow then the finalists will be announced. At this point Professor Mewes hopes to get the ASC involved.

There are approximately five internal candidates.

Dean’s Remarks, Todd Gleeson

Currently a campus-wide advising review is being conducted. Mike Grant chairs the committee doing this review. Advising is losing advisors due to low salaries and high caseloads. $45,000 a year of temporary money has been given to Advising, which they are spending to hire eight to nine new advisors who will serve as freshman counselors. Many freshmen haven’t declared a major or don’t graduate with the major they start with. With the freshman counselor model; when students declare a major they are less likely to change it. Students will meet with major advisers at orientation then meet with a freshman advisor for the remainder of the year. Concern was expressed by a few of the ASC representatives that faculty involvement in was necessary to have successful advising. 

PAC 12 Resolutions

Robert Ferry and Phillip Gilley looked at the Pac 12 Resolution document and made a few minor changes. Dean Gleeson is meeting with deans from the other PAC 12 schools in February and will bring the resolution for approval. The money to fund the resolution requests will come from the additional money the university will make from the television contract. The BFA also plans to meet with the corresponding faculty groups from the other schools.

The resolution was passed unanimously.

Open Access, Martha Hanna, Chair, BFA Library Committee

Professor Hanna recently attended an international conference on the Berlin Declaration on Open Access. Open Access as it pertains to libraries calls for all publications to be made widely available. Norlin Library is faced with a shrinking acquisitions budget while the cost of materials, particularly journals, is going up. Interest in Open Access came originally from an interest in saving money. 

The justifications for Open Access are:

  1. It is unethical to “hide” scholarship behind a prohibitively high pay wall.
  2. Much research has been paid for by public money in the form of grants. As the public has already paid for this work everyone should be able to benefit from it immediately.
  3. Research demonstrates that open-access scholarship has a much wider and more immediate impact.

There are currently two major challenges: At this point, Open Access hasn’t enlisted what are considered “top tier” journals. Additionally the current costs for publishing are prohibitive.

Professor Hanna feels that the financial mechanisms are underdeveloped. Open Access can only work if production costs are less than subscriptions and now it doesn’t appear to be. The representatives discussed some of the different concerns of book versus article disciplines. An alternative would be for to have everything available to the community only. It was also acknowledged by the representatives that with the Internet, Open Access was inevitable.

The BFA would like the ASC’s opinion; whether or not the Council would support the idea of Open Access in principle.

The meeting was adjourned at 5:01 PM.

Minutes submitted by Janice Jeffryes

Thursday, November 17, 2011

The Arts and Sciences Council Meeting Minutes

November 17, 2011, 3:30-5:00, UMC 415/417

Representatives present: Mark Ablowitz, APPM; Daniel Barth, PSYC; Giulia Bernardini, CLHM; Cynthia Carey, IPHY; Liam Downey, SOCY; Robert Ferry, HIST; Phillip Gilley, SLHS; Michael Greenwood, ECON; Markas Henry, THDN; David Jonas; CHEM; Daniel Jones, HONR; Doreen Martinez, ETHN; Horst Mewes, PSCI; Bhuvana Narasimhan, LING; Alastair Norcross, PHIL; Lonni Pearce, PWR; Marcus Pflaum, MATH; Matthew Pranter, GEOL; Artemi Romanov, GSLL; Mark Serreze, GEOG; Andrew Stuckey, ALC;

Representatives not present: Albert Alhadeff, AAH; Reece Auguiste, FILM; Loriliai Biernacki, RLST; Jack Burns, APS; John Cassano, ATOC; Elspeth Dusinberre, CLAS; Valerio Ferme, FRIT; Asunción Horno-Degado, SPAN; John Jackson, COMM; Alison Jaggar, WMST; Catherine Labio, ENGL; Andrew Martin, EBIO; Scott Parker, PHYS; Robert Poyton, MCDB; Payson Sheets, ANTH; Marty Walter, MATH;

Also in attendance: Todd Gleeson

The meeting was called to order at 3:39 PM.

