UNIVERSITY SENATE MINUTES

April 9, 2002

 

 

The meeting was called to order by the chair, Dr. Barbara Streumpler.

 

Approval of Minutes: The chair noted that the minutes of the last Faculty Senate Meeting of March 5, 2002 are posted on the web. Are there any corrections to the minutes? Hearing none, I will ask that they be posted; that they are approved as they are posted.

 

Announcements:

 

President’s Office: The next order of business is announcements from the President’s Office.  Interim President William Walker made the following announcements/remarks:

 

Dr. Walker: If I may, I want to take a few minutes to cover some issues. First, concerning the graduation on May 11, you might be interested to know that at least at this point – of course these numbers change as you well know – we will be awarding 418 doctoral and master’s degrees; that includes a honorary doctorate to Senator Shelby. We will be awarding 2,117 undergraduate degrees. That’s 2,535 total on the main campus. I believe there is another 400 from AUM. I thought that this was worth mentioning because it reflects the really hard work and energy that has been expended over the course of the last few years by this faculty and the continuing high demand for students and aspiring students for an education at Auburn University. Folks over in Student Affairs are working very hard to try to put together an enrollment management plan. The initial phases of that are in place and I believe are in process and I think we should begin to see the effects of that actually next fall. Of course all this education does cost money.

 

If you’re interested in what’s happening over in Montgomery, I just got a call from one of our governmental affairs people who said that the budget could well be voted on today; or if not today, then it probably will be Thursday since tomorrow is not one of the regular legislative days. We’re expecting about a 2.4% increase in the higher education budget over last year. This is an election year, as we’ve pointed out before and, quite frankly, there is still a concern on the part of some that that budget may in fact be prorated. In fact, we’re not entirely certain that fiscal year budget will not be prorated. However, I don’t think that’s something that we need to be particularly worried about at this time; if you’ve kept up with the budget process here at Auburn, the Budget Advisory Committee, or Dr. Large, put aside $6 million to deal with proration in the current year’s budget. And in fact, during their deliberations for the next budget proposal, one of the things they will be entertaining is whether or not to carry that over or to reduce that amount. We will be requesting a tuition increase at the June Board meeting. The size of the request will depend on how the education budget turns out. I can’t say much at this time about any recommended salary increases except to tell you that I am absolutely committed to meeting the objectives that have been laid out by the Board in terms of raising of salaries and therefore I do feel comfortable at this time with saying that there will be a recommended tuition increase.

 

The feasibility study underway by Ketchum and Associates for capital campaign is underway. We should have a preliminary report on that probably within the next two weeks.

 

You are probably aware that there was a meeting of the Board of Trustees last Friday. It was a fairly routine Board meeting; there was approval for a number of capital improvement projects. There was a nice recognition of the women’s championship swim team. Also, a recognition of one Cindy Carver from COSAM who was chosen to the  USA Today academic all around team.

 

At the Property and Facilities Committee meeting, the consultants –Sasaki – presented a campus plan that will be designed, or at least a draft of a campus plan that, if instituted by the Board of Trustees, will transform this university in the years ahead. It is an impressive plan. It’s certainly worth a look. As soon as we get an opportunity to do so, we will see if we can get some of those nice drawings that they have up on the web. I have not had an opportunity to discuss that possibility with Dr. Curtis but if at all possible, we will try to do that.

 

As I said, the Property and Facilities Committee and the Board is moving forward with a number of needed facilities’ projects. On Saturday, we dedicated two completed projects. The first one — and I have a bit of a vested interest in it — and that was the renovation of Wilmore Labs, which was begun a mere 13 years ago. I told the property at facilities that it seemed to me that we could probably get the pyramids built faster than we could get the projects done around this campus. It took a long time to raise the money, to decide what we were going to do. But if you haven’t had a chance to walk through Wilmore Laboratories, I really hope you will. It’s a very, very attractive, modern  laboratory building and one that I think will serve us well for many, many years to come. I can remember when I first came to Auburn, visiting Wilmore Labs and actually watching faculty that had to lecture classes standing in water because the roof was leaking so bad. But the other dedication I went to was the James Tatum Equipment Training Facility over in the Athletic Complex. I also encourage you to take a look at that. It’s named after a former member of the Board of Trustees, Mr. James Tatum.

 

Finally, Pete Degnan came over from Atlanta to brief the Board on Southern Association and their recent statement that I am sure all of you have read. I simply didn’t want to say much to the Board about it because I don’t know where the bounds of legal constraints apply and where they don’t. It was an unfortunate statement because, quite frankly, it brought to an end some negotiations that I thought were being fairly productive.  I thought it was something that was particularly grievous from my point of view in that it simply dismisses due process as a mere technical ideology. We are reviewing our options with the attorneys concerning that.

 

I’ll be happy to take questions.

 

James Bradley, Immediate Past Chair of Senate: Dr. Walker, I have a comment and a question. They both perhaps reflect disappointment and frustration but neither are of course  is intended to. The comment is that it bothers me — and it has from some time — when I hear you refer to the SACS  lawsuit as “we” won and the University “won” , because we all know the university is composed of faculty, staff, students, and alumni, and I don’t know of one of those groups who supports the suit or who necessarily support some of the things that have been said recently. That’s the comment. Now for the question. This has to do with attorney Peter Degnan and his comments at the Board meeting on Friday. Two things that he said during his presentation. One, he said that during his recent negotiations with SACS that you and SACS were asking for one, that all persons testify during the SACS investigation do so in an open court or forum. And the second thing he said was SACS was being asked to keep a complete record of discussions or testimony. Now as you know, there are people willing to testify about certain information and behaviors of Board members but only under the condition of anonymity. They prefer to be anonymous because they fear for their jobs or they fear for personal security. So, my question is this: If you really welcome SACS negotiating then why are you asking for these two things of SACS when you know that’s going to prevent people who are vulnerable from testifying? Moreover, why should we believe you when you tell us that you are carrying on this battle against SACS independent of any dictates from the Board members?

 

Response from Walker: First of all, thank you for that question. To me — aside from what I believe in my person religious beliefs — one of the most important and almost sacred documents that is my life is the Constitution of the United States. And that Constitution ensures us that we will be able to — when we’re charged with something, that we will be able to, what we’re charged with — that we will be able to confront those who charge and we’ll be able to respond in some sort of a rational system that is accepted by the authority. It seems to me that just because this is a university, it does not forgive us of that responsibility, of that privilege of working by the same rules. I’ve never agreed with your position on this. It has nothing to do with the Board of Trustees. It has to do with my personal belief that every individual ought to be able to confront their accusers. That every individual ought to be guaranteed, if it’s a criminal case, ought to be guaranteed a trial by jury if that’s what they want. The answer to your second question is, when I say … if you think that I am siding one way or the other, I am trying to make it very clear from the offset that that’s not what I am doing. All I wanted from the Southern Association was a fair hearing, a level playing field. It was very clear to me that it was not level. We have an individual over there who has a predisposed position about Auburn University. That is not fair. It seems to me that this faculty may in fact have some legal … or some very real, rational concerns about the way the Board has comported itself in the past. And I think those issues need to be addressed. I frankly invited SACS to come over and do that. That’s what they wanted to do. But I think that ought to be done in an open fashion. Any by the way, the judge has made it really clear that if, in fact, we never get that sort of thing, that he would look very, very unfavorably on any retribution that might be taken against anybody. Have I answered your question?

