CHABOT COLLEGE ACADEMIC/FACULTY SENATE
Board Room, Building 200
Thursday, February 23, 2006– 2:19 p.m. to 4:32 p.m.
A P P R O V E D M I N UT E S
Submitted by Norman Buchwald and Chad Mark Glen
Senator Attendance: Applied Technology & Business (Michael Absher); Counseling (Sally
Stickney & Jane Church); Health, Physical Education, & Athletics
(Nancy Cowan & Ross Shoemaker); Arts & Humanities (John
Komisar); Language Arts (Stephanie Zappa & Francisco Zermeño);
Library (Norman Buchwald); Science & Mathematics (Dave Fouquet
& Ming Ho); and Social Sciences (Barbara Ogman & Michael
Thompson); Adjunct Faculty (Anne Brichacek).
Guests:
Dr. Ron Taylor (Vice President, Academic Services); Shari
Jacobsen (CLPFA representative); ISLS Faculty: Susan Sperling
and Don Skiles; Carol Baumann; Kip Waldo
Presiding Officers:
President Chad Mark Glen, Vice President Michael Absher.
ITEM
1.0 GENERAL FUNCTIONS
1.1 Call to Order: President Glen called the meeting to order at 2:19.
1.2 Approval of the Minutes: Though previously approved, the December
15th 2005 minutes were reviewed and one minor error corrected.
Francisco Zermeño moved to approve the amended minutes and they
passed. The minutes will be submitted to the website. The February 9
2006 minutes were then viewed and corrections were submitted.
Francisco Zermeño moved to approve and Mike Absher seconded. The
motion carried to approve the revised minutes.
2.0 REPORT S
2.1 College President. Dr. Robert Carlson only had a brief time to talk to
us as he was to meet with the Classified Senate as well on this day. He
said he had “lengthy conversations” with President Glen both before and
after the Board Meeting on Tuesday night. Now that the Senate’s
resolution on the budget cuts has been forwarded to the Board and a
delay has been requested and granted, he has been asked by Dr. Susan
Cota what he would like to do. He said he wished he had some more
time and also was greatly concerned about classified staff, since some
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February 23rd, 2006
members may have their positions in limbo if there is a delay to the budget cuts.
Dr. Carlson decided to pull the budget cuts item at Tuesday’s Board meeting. Dr.
Cota said she had no objection. Originally, the plan was that the item would be
back before the Board at their next meeting on March 7, but that does not give the
college too much time to truly propose anything different. He would therefore
make a recommendation that March 21 is the due date, and he said that the
Academic Senate can submit budget cuts on their own, if they want. However,
March 21 would be the absolute deadline as he does not want any affected
classified staff members to wait beyond that date. As for any suggestion that the
Program Revitalization/Discontinuance process be implemented in this situation,
there simply is not enough time as the process takes two years. Furthermore, the
document has not officially been approved by the Board as of yet and anyway, the
policy itself says that the Chancellor can set that timeline aside at her discretion.
Dr. Cota can make a further statement on this issue, but she is not back in town
until Tuesday. Dr. Carlson warned that there’s a “trap” if we moved the direction of
using the Revitalization/Discontinuance Process. He claimed that the current
budget cut decisions were not “casually arrived,” and that faculty members’
assessment that there was not dialogue was not true. He said that “conversations
that some claim didn’t happen, did [in fact] happen.” He feels that the proposed
budget cuts were “well thought out,” demonstrated “conscientious, hard work, and
careful analysis.” All of the cuts were made, keeping our students in mind. While
there may be changes that may occur during our delay, as far as he is concerned
the process for what will be cut will not be a “sham process.”
President Glen said Dr. Carlson meant with that last comment that there “will not
be a run around with faculty.” President Glen is concerned that without an official
Ad Hoc Committee as proscribed from the Program Revitalization/Discontinuance
Process document, there may have not been appropriate study of the
impacts/closures currently proposed. Such a committee may also be able to
propose alternatives on the table. The key issue here is that “faculty will not be
ignored”—which is what the Senate’s resolution was about. Hopefully, even if no
changes are made to the current proposed budget cuts, there will at least be more
thought and input.