The minutes of the October 20, 2011 meeting were approved unanimously.

Dean’s Remarks, Todd Gleeson

At the October meeting, the new instructor appointment guidelines were presented. This document was the result of two years of conversations with Dean Gleeson, the Chairs and Directors and the ASC. These conversations were started when the BFA began to deal with issues concerning appointment, evaluation and promotion of instructors. Two instructor models were defined; 3 + 3 + 25 percent service and 4 + 4 with no service; the base compensation being lower for the 3 + 3 model. The response from the departments wasn’t positive so the document has been withdrawn and will be taken back to the Chairs and Directors for feedback and modification.

In response to questions, Dean Gleeson said the document appeared to devalue service and that was not the intent. The college was not trying to make a “one size fits all” model for instructors.

There have been roughly 200 instructors in the college for 3-4 years and 730 tenure track faculty. A few more instructors have been added recently because of the RAP’s.

The next version of the instructor appointment guidelines document isn’t a voting matter for the ASC but may come back for discussion. 

Chair’s Remarks, Horst Mewes

A number of ASC representatives have noted that Boulder’s ranking appears to be lowering in a number of college surveys. Professor Mewes has looked into it briefly and as the rankings don’t use the same criteria they are difficult to compare. Professor Mewes would like to form a committee to look into ’s rankings, to sort and compare information. A vote was taken to see if the ASC would like to continue with this issue; 14 members want to continue, 1 doesn’t and 7 abstain. E-mail Professor Mewes or Janice Jeffryes if you’re interested in being a part of this committee. It has also been noted that our admissions rate is extremely high. In January, Kevin MacLennan, the Director of Admissions will visit to explain how standards are set.

A continuing issue with the library has been open access. This involves making all publications in the library accessible to anyone outside the campus. This could involve major cost and issues with copyright laws. Professor Martha Hanna went to a conference in Washington, DC and reported on the major debates to the BFA. She will report to the ASC in December focusing on the impact to faculty. Norlin Library will be deciding whether or not to join this consortium.

University Code of Ethics, Joni Hayward, Director of Faculty Relations and Janet de Grazia, Faculty Advisor

The Campus Ethics Committee has been discussing the Honor Code and the process of reporting a violation. A survey went out to faculty and the responses reflected an attitude that the system is not user friendly. There is a new website with all code information; it is still under construction and new features are being added daily. The Honor Code Office welcomes calls with suggestions for the website.

The personnel at the Honor Code Office are looking for ways to get cases turned in and they want to increase awareness of the Code to faculty and students. Presentations concerning the Honor Code are given at orientation; this year there are plans for more presentations before finals. Many syllabi have the Honor Code written in them but the Honor Code Office wants to encourage faculty to talk to students about it and more than the on first day of class.

Turnitin.com is a program that faculty can use to insure the originality of a student’s work. Only about 25 percent of the faculty of Arts and Sciences currently have  accounts. It has been purchased by the university and faculty can call Professor de Grazia for access.

Professor de Grazia became the Faculty Advisor for the Honor Code Office because she has experience filing violations and found the process cumbersome. The College of Engineering has an ethics panel of 3 veteran faculty members; any faculty member who thinks they have an ethics violation can simply turn it into this committee and will be told if it is indeed a violation. This extra step can take pressure off the instructor who might be getting contacted by student and parents over a possible violation. If the committee recommends continuing in the process, it’s the faculty member’s decision to continue. Professor de Grazia let the ASC know that her ethics violations have gone from 25 a year to 0 as she now has the reputation of being tough on violators. She welcomes invitations from departments to visit to discuss the Honor Code.

In response to a question, sanctions were discussed. There are academic and non-academic sanctions. Non-academic sanctions allow the group to keep track of violations and involve attending seminars, writing a paper, doing community service. Some students don’t understand plagiarism; Turnitin.com allows the student to see how unoriginal their work might be.

The ASC representatives suggested putting together a list of ways students cheat for the enlightenment of faculty; the Ethics committee has been considering it. There are many departmental differences in the way students cheat; the colleges have been encouraged to set up smaller settings to discuss the ways students cheat.