 

Jim Bradley, Immediate Past Senate Chair: You’ve given me an answer. My question is still … (cut off by Walker)

 

Response from Walker:  I didn’t ask if I gave you the answer that you wanted, I asked if I had answered your question.

 

Jim Bradley: Yes, you gave an answer.

 

Conner Bailey, Steering Committee: Dr. Walker, I am sure we’ve all been misquoted at some time by the  Plainsman, and I certainly hope that was the case when the word childish was used in print by you — you were quoted as saying “the web page document posted by SACS was … reflected a childish response.” I read that document and I’m sure many people here did. That was not the word that would come to my mind. As a comment I would say that I hope that was a misattribution because I don’t think that a comment like that furthers the professional interactions between this university and the accrediting agency. My question is — and I was at the Board meeting and heard Mr. Degnan speak — and having read the SACS document on the web, I am puzzled why the posting of that document meant that we broke off negotiations with SACS with regard to a pending visit by a committee. Can you tell us please, what was being negotiated on the this university’s behalf, and what and why that negotiation was broken off.

 

Response from Walker: I can tell you that Mr. Degnan had my permission to invite SACS to come to campus. And I think the other items that he revealed was that we would expect a record to be kept so that we would know what the Southern Association was basing its decisions upon. Also — I’m not sure if he said it — that so that we would be able to make a response to the findings of the Southern Association. I don’ know … I thought we did a good job of covering all the things that he wrote in a letter to an attorney for the Southern Association … why discussions were broken off. It was, quite frankly, because we had some pretty clear indication that this thing came back without the knowledge of the SACS attorneys. So we didn’t know that we were dealing with — where it was coming from. We will once again try to find out and try to help … I want to bring closure to this thing. But we don’t know whether we’re dealing with this attorney, or whether they’re not in the game.

 

Christa Slaton, Political Science: This is just to seek clarification of your response to Jim’s question about your concern about people having the right to confront their accusers. I was wondering do you see any circumstances under which that might not be required. For instance, the tenure and promotion process in the university. When faculty write letters for or against somebody for tenure or promotion, it is my understanding that the candidate who is going up for tenure or promotion does not have access to that material. So I’m wondering … (cut off by Dr. Walker)

 

Response from Walker: I understand your point, I think it’s a good point, but it seems to me that the accusations that are being hurled about verge on being criminal accusations. They are very close to it in many ways. We hear suggestions that there have been threats on people’s lives among others; this is clearly a violation of every law in this country, of the law of every state in this country. So it seems to me then that if we are going to accuse people of things like that, those people need to have a opportunity to respond in a setting that is as far removed from a mob setting as it can be because that’s what separates us — frankly — from the people that drove those airplanes into those buildings on September 11. We are a civilized society; we are a society of laws. And it seems to me that we ought to respect those laws in everything that we do.

 

Now then, the issue of tenure and promotion. Those are things that are done in a confidential manner, but if in fact that somebody made a statement or did something that was … in that transaction, that person that verged on being illegal, those documents would all be subpoenaed and they would be open to the public.

 

Christa Slaton, Political Science: If somebody said negative things about them, would they even know those accusations were made?

Response from Walker: That’s part of the problem that we have with the tenure and promotion process. And it’s one that we have to work our way through, there’s no question about that. But what you … in that case, what you’re looking at is somebody making comments about whether this quality of scholarship merits promotion, or merits tenure, or merits advancement, recognition or award; it’s not whether or not this act was legal or some heinous activity has just taken place. I can see a distinct difference between those.

 

Herb Rotfeld, Steering Committee: Shifting subject areas, I’d like to re-raise the question from your address read by proxy at the last faculty meeting and that deals with plans that have been repeated many times in the newspaper and the building plans for the campus, tied for growth of the university of 25,000 students. We all know here that the cost per student educated at Auburn University is not covered by tuition and unless there is some indication in whatever time period this plan is expected to encompass, is there some indication that within the period of that plan that we will see a raise in the state’s support for Auburn in excess of 25% in current dollars because without that increase in state support going down, which we are going to have huge coverage of that income somewhere, are we just thinking that well, we’re going to lose money on every student but we’ll make it up on volume.

 

Response from Walker: Well, that’s a good question, and the answer is no, we don’t. I think that Auburn’s wasted an awful lot of time in recent years in trying to decide how we can get more out of the state. As I’ve said before, all I want out of the state is some consistency from one year to the next. And then by tuition and by private support, we’re going to have to do what we have to do. Find the funds to pay for whatever it is we’re trying to do. The figure of 25,000 that the Board came up with … in fact, they came up with that several years ago; they just confirmed it at the February meeting … is even with that figure … if you were at the Property and Facilities Committee meeting on Friday, you heard the consultants say that we’re 2 million square feet short. So those of you that are wondering if we don’t have enough space around here, then the answer is no, we don’t. We’re about 2,500 students short of the 25,000 mark and we’re 2 million square feel short of what we need to handle that, so indeed you’re right. We have to figure out ways to add some square footage to the campus. However, we already have on the books about 1.8 million square feet of that 2 million that is underway and we have provisions to pay for it.

 

Herb Rotfeld: You’re talking space and facilities, I’m talking people. I’ve got average classes per seat … we’ve got graduate level classes whose enrollments are measured in scores. We … I … repeatedly over the last six years have gone to administrators with names of minority faculty that want to come to Auburn and I’m told we can’t hire them. So, I’m talking about people to handle all these extra students.

 

Response from Walker: I’d be very upset if there are known minority faculty who would like to come to Auburn and we’re not hiring them.

 

Renée Middleton, Senate Secretary: Is it possible to come up with a compromise? In other words, where faculty are protected and the information is made public It seems to me that what we should be concerned about is that any information brought forward should be made public for the accused to be able to respond to.

 

Response from Walker: I’m certainly not opposed to that. I have no personal interest in knowing who says what about whom. I simply want to know what are the accusations? What are the factual bases of the accusations so that those accusations can then be presented to people who have been cast in this light and they are allowed to defend themselves.

 

Renée Middleton: So that the identity of the person will remain anonymous and the information made public?

 

Response from Walker: I have no problem with that. In fact, that’s something that would be acceptable to the court. In fact I think that it would be a rational way to do it since I realize there’s a lot of deep feeling about this issue.

 

Jim Bradley, Past Chair of the Senate: If that’s true then Dr. Walker, I urge you to tell your lawyer to withdraw that personal request in asking for the open forum request.

 

Response from Walker: Well, apparently the way it’s done when lawyers get into negotiating, it’s much like when you come and ask for something — something that costs money — from your department head or dean, you ask for more than you want. And I’m assuming that that’s what is happening there. I assume that each party was going to put more on the table than they thought they could get.

 

Jim Bradley, Immediate Past Senate Chair: But we’re telling you that this is important to us. So, I’m asking you to negotiate with your lawyer, Pete Degnan, in asking him to get rid of that particular requirement because it’s standing in the way in this case.

 

THERE WERE NO FURTHER QUESTIONS FOR DR. WALKER

 

Dr. Streumpler: Well, we’ve been having a lot of fun this month. It’s been busy. We don’t really realize how quite busy it is until we’re in the middle of it. I would like to introduce our Senate leadership team because we kind of refer to these people and we give them lip service, so let me take a minute just to refresh your memory on who they are. We have Renée Middleton as Secretary. Raise your hand. And John Mouton, he’s in the back row. He came here early but he reserved that spot. And we have Paula (Sullenger) down here as Secretary-Elect too. So this is the Senate leadership team. The four of us meet every single week with the Provost’s Office  and we meet every other week with the President’s Office. So I encourage you to go back to your faculty and the people that you represent and if they have concerns to make sure that they get hold of one of us and we can take those concerns to the administration. It really give you a pretty good … we can get you a quick answer, it may not be exactly the answer you want but it certainly is a quick answer.