Dr. Carlson said he invites ideas on how to approach the dialogue regarding the
budget cut proposals, and that if we have any ideas on how else to cut, to let him
know. The Ad Hoc Committee needs to be appointed by both Senates.
Dr. Susan Sperling had questions for Dr. Carlson. She asked him “Did you at any
time meet with the ISLS staff to talk about the discontinuance of the program.” Dr.
Carlson said he did not and delegated the task to Marcia Corcoran. Dr.
Sperling’s second issue was regarding the management style demonstrated in the
handling of ISLS. ISLS is a program of 40 year standing, which is very significant
to the college, and if anything deserved his time, it was something of this
importance in the college. She really wished President Carlson spoke directly to
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the ISLS faculty and the issues he had regarding it. She said that based on how
he handled the decision and how he notified the ISLS faculty about it, she has
grave concerns about his overall management style.
President Glen said that when the Board approved our resolution, they affirmed
that faculty must be involved in determining the budget cuts.
Dr. Carlson needed to leave to meet with the Classified Senate, but reassured that
faculty will have the chance to make comments before a budget cuts proposal is
submitted to the Board again.
2.2 ASCC. No report.
2.3 CLPFA. David Fouquet said that there were supposed to have been two
negotiations recently but both were cancelled by the District. There is one for
tomorrow. One of the items will be to review the most updated version of the
budget. Shari Jacobsen reminded everyone that the Faculty Association is now
meeting on Tuesdays this semester, instead of Thursdays. The dates are on
March 14, April 4, and May 9 in room 1904. Stephanie Zappa asked David about
what he meant of the budget update and what has been concluded. David
responded that not until this week did they receive the current budget update. Now
they are able to go over the numbers.
2.4 Public Comments: Carol Baumann said she had two questions/statements. Her
first issue was how communication was handled to faculty at large regarding the
Academic Senate’s resolution regarding the budget cuts passed at the February 9
meeting and submitted to the Board on February 21. She did not know that the
resolution was in existence until after it went before the Board. While her
representative, Norman Buchwald, is usually good at forwarding documents and
other news to his constituents, he was out ill at the February 9 meeting, and she
was not informed. In conversing with other faculty members, she was surprised to
learn that a number of others also were not aware of the resolution. She advised
that there needs to be a “routine way in reporting back to faculty,” especially for
“anything of this importance.” She asked that important items such as the
Academic Senate resolution be forwarded to faculty at large, by at least sending to
CCFaculty on GroupWise.
President Glen said that he takes full responsibility on the lack of communication
on this issue. While the resolution was sent to Senators, who should have sent it
to their constituents, this resolution should have been posted more widespread.
Carol pointed out that when faculty are not informed, and a resolution such as this
is brought before the Board, they are “not truly represented,” because if Carol and
other faculty members had known about the resolution, they may have been
motivated to attend the meeting so that they can provide support. President Glen
said that current practice is that the Senate minutes are posted the day following
their approval on the campus web site. The agenda for each meeting is posted at
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three places on campus and on the website—usually by the Monday of the week
the meeting is to take place. He considered sending the agenda to faculty at large
and asked that they be viewed in HTML format so that they can be read more
easily.
Jane Church thinks that simply pointing faculty members to the
appropriate web site would be enough, but John Komisar pointed out that some
faculty may not be as inclined to go somewhere else and it would be better that the
agenda is sent directly to them.
Carol Bauman’s second question was how the resolution was put forth at the
Board meeting. Based on what she had heard, she asked "Did the Faculty Senate
instruct the Senate President to go to the Board, present the resolution and then
say that it was his personal recommendation that the Board not approve the
proposed cuts and that a delay would give Dr. Carlson a chance to smooth things
over?" If the Senate did not do that then they needed to talk about how things get
presented.
President Glen contended that was not the case, and would explain what
happened on our action item.