The ASC representatives discussed some of the problems with cheating they’ve experienced and sanctions.

PAC 12 Resolution, Todd Gleeson

Joining the PAC12 was not only an athletic decision; it is considered beneficial to be joined with academically superior schools and to develop various forms of academic cooperation. Representatives from the PAC 12 universities met recently to discuss ways they can cooperate. Robert Ferry and Phillip Gilley volunteered to look the resolution over and make changes as suggested by the ASC representatives. .

The meeting was adjourned at 4:55 PM.

Minutes submitted by Janice Jeffryes

Thursday, October 20, 2011

The Arts and Sciences Council Meeting Minutes

October 20, 2011, 3:30-5:00, UMC 415/417

Representatives present: Mark Ablowitz, APPM; Reece Auguiste, FILM: Daniel Barth, PSYC; Giulia Bernardini, CLHM; Loriliai Biernacki, RLST; Liam Downey, SOCY; Robert Ferry, HIST; Phillip Gilley, SLHS; Michael Greenwood, ECON; Markas Henry, THDN; John Jackson, COMM; Alison Jaggar, WMST; Doreen Martinez, ETHN; Horst Mewes, PSCI; Bhuvana Narasimhan, LING; Alastair Norcross, PHIL; Scott Parker, PHYS; Lonni Pearce, PWR; Marcus Pflaum, MATH; Matthew Pranter, GEOL; Artemi Romanov, GSLL; Andrew Stuckey, ALC; Marty Walter, MATH;

Representatives not present: Albert Alhadeff, AAH; Jack Burns, APS; Cynthia Carey, IPHY; John Cassano, ATOC; Elspeth Dusinberre, CLAS; Valerio Ferme, FRIT; Asunción Horno-Degado, SPAN; David Jonas; CHEM;  Daniel Jones, HONR; Catherine Labio, ENGL; Andrew Martin, EBIO; Robert Poyton, MCDB; Mark Serreze, GEOG; Payson Sheets, ANTH;

Also in attendance: Darna Dufour, Elizabeth Guertin

The meeting was called to order at 3:33 PM.

The minutes of the September 15, 2011 meeting were approved unanimously.

Chair’s Remarks, Horst Mewes

Professor Mewes has been selected as a member of the search committee for the new dean. He will involve the ASC as much as possible in the search. November 15 is the deadline for submitting candidate names. It appears that an executive search agency will not be used.

Norlin Library is in deliberations over open access to all materials in the library including articles and journals. This may have implications for faculty as there will be copy write and cost issues. Martha Hanna, the BFA Library Committee chair, will be sent to attend a conference in Washington D.C. which is based on the Berlin Declaration on Open Access to Knowledge in Science and Humanities that was signed in 2003. Professor Mewes hopes to have Professor Hanna report on the status of this issue when she returns.

At last month’s meeting it was noted that Boulder’s acceptance rates are very high compared to comparable universities and also ’s ranking appears to be lowering in various university listings. Professor Mewes will gather relevant materials and report back to the ASC and the Council can decide if there’s an issue to be discussed.

Dean’s Remarks, Darna Dufour, Asso. Dean for Faculty and Administrative Affairs

Dean Gleeson is attending the re-dedication of Smith Hall, one of the residence halls in the Kittredge area. It’s been recently renovated.

The ASC Budget Committee will be meeting on October 21 to discuss summer incentive money; money generated by summer school which comes back to the college and departments.

Mary Kraus from Geological Sciences currently the only candidate for the Natural Sciences Dean position which is opening on January 1, 2012. She has been a chair and involved at many levels on campus. Any comments on Professor Kraus’ candidacy can be made to Dean Dufour or Dean Gleeson.