 

The next thing that I’d like to talk about just for a minute is faculty representation on the Board of Trustees Committee. This was started last year and we now have faculty representation on the working committees for the Board of Trustees. That was a long time in coming. You’ll notice too that Connor Bailey — thank you for substituting for Kim this last time who was in China. So we have the opportunity to sit on their working committees and have input. One of my goals for this next year though — and it has been the goal, I think, of the chairs for the past decade — is to actually to be a non-voting member on the Board of Trustees so that when problems and situations occur, we can provide valuable input to guide them in how faculty think and what may be best with those of us who are on the campus all the time. So there’s been a lot of activity in that sense recently. Most recently, President Walker, at the Board meeting on Friday, re-iterated his positive support of a faculty member on the Board of Trustees — thank you very much, we appreciate it. He did that last year too by the way. So, he is in favor of a faculty chair, hopefully, of sitting on the Board of Trustees and providing input on that.

 

A group of people about five weeks ago also met with Governor Don Siegelman’s Executive Committee. They came over here and met with us. We have James Buckalew, Nick Sellers, and I should commend Malcolm Crocker; he was the one that really got all the players together. We did meet with the Executive Committee for Don Siegelman. What we asked of Don Siegelman was to put in writing his support for faculty representation on the Board of Trustees. And he did that a week later. He sent Pro-Tem Jimmy Sanford his recommendation to seat a faculty member on the Board. I will read you the third paragraph of his letter. He said,

 

“I believe that the creation of a non-voting faculty position on the Auburn Board of Trustees would improve communications between the Board and faculty members. Currently, two undergraduate students enjoy whole participatory privileges on the Board, yet no single faculty member does. Representation on the Board of a peer-elected member could do much to improve communications between the faculty and the Board of Trustees.”

 

So, in addition to Dr. Walker’s support, we also have Governor Don Siegelman’s support. This letter was written to Trustee Jimmy Sanford. I’ve spoken with Jimmy Sanford many times on us being seated on the Board and his response is always “when the time is right.” So we will wait patiently for that. Of course, as many of you realize, Trustee Early McWhorter also had a press conference where he announced his support of faculty representation on the Board. I’ve talked with Paul Spina; so there’s many, many, many trustees that working on our behalf. We still don’t have them all apparently. So, we’ll keep you posted on that.

 

Well the Rules Committee is fired up. If you’ve never had an opportunity to serve on a committee, you should try the Rules Committee because this is truly a working committee. During the next six weeks, the Rules Committee — there’s about 11 members; they are elected or they’re the leadership team — we come up with nominations that we forward to President Walker for the University Senate Committees and we also come up with the selection of faculty members that sit on the Senate committees. As you know, there are probably about 40 university committees and at least 25 Senate committees. I anticipate that probably 20% of all faculty in the next six weeks will be contacted and asked to serve on a committee. There’s no way around it. In the last year or two I’ve heard a lot of committee members say, well, they’re fed up with the system so they don’t want to participate in committees or they drop off the committees. I’d like you to go back to your faculty and encourage them that if they are called, to consider serving on committees. They may be fed up with the system, but when they don’t participate, they hurt the faculty. They don’t hurt the other people. So we really need faculty representation in many of the real strong candidates; we need their help this next year

 

At the last Senate meeting, President Walker entertained the notion of … or he requested that the Rules Committee submit nominations for the Weary Report. The Weary Report is kind of the road map — the Auburn University Agenda that’s the road map that’s going to take us to where we go and re-establish some of the qualities that we have. The Rules Committee nominated three faculty; they were Jim Bradley, Larry Gerber, and Virginia O‘Leary. They would all be very good representatives on this Committee but I am truly glad that Jim Bradley was selected. Jim Bradley, the immediate past-chair, is very … he’s read the Report many times and he’ll do just a wonderful job representing us. If you have any comments for Jim — the Weary Report is under “Special Reports.” It’s posted. If you have any comments for Jim on the Weary Report, make sure you get them to him. And they’re going to start working soon, as I understand it.

 

There’s a new council that’s being formed. It’s called the Diversity Leadership Council and it will be chaired by the President. Their charge is to integrate diversity as a core value into every segment of the university. There are some … this is the tentative membership. For faculty representation, we will be submitting nominations for them to pick from. They’ll have eight (8) faculty on the final committee. I’m sure you will be hearing more about this. It’s kind of a ‘hub of a wheel’ as Dr. Pritchett explains it. They’ll coordinate all of the activities that deal with diversity.

 

There’s another committee — and also if you’d like to be a member of this Committee, let Renée (Middleton, the Secretary) know, e-mail myself, get your name in there. It would be a wonderful Committee. And they will be on a rotation basis, at least for faculty representation. There’s another committee that some of you may be very interested in. It’s an Ad Hoc committee. It’s kind of on Course Packets and Textbooks. We don’t have many policies here on what is used, how they’re used, how they’re duplicated, how they’re printed, how they’re sold, how much they cost, who gets the kickbacks. So we will be forming … Dr. Pritchett requested that an Ad Hoc Faculty Committee be assembled so that some of these questions can be … the answers can be formulated by faculty members and they’ll be making a report to you. So if you are at all interested in that Course Packets and Textbook Committee, that would be a good one to get on. So you can contact us and let us know.

 

I do want to take care of a couple of housekeeping issues. Herb Rotfeld, you’ve been our Parliamentarian for years and years and years and we thank you. Thank you very much. Herb has provided wonderful service to the University. When he told me that he really needed to take a little bit of a break, there were lots of people clamoring for this position. So the stakes were high, the salaries you know, they were competitive and everything else (she says facetiously). But Paula, thank you graciously for becoming the Parliamentarian of the Senate for this year.

 

There’s been a new course this last month on campus. Paula and I attended it. It’s called “Crash Course Parliamentarian Rules 101.” So we will use all the rules that we know and try to keep it in line. We have also met … the Senate Leadership Team has also met with Willie Larkin. He’s a professor and he was, years ago, Secretary of the Senate. He also was the Parliamentarian. So we met with Dr. Larkin and he’s made some suggestions so we’ll keep in touch with Willie Larkin. He suggested that I bring this gavel and use it. I don’t think that I have enough nerve to do that yet but I might get there at some point. But if you remember, Jim Bradley, in his farewell remarks,  also gave me the running baton, so I might pass this on first. Thank you, Jim. I keep it with me at all times.

 

So we are going to follow, essentially, the rules that we followed last year — some of the procedures. They reminded me … you know when you come in, if you are a member of the Senate, you need to sign in. Or you substitute needs to sign in. And please, when you are speaking, state your name and your affiliation. If you are a non-member, please state that you are a non-member. The reason for it, even if you’ve just spoken, if you are doing the transcription, it is important that you have the name. So please do that.

 

When items are discussed, we are going to grant members of the Senate first speaking privilege. Once at least the majority of them have had their 3 minutes say so, we will take comments and discussion from the non-members of the Senate.

 

We are asking that you address the chair and not each other. And we’re going to try to limit some of the discussions to about 3 minutes. We’re going to try that. Of course … I’m going to tell you the reason for that in just a minute. Once you’ve spoken twice to something, that’s it on that issue. But we’re trying to do this (1) to make sure that the elected officials of the Senate is to represent their members; and (2) to ensure that the meetings conclude by about 4:45 or 5:00. We just lose quorum and we can’t go on like that.