3.0
ACTION ITEMS
3.1 Budget Cuts & Program Closure Process. To respond to Carol’s second
question, President Glen gave some background as to why a request for a delay
was eventually made. Dr. Carlson would not work with the Academic Senate’s
resolution, and when discussing the resolution with Dr. Cota, she felt it was
important to support the College President. Dr. Carlson believed he did not do
anything wrong as to how he put the budget cuts proposal together. He felt that
shared governance was too slow. Dr. Carlson said he would not support the
Academic Senate’s resolution before the meeting and Dr. Cota was supporting the
president.
President Glen read a prepared a statement to the Board:
Dear CLPCCD Board of Trustees:
2/21/06
The Chabot Educational Master Plan is on this evening’s Board Agenda. The
Academic Senate thanks you for being responsive to faculty concerns. As a result
of pulling the Educational Master Plan from the previous Board Agenda, there is
greater buy-in, the Ed Master Plan is a better plan and document, and it has
improved communication.
2/9/06 Academic/Faculty Senate Resolution:
In light of recent (proposed) budget and program cuts, the Chabot
College Academic/Faculty Senate agrees that there has been no
formal, transparent process, nor has any form of shared governance
been observed. We have processes in place by which decisions ought
to be made inclusively and transparently. This lack of collegial
consultation is evidence of bad faith on the part of Chabot College
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administration. The Academic/Faculty Senate insists that there be a
transparent process that includes faculty at every level. In particular,
the Senate insists that any decision regarding Interdisciplinary Studies
in Letters and Science (ISLS) or any other program follow the Program
Revitalization/Discontinuance Process, which is approved by both
colleges and is expected to be followed by the administration in good
faith. [Chabot approved the Program Revitalization/Discontinuance
Process on 10/27/05, prior to President Carlson’s 1st budget cut memo
of 11/7/05.]
The Senate respectfully requests that the Board pull the Chabot Budget
Reductions for 2006-07 until the March Board meeting. This will allow President
Carlson to meet with the faculty directly affected by the proposed budget cuts.
Chabot’s accreditation report lists communication as a major area that needs
correcting.
Although President Carlson sincerely believes adequate
communication has taken place, if the faculty in those areas do not believe they
have been communicated with, then there is still a communication problem.
Trust, or the lack of trust by faculty and staff of administration, has been a central
factor contributing to Chabot’s communication problem. Pulling this agenda item
until the next Board meeting will allow Chabot to communicate and strive to build
trust. Even if there is no change in the proposed budget cuts, allowing a bit more
time could yield dividends far greater than dollars and cents.
[I clarified that the Senate resolution did not stipulate the March Board meeting and
that the March 7th date that Dr. Carlson mentioned was a workshop and not a
Board meeting. The next board meeting would be on March 21st. Dr. Cota pointed
out that the March 7th Board “meeting” was at Chabot, which was in Chabot’s
favor. The March 7th meeting would allow for an update and feedback to the Board
and that the item could return for action at the March 21st meeting.]
Thank you,
Chad Mark Glen
The main case President Glen brought forth is that Chabot had approved the
Program Revitalization/Discontinuance Process (PR/DP) document on October 27,
before Dr. Carlson put the first budget cuts proposal forward, which was on
November 7th. He made this case to Dr. Cota to correct her belief that the PR/DP
passed after the budget cuts were first being proposed. Eventually, Dr. Cota said
she would not have an issue if Dr. Carlson pulled the budget cuts item. Dr.
Carlson said he disagreed with the proposal for a delay, but offered to have it
pulled. He probably did so because there appeared to be a possibility that his
proposal may have been voted down.
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When President Glen had asked for an extension at the Board meeting,
immediately after he forwarded the Senate’s resolution, Susan Sperling, who was
there, reminded him that the Senate did not ask for an extension and President
Glen did clarify this fact at the Board meeting.
The next Board meeting takes place on March 7 and it will be here at Chabot, but
is a workshop. The next regular Board meeting takes place on March 21 and that
is when likely the Board of Trustees will consider a budget cuts proposal from
Chabot College again. This extension is possible because the District has no
intention to lay off any full-time faculty members, so decisions do not need to be
made before the March 15 deadline, the last day a tenured or tenure track faculty
member can get a pink slip. Classified members are given only 30 days notice.