New standards for instructors are available online. There has been an attempt to make instructor evaluations similar to tenure track faculty. Last year a PUEC process was instituted as well as a process where the Personnel Committee becomes involved in cases where the recommendation is non-reappointment of an instructor. The Personnel Committee wanted to better define standards for the instructor rank for reappointment evaluations in the college. Instructors have an appointment that is teaching and service. The tenure track description of excellence in teaching isn’t appropriate for most instructors so a new rating of “superior” teaching has been defined. There is also a new explanation of service. This is the new standard and the college will be transitioning into it. The chairs and directors were notified about the new standards on October 18, 2011 and on October 20th the program assistants will be notified.

Instructor Appointment Guidelines were passed out. These guidelines were discussed with the chairs and directors, the Associate Deans took them to divisional meetings and Dean Gleeson also had them reviewed by Faculty Affairs. They were announced officially on October 18th. The college has been appointing instructors at a 3/3 teaching load with significant 20 to 25 percent service component. Looking at instructor reappointments for the last few years and in talking to departments it is evident that in some departments service is not required. There will now be options; if an instructor is doing no service the teaching load will be higher. The departments will be asked to document service when the teaching loads are lower.

It was noted after reviewing the instructor reviews that the service component wasn’t valued. The chairs and directors don’t want instructors teaching more than 4/4. Concern was expressed over instructors replacing tenure tract faculty. Dean Dufour said the student to tenure tract faculty isn’t improving but when professors retire; no funding is available for new lines.

Dean Dufour was asked to speak about the RAPs. Residential Academic Programs, or RAPs, go back to 1972 at Boulder with Sewall being the first. RAPs have been added more rapidly recently with the idea being that they help students adjust and succeed in a large university by providing smaller classes and a sense of community. A typical class size in a residence hall class is 18. Students have more interaction with faculty as they have offices in the hall and some faculty lives in. There are now 8 RAPs: Sewell; Baker; Farrand; Libby; Global Studies; Communication and Society; Social Entrepreneurship, Equitable Development and Sustainability and Honors.

Tenure track faculty and departments haven’t chosen to be very involved in the RAP program. Most teaching is done by instructors although all RAP directors are Full Professors. Dean Gleeson will be starting a new tenure track faculty line for the department when a RAP is started. Dean Dufour has been meeting with different people on campus trying to craft alliances with the RAPs. The goal of the college is to get all freshmen in a RAP. 

There has been a lot of discussion in the Curriculum Committee on the classes that come from the RAPs; the college wants the classes in the RAPs to be academically rigorous and is working toward that end.

The State of the Advising Center, Elizabeth Guertin, Assistant Dean and Director of the Academic Advising Center

Dean Guertin came to Advising in 1998 to start a new advising program for the college. The concept for the new program came out of a task force that was chaired by the provost and dean of Arts and Sciences. Advising has been revised and improved with the addition of professional advisors. The Arts and Sciences Advising Office serves as the dean’s office for undergraduates; handles departmental advising and open option advising. In addition, graduation applications, change of records, petitions, academic records, transfer credits, students in difficulty, veterans, returning students, foreign exchange students come through the advising office. A new freshmen advising center will be developed from now through next summer and incoming freshmen will start transitioning into this group. Dean Guertin discussed funding and caseload issues with the department. If there as a sentiment for a resolution supporting the Advising Center, the ASC will bring it up at the next meeting.

Curriculum Committee Motion, Horst Mewes

On Wed., Sept. 28, 2011, the Curriculum Committee discussed the limit of credit hours for certificate programs and brought the following motion to the ASC:

The Curriculum Committee moves that a maximum of 6 transfer credit hours be accepted for certificated programs in the college of Arts and Sciences.

The motion was approved by a vote of 23 yes, 0 no and 1 abstention.

The meeting was adjourned at 4:57 PM.