 

We’re making one other minor little change. When you put materials on the back table — and we encourage you to do that — we’re asking that you just put a little card that says who the contact person is.

 

Is Heath Henderson here? Heath Henderson said he was going to be here. He is our newest member of the Senate. He is the president of the Student Government Association. So we welcome Heath.

 

Are there comments, questions? Okay. Yes, Paula (Secretary-Elect)?

 

Paula Sullenger, Secretary Elect: Given your stated desire to be out of here at a reasonable hour, and the fact that the Policy on Valuing Diversity we’ve discussed a few times, and it’s always so late that we lose a quorum, I’d like to move that we suspend the rules and change the order of the agenda and discuss the Policy next rather than the information item.

 

Dr. Barbara Streumpler, Chair: It has been moved, is there a second? Okay,  it has been moved and seconded that we change the order of the agenda and have the Policy on Valuing and Diversity first and then have information items. Is that correct? All those in favor say “aye.” Opposed by voting no. Okay. The “ayes” have it. So, calling Dr. Stadler.

 

Dr. Holly Stadler, Head, CCP: I’m not a member of the Faculty Senate, but I feel like it. I’ve been here since January in regard to the item that we are now discussing. Let me give you a little background, especially those who along from January following the movement of this document. First of all, let me reiterate that this document is the work of four different groups of people, and now I can probably say five. First of all, the Black Caucus asked the Gay and Lesbian Caucus, asked members of Women’s Studies, and asked those of us whose area is multicultural diversity to work together to come up with a document following the racial incidents on campus last fall. The document that has been posted on the Senate website also has been altered to reflect the comments that have gone on in the Senate meeting about the original document that was proposed. Actually there’s five groups: the University Senate and the other four that I named. Let me point out some changes for those of you have some memory of the earlier document. You’ll note in the preamble as we see it now, there’s not a reference … there was quite a broad reference to the events of this fall and characterization of those events. The suggestion has been made from a number of quarters to remove that language and that has been removed. If we go to page 3, “Formulation of a Multicultural Diversity Commission.” Even since last week when this document was prepared, we have some new information that has led us to change this particular part of the document and that is that statements have been made that clarify the membership on the Multicultural Diversity Commission. These have already been pre-determined so the language that you see here in the document is not necessary because that Commission has a couple of members that are pre-determined. (speaking in background). Let me say one more thing before I invite comments. As I said, this is the work of four groups and the input of a fifth. I have been asked to participate in this activity because for a long time in my career, my areas of research and writing and teaching have been about multiculturalism and diversity in my own particular profession. That also has to do with the integration of diversity into institutions of higher education. So that’s where I come from, my background. I’ve tried to see my participation here and the development of this document as a stage in the evolution of institutions that are attempting to diversify. One of the very first stages is to bring people into the campus or an analogy, bring them to the table so that we have new and different faces around the table. And we’ve done some of that Auburn. Currently we have more goals to meet in that regard. But the next step in the institutionalization at the evolution of diversity has to take into account hearing the voices of the people who are sitting around the table. And that’s what I see this document as. These are the voices of individuals sitting around those tables: those Black Caucus tables, those Gay and Lesbian tables, those Women’s Studies tables, the people in multiculturalism and the Faculty Senate saying we want our voices to be heard in regard to issues that are happening on campus and a need for clear policies and procedures that help us to educate as well as to review the situations that come up on campus. So with that, I’m allowed to make a motion that this policy be accepted.

 

Dr. Struempler: Let me just clarify this. You’re asking that this policy be accepted by the Senate minus the formation of the Multicultural Diversity Commission. From here on, the last paragraph of your document would not be there. Is that what I’m hearing? The motion?

 

Dr. Holly Stadler: Yes.

 

Dr. Struempler: So, there’s a motion, is there a second to adopt this as a policy minus this last paragraph?

 

Connor Bailey: I don’t know that it needs a second.

 

Dr. Struempler: It didn’t come out of  committee, so it does need a second as I understand these rules. There’s a motion and it has been seconded. Is there any discussion? And I’ll ask Holly to stay up here for input please.

 

Dr. Roy Broughton: Point of information, how does the Committee that Bruce and … How does that Committee fit in with this, because the previous motion was sent to that committee for study and a report. Was that Bruce or you can tell us …

 

Dr. Stadler: Well, I think Dr. Gladden, Bruce, should be able to answer that.

 

Dr. Bruce Gladden, Past Chair, Senate: Well, I reported at the last meeting that ahh …

 

Dr. Struempler: Bruce, why don’t you come up here please. So we can hear you.

 

Dr. Gladden: I reported on behalf of the Multicultural Diversity Commission the last … Senate  meeting that we were asked to consider adoption of the policy, and as it has changed somewhat since then. At that time, the Commission chose not to adopt the policy or to recommend it to the Senate. We have not taken any action on the current version.

 

Dr. Roy Broughton: Are you planning to take some action, period, any action?

 

Dr. Gladden: Well it never cleared last time. The route that we’re pursuing is to gather all pertinent regulations and policies together to see where we think the university stands at this point. Whether or not, first of all, consider bringing all those together in one place for ease of access and making it well known to the university community. Secondly, then deciding whether or not other policies and regulations should be added. Certainly action on this might or might not change what we’re doing.

 

Dr. Struempler: Is there any objection to Bruce staying up here and answering questions?

 

Dr. Gladden: I didn’t plan on being up here.

 

Dr. Cindy Brunner, Pathobiology: First, I assume that you’ve read this new document.

 

Dr. Gladden: I haven’t.

 

Dr. Cindy Brunner, Pathobiology: Okay. I’d like to know what you think about the role of the Multicultural Diversity Commission as it pertains to this document?

 

Dr. Gladden: Well, first of all I will not and cannot speak on behalf of the Commission because we have not considered this document or the role of the Commission. I can say personally without saying anything about the merits of the proposal in general that the Commission is incredibly busy right now and I would say very much behind in lots of things that we need to be doing. That’s not to at this point argue in favor or against the general principles of this document

 

Dr. Struempler: Other comments? From our non-members of the Senate or members of the Senate? Yes?

 

Dr. Bill Gale, Mechanical Engineering: If those of the Senate will forgive me if I read this. This is the lead comment which came out of discussion among my colleagues. It basically says the following.

 

I received numerous comments from mechanical engineering faculty regarding the proposed diversity policy. The faculty are very much opposed to the aggregious behavior shown by the fraternities. Most of my colleagues would like to … However, the vase majority of comments I’ve received indicate the wording in the proposed policy, although well intentioned, would have unintended consequences for free speech. With that said, it would be misleading to state that all of my colleagues were opposed to the proposed policy. A small number of colleagues do support and would enact the policy in its present form. Based on the overall guidance I received from my colleagues, I cannot support the policy in its present form. It is, however, our sincere hope that you will accept a new version of the policy when it is produced.

 

Dr. Brian Bowman, Civil Engineering: Diversity is a word being used in place of discrimination,  then you don’t need it. There is already state law, federal law and it is already university policy that discrimination is something that we will not tolerate. If it’s meant to be diversity, from my personal point of view, diversity isn’t necessarily something good, something that should be supported. This country was built as a melting pot; the melting pot is what made it great. I don’t think that we need a policy that’s going to take them … we’re saying the things that this policy is and it has nothing that’s really needed because it’s already taken care of by the word discrimination by myself and the department. We don’t support this at all.