President Glen noted that some classified staff are not pleased about the delay.
President Glen wants decisions regarding budget cuts to go through the shared
governance process through an Ad Hoc Committee as proscribed in the PR/DP
document. The time frame would be expedited, however this is the process that
was agreed to, was approved by both colleges. The Senate feels Dr. Carlson
ignored a verbal contract agreement, simply by making the case that the document
had not been formally approved by the Board at the time.
An issue was brought up about one time money proposals Dr. Carlson announced
to faculty and staff just this week. Where was there evidence of faculty and staff
input on these documents? President Glen said that Dr. Cota had agreed that
there must be participation from faculty and staff on these proposals as well.
Mike Absher believed that President Glen did the right thing by asking for an
extension. He also pointed out that Dr. Carlson’s claims that the PR/DP could be
waived by Dr. Cota, but President Glen had appeared to persuade Dr. Cota of the
value of our shared governance process. It was very important for us to have
voted in this PR/DP because we now had it in writing and so it is appropriate that
we now make budget cut decisions by this process.
Francisco Zermeño believes the 1.4 million dollar budget cut requirement is a
sham. He believes such an ad hoc committee should be formed right away so that
the study of the numbers of our growth and what exactly is being planned has
appropriate oversight and input.
President Glen pointed out that while Dr. Cota had set the February 21 deadline,
that Dr. Carlson could have asked for it to be pushed back. He did not do so. Dr.
Cota said she might have given a different deadline if Dr. Carlson had asked.
President Glen finally got an updated book of the budget cuts and the numbers so
the committee can work with them.
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Francisco Zermeño had questions on the numbers. Up until now, there were no
clear figures as to how much it would take to keep the Television Studio open, for
example.
Stephanie Zappa raised the question that the Program and Classified cuts might
be treated separately. Furthermore, programs that are on the docket are intercurricular, and discontinuing particular programs will have impacts in the future. If
cuts occur as they are now slated, it would take years to rebuild them, recapture
the growth that has been achieved. President Glen and Zappa both agreed that
any affected classified members should be notified now of possible lay-offs or
reassignments, while the fate of programs continues to be discussed. Frustrations
were voiced how Dental Hygiene faculty were not notified of an eliminated
classified position, and how even President Glen was not notified of the Television
Station being cut beforehand.
Michael Thompson felt a little bit uncomfortable of “changing things on the fly.”
He is unsettled how communication regarding the cuts has been presented to us.
He feels as if decisions are still already made, without any real input from the
Senate, even. President Glen said that Dr. Carlson and he will meet the next day
based on what is decided, today. Michael still felt that the budget cuts are still
entrusted upon the Senate. Dr. Carlson had to be dragged into the shared
governance process. Michael says how can we have much confidence? Does Dr.
Carlson “get it” as to how important decisions such as these need to be made
collegially? How sincere will his listening to us be? President Glen said that Dr.
Carlson’s past behavior has been a bit stubborn. However, when Dr. Carlson does
see when he is wrong about something, he will respond. The challenge is that Dr.
Carlson currently does not think he handled this situation inappropriately. Dr.
Carlson needs to understand if his attitude does not change, faculty at large will
not trust him. There is concern among the Senate that this institution could be
damaged in the long term with the budget cuts as proposed.
President Glen said there were a couple of other options we could take besides
the Ad Hoc Committee of the PR/DP. IPBC could be the deciding body, but
President Glen and IPBC felt that was not appropriate.
Jane Church pointed out that there is a lot of disinformation going around
regarding the budget cuts. The reason the Career Center is being de-funded is
that it was dependent on VATEA funds, and they run out after this year. While the
position is being eliminated in the Dental Hygiene Program, the classified person
was not laid off and was in fact promoted to be the administrative assistant for
Counseling. The person was given choices and was consulted about where to go.
Members from Administration went out of their way to help this person.