 Minutes submitted by Janice Jeffryes

Thursday, September 15, 2011

The Arts and Sciences Council Meeting Minutes

September 15, 2011, 3:30-5:00, UMC 415/417

Representatives present: Mark Ablowitz, APPM; Albert Alhadeff, AAH; Reece Auguiste, FILM: Daniel Barth, PSYC; Giulia Bernardini, CLHM; Loriliai Biernacki, RLST; Liam Downey, SOCY; Elspeth Dusinberre, CLAS; Valerio Ferme, FRIT; Robert Ferry, HIST; Phillip Gilley, SLHS; Michael Greenwood, ECON; Markas Henry, THDN; John Jackson, COMM; Alison Jaggar, WMST; Daniel Jones, HONR; Keith Julien, APPM; Catherine Labio, ENGL; Andrew Martin, EBIO; Doreen Martinez, ETHN; Horst Mewes, PSCI; Alastair Norcross, PHIL; Scott Parker, PHYS; Lonni Pearce, PWR; Matthew Pranter, GEOL; Artemi Romanov, GSLL; Andrew Stuckey, ALC; Marty Walter, MATH;

Representatives not present:  Jack Burns, APS; Cynthia Carey, IPHY; John Cassano, ATOC; Damian Doyle, PWR; Asunción Horno-Degado, SPAN; David Jonas; CHEM;  Bhuvana Narasimhan, LING; Robert Poyton, MCDB; Mark Serreze, GEOG; Payson Sheets, ANTH;

Ex-officio: Todd Gleeson

Also in attendance: Bill Kaempfer

The meeting was called to order at 3:34 PM.

Dean’s Remarks, Todd Gleeson

Todd Gleeson will step down as dean at the end of this academic year. He won’t play any formal role in picking his replacement; that will be a job for the faculty and provost. No announcements have been made concerning the search but Dean Gleeson is expecting that a national search will be conducted, recruiting internal and external candidates. Dean Gleeson is looking forward to returning to the lecture hall.

Merit increases have been approved for the faculty and exempt professional staff. Classified staff has not been included in this increase.

The college’s budget is balanced; funds are available to meet all obligations without any surplus. 12 faculty searches have been approved, far down from the 30-40 historically conducted.  

Chair’s Remarks, Horst Mewes

Horst Mewes introduced the new Arts and Sciences Council members: Mark Ablowitz, APPM; Reece Auguiste, FILM; Markus Pflaum, MATH; Alastair Norcross, PHIL; Lonni Pearce, PWR; Anu Sharma, SLHS; Liam Downey, SOCY and Markas Henry, THDN.

The minutes of the April 21, 2011 meeting were approved: 22 yes, 6 abstentions.

Professor Mewes contacted the provost to let him know the ASC expects to play a significant role in the search for the new dean. Russell Moore will let the council know as soon as decisions are made on the type of search to be made. The Chairs and Directors of Arts and Sciences met to discuss the upcoming search and made recommendations concerning their input. At this meeting, it was decided to recommend Professor Mewes as a member of the search committee to represent the ASC. It is his intention that when the candidates arrive on campus the ASC will have an opportunity to hear them.

Dean Gleeson initiated certain practices with the ASC that are not part of the bylaws. Professor Mewes would like to to see these practices continue so that the communication with the new dean will be as effective as possible.  

If any ASC representatives have ideas of how to get involved in the search for the new dean, please let Professor Mewes know.

If any members have any issues that the ASC should become involved in this academic year, please contact Professor Mewes.

The assembled representatives voted to support Professor Mewes as the representative of the ASC for the search committee.

The ASC has a website which has agendas, minutes, bylaws and other information useful to ASC representatives.

The Diversity Committee is looking for new members dedicated to the promotion of diversity on campus. Please contact Damian Doyle if you are interested.

The State of the Budget, Bill Kaempfer, Vice Provost and Associate Vice Chancellor

Bill Kaempfer introduced himself as a 30 year member of the Economics department. He prefaced his remarks on the budget by letting the ASC know he was going to give his own opinion of budgetary matters and not necessarily what might come from another office.

The salary adjustment process has been finalized. The adjustment will appear with the October paycheck. It will be 8/9’s of what the percentage adjustment is as a percentage of the base salary going into the year. It will apply to faculty, professional exempt and graduate student stipends.

The budget status is available on the website for the Office of Planning, Budget and Analysis.