 

Dr. Struempler: Other comments? Cindy.

 

Dr. Cindy Brunner, Pathobiology: I’m still concerned about the document. It is advanced as a document promoting diversity, but it immediately changes midstream into document that will punish intolerance. In fact, except for the statement about what Auburn University would like to have itself be, the document consists of a policy statement on how active intolerance or perceived intolerance would be judged and then possibly punished. And that troubles me for the same first amendment reasons that the previous speaker has noted.

 

Dr. Roy Broughton, Textile Engineering: First of all, I’d like to make a couple of points. I do think that hate crimes are in fact different and deserve special consideration in the law because I think that you could make a case that hate crimes have a bigger effect on the community to which they are directed. Then on the similar types of crimes on the general community. So, I think you can make a case that hate crimes deserve special consideration. But I think that the worse that can be said about the incidents of last October is that the fraternity’s misbehavior and that the individuals participating were either stupid or young as a popular — I think country — song is talking about now, or that their actions were distasteful. Maybe they’re only silly and insensitive to the feelings of others. But then, maybe that’s what fraternities are supposed to be. They are, in fact, made up a rather homogenous group of people who self-select themselves to join the association they join. So, for myself I have prepared a lecture on the offensive nature of interactions between people and maybe how we ought to ask questions about our own behavior. I’ve given that a couple of times in class. I gave a copy to the Diversity Commission. And although I think I tolerate diversity more than or better than most people, I really can’t say that I like it. I believe that many individuals tolerate it less well than I do and don’t like it at all. I once belonged to a social organization that was quite diverse and I found that lots of people didn’t want to join it because they found the diversity too much trouble. Our community is diverse; but individuals in it subdivide into a myriad of clubs, churches to escape that diversity. Auburn University is a diverse community; students both Black and White segregate themselves into clubs that are very homogenous and not very diverse. The Board of Trustees certainly doesn’t like diversity. But I would submit to you that this bill that is before the group doesn’t like diversity either. It is, in fact, kind of intolerant of other people who might disagree and I oppose it because of it’s intolerance … I wish we would let Dr. Gladden and Dr. Green continue in their work, and eventually come up with something that does in fact promote diversity instead of killing it.

 

Dr. Stadler: I think that I’ve hear two important responses that I’m sure the people that wrote this would like to hear and that I heard two folks say that diversity is not an important value for them and therefore they wouldn’t see themselves or some of their colleagues as promoting this kind of document or this kind of effort. Let me just reiterate again that you’re hearing the voices of diversity; the people that, for whatever reason, you have invited to this campus to be your colleagues. Maybe your dean or your president or whatever said you had to have people that represented diversity, but we are here and these are our voices. Our voices are saying that we want to be taken seriously, we want threats against us to be taken seriously, we want our students to be educated about the full range of differences among us and how we can live together, and we believe that this document — as flawed as it may be — is an enormous step in the evolution of Auburn University and an enormous step that is a response to those people that I’ve discussed who made this document and who are saying to you essentially, “I don’t feel a part of the Auburn family, I noticed these activities that go on on my campus that have not been dealt with through disciplinary means,” or that sort of thing. And I also represent the students who come to me and say, “Dr. Stadler, what is this going on on campus? Why is the faculty not saying something, not doing something about this?” So while I can say that I also represent that group of four different groups that came together, I’m also representing diverse student voices that I have heard say, “What is this campus all about? Where do we stand in terms of our evolution in diversity?” Thanks

 

Dr. Sadik Tuzun:  I can see that some of you have never been treated differently in your life because of your diversity. There is differential treatment at the university. Don’t think of yourself. Diversity has to be protected. If you don’t protect diversity, then you don’t …(unable to hear other comment.)….

 

Dr. Kem Krueger, Pharmacy Care Systems: Dr. Stadler, I recognize your concerns … so I don’t want my question to be seen as disagreement with your points … so I guess my question and comments are one of policy. The Senate sent this issue to be discussed and studied further by Committee, than I feel like we need to bring something back to it and then decide those issues and concerns were appropriately addressed. And then my other question is that at the last meeting I believe that the Senate recommended that the group that secured this document and the Commission … we should work together to try to draft some document. Has that happened?

 

Dr. Stadler: It’s my understanding that Drs. Gladden and Green have reviewed this document.

 

Dr. Kem Krueger, Pharmacy Care Systems: There’s been no further interaction between the two groups.

 

Dr. Stadler: No. We’ve just been trying to work to get the document in a form that responds to Senate comments and different groups that have wanted to have input on it.

 

Dr. Ken Krueger, Pharmacy Care Systems: Then at this time, I am going to vote against this proposal just for policy purposes because I think that it’s important that the Senate refer this back to the Commission and have them make a report. But I would encourage that the two groups work together to draft a document that does address the concerns of the Committee.

 

Dr. Randy Pipes, Counseling & Counseling Psychology: I think it would helpful here to have someone, maybe Bruce, someone to address the implications of the Senate adopting this policy. The implications for the work of your Committee. What relationship those two would be with each other. I personally do not see the adoption of this policy superceding a report. So that’s one question. I also wanted to say that I think there have been a number of free speech issues that are raised here, and I’d like to say that as a card-carrying member of the ACLU, I share those concerns about free speech. I also think that as we consider this document, it’s very important the we consider the issue about the people that have spoken through this document because we have all been outraged at the behavior which was exhibited in the Fall and the people that have been the targets of that behavior are now saying something to us through this document. We may have concerns about specific free speech issues, but I think that we should take this kind of statement very seriously before we vote it down because I think this becomes an act in itself which is a statement about the way the Senate views diversity and responds to concerns from diverse populations.

 

Dr. Struempler: Bruce, would you like to address his first question.

 

Dr. Gladden: The question regarding the Senate passing this?

 

Dr. Pipes: What are the implications for your work? How does that … I don’t think that’s clear.

 

Dr. Struempler: Before you do that, as I understand it Dr. Pritchett, if this passed it would go to the administration.

 

Talking in background — unable to make out fully.

 

Dr. Gladden: Well, we were asked to look at this, or a previous version, we didn’t ask for it, but we got it. At this point, the Committee has not taken any action on this … All I can say is I have no idea how many complaints there might be, how many times people might want to appeal to the Commission to have investigations. I would simply say on that could we are pretty much burdened at this point. But that’s aside from the basic issue. The Senate is in charge of passing the policy, not the Commission.

 

Dr. Ralph Henderson, Political Science: I don’t think any of us feel really comfortable rising and talking about this issue. There are I figure three things that I would like to say. First, and it just came to my mind, if the Senate and faculty can feel offended if the … if actions are taken where we are not brought into the loop, I think the same might be said for Bruce’s Committee if we were to take action which could involve them or take them out of the loop. That’s simply a comment and it’s my afterthought. The things that I was perhaps more concerned about as I read the document, and I’ve talked to Renée, and I’m concerned the document be forwarded in a good manner. I believe that this must be a scholarly document as well. As I read it — and I don’t mean anything disparaging to the authors because as a veterinarian, I’m not a grammarian — but there were certain elements of the text that I believe perhaps didn’t follow all the best rules of grammar. I think that coming through us that there should be a document that is grammatically proper throughout. The other thing is — and I will address this to the chair — I really don’t know again fully the implications of policy and what this policy should lead me to be able to do as a faculty member. Should this policy be complete enough to direct me should I have someone come to me and say, “I believe that I have been a victim or I have an alleged complaint or I have a complaint,” should this document in its right be able to describe what action or what contact that person should make, and if that’s the case, this document does not do that. It’s very vague in what action I should take as a faculty member should someone speak to me. And I don’t know the correct answer from what this document purports to be able to do or what it should do.