She also reminded that during the Fall semester to the present, we have had four
managers coming from faculty. They were faced with tough, arduous budget
challenges and had to make very difficult decisions. They continued to have
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faculty in mind and they saw everything that was being proposed, and had to really
focus on how every penny was being spent. While she cannot speak for the final
decisions, she did not see any viciousness, but she also pointed out that the
process can be improved in coming to these decisions. Dr. Ron Taylor agreed
that administration did look at everything with careful consideration.
David Fouquet said that decisions can be sharply affected by “jury instructions
given by the judge.” He thinks just as when a jury will sometimes come with a
verdict by rather closed instructions from a judge that may be the situation we have
been in (coming from Dr. Carlson). He pointed out that since the March 15
deadline for pink slips does not apply to Chabot College, the deadline dates being
given to us are coming from Dr. Carlson, not Dr. Cota. He further pointed out that
he does not believe in the District’s budget claims—he has seen how they have
rendered and displayed the numbers. He does not believe we are in such a huge
deficit. He sees similar over budgeting practices that happened in the 2004/2005
year being done again this year. David believes we may be ½ million in the red for
this year, similar to last. President Glen said the Chancellor and the Board believe
these are the real numbers. David said we need to analyze those numbers to see
what the real budget is. The current rendering of the need for budget cuts, etc.
seem “riddled with fallacies.” For example, one area in the December statement
documented one proposed cut to be a savings of $180,000 when the official Board
packet had the savings for that area down to $128,000 and the savings may even
be less because, if the particular cut happened, we would lose students that would
have otherwise generated revenue. Whenever David has tried to present numbers
when Dr. Carlson is in the room, he feels he is being “treated like a potted plant.”
David Fouquet stated that Dr. Cota had invited Tom De Witt and David to read the
numbers, but the meeting did not happen (it was supposed to have happened in
January). David reaffirmed again his concern that many of the savings proposed
from the cuts do not factor in the students we would lose which would make any
savings smaller, at best.
Mike Absher gave a point of order that it had been 46 minutes focusing on this
Action Item and Action still has not been taken.
Stephanie Zappa said that when she agreed to serve on the Senate this year, she
was expecting it to be a positive experience by taking part of shared governance
and yet then is told “I’m the President and I’m making the decisions.” Instead of
being faculty who are participants in the process we are told we are a pain, or that
we only focus on the negative on the budget cuts, or we are told we are “whiners.”
The purpose here is not to be “us vs. them”—the ultimate goal is to have actual
dialogue. Currently, faculty are not included in ways they should be. “I believe the
College President does not even begin to understand our programs that are on the
chopping Block.”
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President Glen passed out the final draft of the PR/DP. David Fouquet said he
was concerned about President Carlson’s argument that we cannot follow this
document, but President Glen said he disagrees with Dr. Carlson. While the
timeline obviously cannot be followed (it is a two year process in the document), it
can still be a guideline.
John Komisar pointed out the continuing frustration on how Dr. Carlson has told
us that certain programs are being cut for good, and then at other times, they are
not permanently cut. Dr. Susan Sperling said that Marcia Corcoran had made the
recommendation that ISLS be suspended for a year, and that she and the faculty
had the impression that would be the case, but then later they were told that the
program would be permanently cut. John Komisar asked Ron Taylor to comment
and explain what the difference between suspending and eliminating programs is.
Dr. Taylor said that cutting the ISLS program has to be seen in concert with all the
other cuts. He’s happy to hear alternatives. There was a lot of discussion of
savings that were looked at regarding possible cuts. There was skepticism of
whether stating a suspension of a program could work.
Francisco Zermeño thanked David Fouquet for his discussion of seeing likely
discrepancies in the numbers. He believes we should recommend there be no
cuts.
President Glen stated we could forward three alternatives: 1. There be no cuts. 2.
The PR/DP be followed expeditiously. 3. A worst case scenario, cuts be
proposed.
Page 6 of the PR/DP calls for an Ad Hoc Committee. The formation of the
committee may need to be changed slightly as in this case, the committee would
be looking at multiple areas/programs instead of one committee for a single
program. Sally Stickney asked should there be any subcommittees. President
Glen said that the ad hoc committee should look at key documents such as the
one on Program Review and definitely think qualitatively on three year trends to
see what would be the best proposed cuts. He then asked us to look at page three
to view the quantitative measure.