AVC Kaempfer spoke generally on revenue information. This fiscal year’s budget is approximately $1,220,000,000. The budget tends to rise over the year. Last year the budget started at $1,170,000,000 but ended at $1,206,000,000. The budget has been increasing while the campus has been under restrictions from the state and experiencing a general decline in the national economy. From the budget, $56,000,000 is state support. Half of that amount is the Colorado Opportunity Fund, the second half is a fee for services, a payment the state makes to institutions that provide graduate education. The state support is less than the previous year. Budget cuts have been made in anticipation of the reduced funding. There has been much fluctuation of state support over the years.

In response to a question involving the state’s ownership of the campus, AVC Kaempfer replied that he is dealing with the operation budget rather than the capital budget. It has been 5-10 years since the state has made any substantive investment for new capital purchases. 

Out of the current budget there is $526,000,000 from tuition and fees. This is an increase from last year due largely due to increased resident tuition rates. Non-resident tuition is generally 4 times resident tuition. Non-residents have guaranteed tuition for four years which helps with retention and recruiting. There has been talk of a tuition guarantee for residents students which AVC Kaempfer is wary of due to the possibility of future inflation. 

In response to a question, AVC Kaempfer expressed his opinion that the increase of students is not due to lowered admission standards but rather improved retention rates.

Federal contracts and grants account for $263,000,000 of the budget which is an increase; the indirect cost recovery associated with those contracts and grants accounts for another $76,000,000 of the budget. Gifts are $81,000,000 of the budget. Auxiliary revenues account for $162,000,000 and are made up mostly of revenue from dining and housing services and athletics. 

The budget can also be looked at as falling into two categories, restricted funds (research contracts, gifts and auxiliary revenue) and unrestricted funds(tuition, state support and indirect cost recovery).

There are restraints placed on the university by the state concerning the mix of resident and non-resident students; the freshmen class must be no greater than 45 percent non-resident students and the overall student body must be no greater than 1/3 non-resident students. Recently the state approved a change in how we count those numbers which is in our benefit; international students now count neither in the numerator or denominator. We will now be able to recruit many more international students.

Boulder has about 7,000 employees; those salaries take up about 2/3rds of the budget. Tenure and tenure track faculty was relatively flat at 1030-1040 for a number of years. When Bud Peterson became Chancellor he wanted to grow the faculty and by spring 2010 the TTT faculty numbered 1166. Faculty dropped slightly this year due to the impact of the budget restrictions. Instructors increased from about 220 to 320 in recent years.  

The University’s budget office has been fairly conservative which has allowed a good cash flow situation for the campus. State support is expected to lower but as it has always been low, Boulder hasn’t been dependent on it. The area of potential concern is federal grant funding loss. The federal budget has had fluctuations as well as the state. 

In response to a question, AVC Kaempfer spoke concerning student services and classified staff. Additional funding has come through for academic counseling. IT services have undergone reorganization which has created efficiencies that have allowed them to do more. Historically, the greater part of budget cuts fall on non-academic areas; for Boulder its building maintenance which has insufficient funding.

Undergraduate education is paying for more than itself.

Bill Kaempfer was thanked for attending and presenting to the group.

Curriculum Committee Motion, Valerio Ferme, Chair, Curriculum Committee

On Wed., Sept. 1, 2011, the Curriculum Committee met to amend the language with which the college defines the awarding of degrees in the College.

It was moved, and voted upon unanimously in favor by the Curriculum Committee, that the language change the current language from (p. 68 of catalog, “General Graduation Requirements,” pt. 7:

“Complete a major…”

to:

“Complete a major within the College of Arts and Sciences…”

Moreover,

The committee also voted to clarify that:

“Majors that qualify within the College of Arts and Sciences are those that have been approved and vetted by the faculty of the College of Arts and Sciences through its Curriculum Committee and the Arts and Sciences Council.”

A friendly amendment was made by Elspeth Dusinberre to change the wording to:  “…are those that will have been vetted and approved…”

The motion was approved unanimously.

The meeting was adjourned at 4:56 PM.

Minutes submitted by Janice Jeffryes