 

Dr. John Mouton, Building Science: The first thing that I want to say refers to the event of this Fall, which were discovered inadvertently by someone close to home. There are events that take place on this campus almost on a daily basis that are offensive, discriminatory, and all those other things. We’re having a hard time getting some resolution. So I think there is definitely a need for policy. My fear is that a vote against this policy would be interpreted as against the need for a policy. And I concur with … I think this issue … I would very much like for there to be a policy.

 

Dr. Renée Middleton, Senate Secretary: I just wanted to respond to Cindy Brunner and say that the policy has been revised to be mainly educational. It clearly states that the members of that Committee, whoever they are, they don’t have the prerogative to punish or do whatever. It’s to educate, because very often people are not aware of the things that they are doing. If somebody makes an accusation, we want to be able to determine if the accusation valid; are they correct. If the Committee finds that what they are saying is not valid or there’s confusion, then that’s the finding of the Committee in terms of the investigation. If there is any punitive or punishment done, then that’s done by another body — you have a Student Discipline Committee. Are you going to tell me that the Student Discipline Committee doesn’t have the authority to punish? It does. But that decision has to be made by the appropriate body. The same with the faculty. We have a Committee … we have the Faculty Grievance, we have a Faculty Dismissal Committee. So if it came to that point, those Committee members would be making those determinations. This Committee is designed to educate. And examples that are given are simply to make people aware of the kinds of things that we have received in terms how people feel like they are being discriminated against too, even in the classroom where professors aren’t aware. One of the things that we would like to recommend is to go back and talk to professors. But that has happened and people still continue to be insensitive. So we see it mainly as a dialogue to educate between the two groups. It is not a punitive thing. I think if you read it, I don’t see how you could say it would be punitive. If there’s punitive actions taken, it is not taken by that Committee but the appropriate Committees have the right to do that by recommendation of this faculty that constitute those Committee — Grievance, Dismissal, and Student Discipline Committees.

 

Paula Sullenger, Secretary-Elect: I’d like to speak up against this policy. I’ve seen several versions of … I’ve seen several versions. And in each version I have the same question and that is why we need it? We have a policy against discrimination and harassment in the Faculty Handbook. They are printed in the Tiger Cub. I’m not certain those policies written as follows the Fall incident which is unfortunate, but I don’t think that justifies forming another Committee. If the purpose is to examine what happened and to describe appropriate punishment, then I think that the policies that we already have are sufficient. If their purpose is education, we have a newly established Multicultural Diversity Commission and we are in the process of setting a coordinating body for multicultural efforts, and I can think of three or four efforts that are going on. All along I’ve just seen it as unnecessary and I still see it as unnecessary.

 

Dr. Streumpler: Is there any other discussion?

 

Dr. Paul Schmidt, Mathematics: While I appreciate the work of the authors of this policy, I personally do not think that it is a final document that should come to a vote today and be forwarded as a recommendation by the Senate to the Administration On the other hand, there is one thing that really bothers me about this entire process. The previous version of this policy was sent by the Senate to the Commission for consideration. The Commission came back to us last time and stated the Commission decided not to consider this policy. No rationale was given as far as I remember. I think we have to ask the Multicultural Diversity Commission to present a report on this policy that is before the Commission. Right now I believe it’s not even on the agenda. I don’t understand that. The Senate referred a previous version of the policy to the Commission, the Commission was supposed to report back to the Senate, and that never happened. I don’t think this is appropriate.

 

Dr. Struempler: Other discussion? Okay. The question that you’re voting on is that the Senate approve this policy and forward it on minus the last paragraph that was on the Commission. Yes?

 

Dr. Emmett Winn, Journalism: Barb, I’d like to see this vote taken on paper ballot and if it’s appropriate, I so move.

 

Dr. Struempler: Okay. So we have a motion for a ballot rather than a hand vote. All those in favor say “aye.” (Audience responds) Those opposed “no.” (No response) So the ayes have it and it will be a ballot vote. So, we’re going to start bringing these all the time, I might add, just in case. We’re voting on … what you’re voting on … the motion has been moved and seconded that the University Senate adopt this policy on valuing diversity on the educational and in the work environment. The ballots that I presume will say “Yes,” “No,” or “Abstain,” so you would vote for it by voting “Yes,” you’d oppose it by voting “No,” or no vote or no preference would be “Abstain.” And then pass your votes in. Only members of the Senate vote. Non-members and friends don’t have that privilege.

 

Bruce, while the vote is being counted, how about you come up and we hear your report from your Committee. Bruce has taken on the task … I should tell you a little bit about Bruce. I always say never do anyone any favors and after this year, I’m going to listen to myself. But first, we haven’t had an Administration Evaluation for probably six or seven years. That’s because it has really has always fallen to the Chair-elect to get it done, and the Chair-elect is out of that position before they even get going with it, so we’ve never had anyone in there long enough to coordinate our efforts. So Bruce, I’m truly glad that you decided to stick with this and help us get this process done. We will announce the vote at the end of the meeting. Thank you, Bruce.

 

Dr. Gladden: I’m not sure I want any credit for this job. These are the current members of the Administrative Evaluation Committee: Jim Bradley, Immediate Past Chair of the Senate; Thada Bransby, Agronomy & Soils; Wayne Brewer, Entomology & Plant Pathology; M. Janner, Clinical Pharmacy; Barbara Struempler is on the Committee; and, I am chairing the Committee. The reason I’m here today is to tell you that after several years of not having evaluations of administrators by faculty, we are going to attempt an evaluation by faculty of deans and department heads. Here’s our timetable; I’ll say tentative. We hope that this is the way that it will happen: we are hoping that by Monday — and I’ll say hoping because it’s a little bit scary to try to put out over 1,000 questionnaires since it hasn’t been done for a while and to make sure we’re doing it all correctly and it’s going to come back in a form that we can do something with — so we’re hoping that by Monday, April 22, the evaluation forms will be in the campus mail. It will be about 12 pages of instructions and questions and a few scan sheets. Now that sounds like a lot; it’s probably 4 pages that’s just showing the name of your department and college and it has a code number on it. There are about 31 questions about department heads and chairs, and 13 questions about deans. There should be a mailing label in there to return the documents to me — my address will be on there so you will return it to me. We plan on April 24 sending out an AUPROFS message. We will get permission to do that and we encourage all faculty to complete the evaluations. This will be by tenure-track faculty. Tuesday, April 30th we hope to have another message reminding faculty that the evaluations should be complete by the next day. The return due date is Wednesday, May 1.

 

The other major point is here. We need your help. Remember a major, major, major issue several years ago when this was discontinued was the response rate. We need all senators to make an effort. We need you to go up and down the halls and ask your tenure-track faculty to complete these evaluations and send them back. If these are going to be meaningful, we need to be … we need to have a good percentage response rate. When this stopped a few years ago, it was down to probably below 20%, mainly those people who wanted to say something good about your friend who was your department head and someone who hated the department head basically. So we just had these very disparate points of view and they really weren’t constructive. That would be the other point that I would add and we hope that this will be a constructive process. The results will be sent to the person being evaluated, your supervisor, and the Provost and President as appropriate. The results — other than percent of return and that sort of thing — will be confidential to the extent permitted by law so that this will be a constructive process, one to improve administrators as opposed to being adversarial. I’ll be happy to try to take any questions, but the bottom line is we want your help. Yes?