Jane Church asked what exactly the draft status of the PR/DP is. President Glen
explained that while the Board has not adopted it, it has been approved by both
colleges so the Board should take it seriously.
Mike Absher said that our resolution is based on the assumption that there will be
cuts. The Board in accepting our resolution would want to hear from us how we
want to do it differently. In his opinion, the Board would not expect us to say “don’t
make any cuts.”
President Glen said the timeline, starting on page 4 and some of the particular
deadlines and certain processes will need to be skipped, and a timeline further
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redefined. A very streamlined process will be drafted for this unique process soon.
Ron Taylor pointed out that there would be one challenge. The Ad Hoc
Committee includes a Vice President of a relevant area—however for multi-areas
as this Committee will be overseeing—there is not a clear designation as to which
Vice President is best to be on this committee.
Ming Ho said that appointments will depend on the combined Programs, and to
look at the requirements for faculty to be included. President Glen said that when
discussing this issue with Dr. Carlson, the President that the challenge here is that
the committee can only include anyone who is NOT affected by the cuts. For
example, President Glen cannot be on this committee because the TV station is a
part of his program.
President Glen said that there will be one Ad Hoc Committee—this committee will
meet with individual programs for presentations. Stephanie Zappa believes the
committee will need to be large. She still has issues that affected faculty cannot sit
on it.
Mike Absher moved that there be an Ad Hoc Committee, which will include one
faculty member from IPBC, one from the Budget Committee, one from the
Academic Senate, one from the Faculty Association, one “floater” (at large faculty
member from anywhere), one Classified Senate member, one Classified Union
member the College President and one administrator. These positions would be
appointed by the Academic Senate. Ming Ho seconded. The motion carried.
Norman Buchwald asked with respect to the three options President Glen
mentioned earlier, why there is not a fourth one that really gets at the heart of the
matter. Why are we not demanding that the current District budget allocation
model be changed? It seems that at the beginning of each year, Chabot is told to
be in a deficit, and this is not the first year the college has been forced to make
significant cuts, while Las Positas by comparison, seems to get by unscathed.
Why isn’t the Board taking a serious look at this model which always makes
Chabot seem delinquent when that is really not the case? Mike Absher felt this
was not the time to demand the Board change it, but President Glen does believe
it is at least an opportune time to remind the Board that the Budget Allocation
Model must be given a serious look and to consider changing it, in the future.
Sally Stickney said that people need to be appointed expeditiously and that word
needs to be given to affected Programs quickly.
President Glen said he will let Dr. Carlson know what the Senate’s
recommendations are on the ad hoc committee and the review process. The next
Academic Senate meeting is on March 2nd.
Meeting adjourned at 4:32
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Below are Agenda Items not covered today due to time constraints and will be
covered at a future date:
4.0 DISCUSSION ITEMS
4.1
4.2
4.3
4.4
Program Review and Program Closure Process —Tom Dewit
District Curriculum Council Charge — Chad Mark Glen
Tree Planting and Naming— Francisco Zermeño
Board Policy 2260: Political Activity— Chad Mark Glen
6.0 FUTURE AGENDA ITEMS—
6.1
Counselors Assigned to Divisions— Mike Absher;
6.2
2006-07 Draft Strategic Plan— Laurie Dockter;
6.3
Cheating Update— Chad Mark Glen;
6.4
50% Law State Task Force— Zappa/Zermeño;
6.5
College Council and IPBC Charges
6.6
Program Introduction Process— Ron Taylor;
6.7
Construction Effecting Scheduling of Classes— Stephanie Zappa;
6.8
Curriculum Committee— Mike Absher;
Adjournment— Next Meeting— March 2nd*, 2006
Spring Meetings— 2nd & 4th Thursdays: April 6* & 20*; May 4* & 11*
(*Special Meetings— not on 2nd or 4th Thursday).
N B /CM G
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