 

Dr. Ruth Crocker, History: The procedure that Dr. Walker described with SACS regarding confidentiality and an open forum … is there confidentiality?

 

Dr. Gladden: Well this has been discussed in great detail. This is information that will be taken as advice by the Provost and by the Deans and … Our intention is that in order to be more constructive, that they be confidential.

 

Dr. Mike Reinke, Clinical Pharmacology: Bruce, I represent a very large department that I believe now has a majority of non-tenure-track faculty where it’s distinguished for all ways from tenure-track faculty. I’m sure they’ll want to ask me why they are being disenfranchised.

 

Dr. Gladden: Well. This is the first go round. Let me emphasize that this is subject to change; there will be questionnaires, the evaluations themselves will be looked at before they are administered again. This is a starting point. We haven’t clearly defined the starting point and this is it.

 

Dr. John Pritchett: Bruce, I believe the policy establishing the clinical-track and also the research-track clearly state that those faculty have the same rights as tenure-track faculty. And I would interpret it that should be included.

 

Dr. Gladden: Alright. I’ll get in touch with them. We don’t want to break any rules. So those entitled to be will be included.

 

Dr. Connor Bailey, Agricultural Economics: I’m trying to understand the rationale that department members, faculty would not find out the results of the evaluations given their own department heads, chair, and their own deans, and why sharing that information would be anything other than constructive.

 

Dr. Gladden: Well, you asked me to reach back to a discussion that we had over a period of months but again, the basic idea is that we not be adversarial; this not be something that is in any way published for all the world to see and a claim that the faculty are out to get you in any way. We discovered that that would be an advantage to keeping it between the person being evaluated and their supervisor, and their Dean.

 

Dr. David Bransby, Agronomy & Soils: I think one of the reasons that the Committee decided to do this is that (inaudible).

 

Dr. Gladden: That is correct. Thank you, David. That’s one of our rationale for this.

 

Dr. Ruth Crocker, History: Can we see the membership of the Evaluation Committee again? I think I have some concerns about diversity. Are they all in one area of the university?

 

Dr. Gladden: Well, this Committee … there were two ways that this Committee was selected. One is that by the general route of the Rules Committee. And secondly, I’m on there because I asked to stay and try to get us through one round of evaluations. We haven’t had a lot of people begging to be on the Committee, but this is generally through the Rules Committee. I should say that I know that this has happened over a period of two or three years and many of you may or may not remember that the questionnaire is pretty much the same questionnaire used that came to the Faculty Senate and we asked for input from everyone and from around the university. It has gone out in the past to the department heads and to the deans, so this Committee is really implementing it, we are not going to be judging anything. We’ve put together — and actually some other people that aren’t on the Committee now — the questionnaires that then had been used by the Senate and input was asked from everyone throughout the university.

 

Dr. Cindy Bruner, Pathobiology: In response to the comment that Bruce made about releasing the results, I’d like to point that at least to this point the university did not release the results of our student course evaluations for public review. I know that that was being debated at Alabama; students wanted the results released and I think the faculty was strongly opposed because they considered those evaluations to be a personnel issue and therefore, privacy restraints were in order.

 

Dr. Gladden: You’re reminding me of things that we did discuss with the comments that you had made. They are things that we did discuss. I didn’t remember off the top.

 

Dr. Herb Rodfeld, Steering Committee: Question about data reports. Of course, these go back to the administrators involved, saying what was done. I know you’re not going to identify the people. At the department level when you’ve got small departments, it’s a little hard. I was wondering about the deans’ level, are you going to identify saying which came from which department? Or are all colleges going to be lumped together?

 

Dr. Gladden: At this point, I would say we had not planned to separate the departments, it would simply be the faculty in a college. Again, subject to fine tuning, but that’s the game plan. Well this time, it’s not going to be identified by departments. Is that clear?

 

Dr. John Heilman, Acting Assoc. Provost: I am not a member of the Senate. I am just asking Bruce if someone decides to file a brief of information request, would you be able to block the release of information of that request? I don’t know the answer to that.

 

Dr. Gladden: I am not a lawyer. We have spoken with the university lawyer, Lee Armstrong, about this. I can only speculate that if someone wanted to file a lawsuit, they very well might win. Again, the main point that I might ask is please try to get a good response rate. Thank you.

 

Dr. Struempler: Before hearing our next … Thank you Bruce. Your report will be filed. Before hearing the next report, I’ll give you the results of the motion. There were 9 for accepting it, 36 for not accepting it, not forwarding it on, and 6 abstentions. So the “nos” have it and the motion is lost.

 

Dr. Paul Schmidt: May I make a motion?

 

Dr. Struempler: Ah, yes. There is nothing that stops you.

 

Dr. Paul Schmidt: I move that we refer the Policy on Valuing Diversity as presented by Dr. Stadler back to the Commission on Multicultural Diversity, and charge the Commission with reporting to the Senate with regard to the substance of this policy.

 

Dr. Struempler: So, we’ve got a motion and a second to refer this report back to the Multicultural Affairs Commission and to make a report back to the Senate. Is that correct? There is a motion and who seconded? Crocker; thank you, Ruth. Okay. It’s been moved and seconded. Can we vote on this today? Herb? Can we vote on it today? Okay. It’s been moved and seconded, so let’s open it up for discussion. Cindy.

 

Dr. Cindy Bruner, Pathobiology: I’d sure like us to not end up in the same situation that we were in over the last version of the policy in which the Multicultural Diversity Commission comes back to the Senate and says, Well we don’t think this is a good policy yet. I’d like to see the Commission work with the authors and other groups who presented this policy to come up with something better. How can you do that?

 

Dr. Brian Bowman, Civil Engineering: We’re going around in circles. That really hasn’t … I think when we have something that is sufficient under state law, federal law, and university policy over discrimination; so let’s just drop it and move on instead of wasting all of our time every month on the same thing over and over again.

 

Dr. Virginia O’Leary, Psychology: I would like to underscore … I think it’s tragic that these two groups have been working in parallel and not together. It concerns me a great deal because I think that this is an issue on which we as an academic institution can ill afford to have divisiveness.. I want to encourage the Commission to work with all of the groups that participated in the drafting of the several rounds of proposals toward the end of adequately  representing their concerns and I don’t think that this needs to come back in the form that we are sending it forward. I think the issues obtained herein do need to be addressed and they do need to be addressed by the Senate. It will require the University Commission working as broadly as is necessary to speak to constituent groups, the five groups that were involved in the original drafting of this proposal as well as any other group anywhere that is involved with this university.

 

Dr. Bill Gale, Mechanical Engineering: I would very much like to speak to the last couple of comments. I think if we let the Diversity Commission to get on and do its job, there’s a good chance that they’ll come back with a policy of their own that most of us can buy into. I think that it will be much more constructive to let them do their thing and when they’re ready to come back to us with a policy that they think is workable and most people can buy into and hopefully we can pass.

 

Paula Sullenger, Secretary-Elect: I’d like to speak against the motion. This issue was just decided by this body and we voted it down. A very similar version was sent to this Multicultural Diversity Commission already and not referred, so it just seems a waster of time. We have Bruce’s Committee doing it’s own work. We have this new Committee being appointed by Dr. Pritchett. I think between the two of those that some kind of policy or revision of our current harassment and discrimination policy will come out of it. I can’t see how referring this to the Multicultural Diversity Commission will serve any purpose.

 

Unidentified Speaker: Call the question.

 

Dr. Struempler: Are there any objections to calling the question? If there’s further discussion, we’ll listen to it. I guess so. So, we’re not going to call the question yet. Yes, quickly?

 

Dr. Paul Schmidt: The reason for my motion was that we have never heard from the Commission any serious rebuttal of this policy. At the last Senate meeting we were told that the Commission decided not to consider the policy. Now that may be  a valid decision by the Commission but they still have not told us why. I would like to hear why.

 

Dr. Struempler: Other speakers? Connor.

 

Dr. Connor Bailey: I will speak in favor of this. I believe that the voices involved in creating this document need to be heard; they need to be given the respect of the Commission. I believe that while it’s … I can’t know the 36 people who voted against this, I think many of them were on procedural grounds on the basis that we had given this to the Committee, we are waiting for the Committee, and we are simply expressing the sentiments of  this Committee that we are interested that this move forward and we ask that the Commission do so expeditiously.

 

Dr. Randy Pipes, CCP: I’ll just echo what Connor just said.

 

Dr. Christa Slaton: The last comment, I’m not going to reiterate that but I don’t think you can have enough diversity policies or an understanding of how various policies intersect. The administration acted pretty swiftly after the incident. They got criticized by acting swiftly enough, or for not following procedures, for not doing this, or not doing that. They tried to do a good thing and it was decided that lawyers decided that that was not a good thing. So, I think that we should not leave out the voices that have developed this policy, that most of what happened in terms of objectives that I heard were on procedure not substance. So, to get these two groups working together, and for the Commission to come up with … if Paula is saying that we already have sufficient procedures, then let’s articulate those very very clearly for everybody in the Senate to know, for the administration to know, and so when we have one of these incidents we are not running around trying to figure out what to do and taking one action and lawyers telling us we can’t do that. It’s just not too defined and I think it ought to be a really very high priority.

 

Dr. Struempler: Other discussion. Ready for the question. Sorry, Renée.

 

Dr. Renée Middleton, Senate Secretary: That is that I think … I would like to see … I would like to stress that we asked the Multicultural Commission to come up with a policy, to use Conner’s comment  “expeditiously,” they have indicated they have a number of things on their plate. We don’t know what the timeline is on that plate; it could be two or three years or months before something comes forward. That this faculty asked that they place developing a policy  and bring it to the group. The other thing that I would like to say is when people say that we already have something in place, clearly there is a need to protect unrepresented groups because what we have in place … the university violated its own practices and procedures. You said we have something in place, we had a Student Discipline Committee in place and it wasn’t used. I think we need to develop something where individuals can bring forth issues and it doesn’t have to come through bureaucracy in order for it to be heard.

 

Unidentified Speaker: I think I’m hearing two different motions.

 

Dr. Struempler: There was and it’s not … it wasn’t addressing the question. The motion as it stands now — she didn’t put it in the form of a motion but it was a suggestion to the Commission — the motion that you will be voting on that has been seconded is to refer this policy as it’s written minus the last paragraph on to the Multicultural Diversity Commission. Is that correct? Okay. Are you ready for the question? Okay. All those in favor of the motion say “aye.” (Audience responds) All those opposed say “no.” (Audience responds) I’d say it’s close; let’s take a ballot. Hand votes? Okay, hand votes. Hand vote. All those in favor of the motion of sending it on to the Commission, please raise your right hand. (A pause taken for the count) All those opposed? Same sign, right hand. (Pause for count) Is there a quorum? Abstentions? No quorum. So, …

 

                        VOTE OUTCOME: Yes                  (23)

                                                             No                  (09)

                                                            Abstain           (0)

 

Dr. Virginia O’Leary: Wait. I believe that Parliamentary Procedure indicates it is inappropriate to ask a question about the quorum after the vote. If you’re going to call for the quorum, you have to call for a quorum prior to any vote, because an absence of a quorum is what negates the taking of the vote.

 

Dr. Struempler: Paula?

 

Paula Sullenger: I believe that if we take a vote without a quorum, then at the next meeting when there’s a full quorum, we will have to ratify the vote.

 

Dr. Struempler: Herb, help us out. Quickly, please. I’d like to be out of here soon.

 

Herb: Yes. We can have a quorum, but if you find there’s an absence of a quorum in the process of taking the vote, the vote is void because you don’t have a quorum to conduct any business.

 

Dr. Virginia O’Leary: The absence was not discovered in the process of taking the vote and the Chair questioned the quorum.

 

Dr. Kem Kruger, Pharmacy Care Systems: Is it appropriate for the Executive Committee or for the chairman to refer this to the Commission.

 

Dr. Struempler: Yes. I think I like that suggestion and that’s … I’ll do that. That’ll get us out of that situation. Bruce, this will be coming your way, to your Commission. None too soon. Okay, Jo. Quickly. Your report. Jo has a very important report. Please stay with us for about five more minutes. She represents very few but it’s a very important group of university personnel.

 

Jo Heath: I’m representing the Non-Tenure-Track Instructor’s Committee; the people are listed there at the bottom of the page. This is not our proposal. This proposal was made a couple of years ago by the same Committee, different people. Alex Dunlop was chair. A number of items were passed; but one of the items that was approved was the Health Insurance for part-time instructors and that was treated a little differently. That was sent to the I&B Committee (Insurance and Benefits) for a cost estimate. Their estimate was very high and so that benefit has been languishing on the priority list for a couple of years. Last Fall this Committee decided to get a sharper estimate and you can see that we have a … that 76 is the prorated and the 96 is the non-prorated cost to the university to provide health insurance to part-time instructors. Their cost estimate was, it was over $400,000; I can’t remember what it was. At any rate, we decided to send out a survey and actually get the department heads to ask the part-time instructors to fill out forms as to whether or not they would actually take the part-time insurance if it were offered to them. And this really low figure is a result of that survey. There are a lot more details on it, where these figures came from and the next three pages which you can get from a link on the Senate page. Now, we found out that the reason that the I&B has such a high cost estimate because they were including insurance for all part-time employees which includes a great many people such as Extension people and so forth who are not instructors. Furthermore, let me point out that when I say Instructors, this is with a capital “I”; we’re not talking about little “i”, people who just teach now and then, this is people with a position called “Instructor.” We feel that we can make a special case for this particular collection of people because … there’s two things. There’s a fairness issue and there’s a help in our undergraduate program issue. When Instructors are first hired, they are hired full-time; they have a full paycheck, and they have full benefits. But after a few years, because of our rules — the de facto tenure rules — no matter how good a job they are doing, no matter how much the department wants them full-time and will pay them full-time, there are forced into part-time. They lose their full paycheck; they lose all benefits for income. So the fairness issue, we want these people to have access to health insurance. The other thing is when we think about the undergraduate program, it seems clear to our Committee that it’s going to improve if we have really motivated instructors. We have motivated tenure-track faculty but we want motivated instructors as well. How many of you would be seriously motivated if you’ve been demoted, even though you did a great job and even though the department wants you there and the department has plenty of money and so forth? So we feel like this also will have a benefit on the undergraduate program. I wanted to mention, I wanted to thank Van Rosenthal, my friend in Planning and Analysis who provided us with a huge amount of data, who came with the three pages that you are not going to see unless you go to the link on the Senate page. Are there any questions? This is just an information item. The Senate approved it two years ago; we just have a better cost estimate. We’re hoping that the benefit will rise on the priority list.

 

Dr. Struempler: Your report will be filed. Are there any objections to adjourn? So, we’re out.

 

MEETING ADJOURNED @ 5:15 p.m.