CAS Senate Executive Committee Meeting Minutes
January 8, 2016
In attendance: Jean Ippolito (Chair), Kathleen Commendador, Yucheng Qin, Chris Lauer, Mazen Hamad,
Becky Ostertag, Yoshiko Fukushima, Jene Michaud, Matt Platz, Susan Brown
Approval of minutes from 12/11/15 Executive Committee meeting
Minutes approved 6-0-0
Chair’s Report /Old Business (Jean Ippolito):
- Division Elections: UHPA ruled that divisions in CAS are permitted to develop their own Division Chair
election procedures. The Humanities Division election will proceed with electing a new Chair according
to the procedures developed in Spring 2015.
- Update on the reorganization task force: Faculty Congress delayed voting on appointing
representatives to a reorganization task force until the faculty of each college had been consulted.
Tracy Wiegner, Kathleen Commendador, Jan Ray and Chris Lauer were asked to poll their respective
divisions. Objections are due by Wednesday.
Kathleen Commendador: The Nursing program recommended a different primary representative and
wants to be sure that the program’s interests are respected.
Vice Chancellor Platz: The task force’s role will not be to develop a model and push it through. It’s likely
that five to six models will be developed. In the end, the power of decision lies in negotiation between
the administration and UHPA. Four units that are roughly equal in size and more internally
homogeneous in culture might be more efficient and improve first-to-second-year retention.
Chris Lauer: The Humanities Division has been asked for opinions on the proposed representatives, and
no one has objected.
Point of order: Does Faculty Congress’s decision to consult colleges before appointing representatives
violate policy? Answer (Jean Ippolito): Congress merely postponed a vote until the various Senates were
consulted, which is in accord with policy. However, the bylaws will still need to be consulted to
determine if the representatives can be changed without starting the process over again.
- Last month’s motion to rename the newly renovated gym has been postponed until the next Faculty
Congress meeting.
APC Report (Jene Michaud):
Nothing to report.
CRC Report (Chris Lauer):
Nothing new to report
New Business:
New course proposals and department voting procedures: There has been some confusion over how
votes on proposed courses ought to proceed before being submitted to Division Chairs and the
Curriculum Review Committee, particularly for cross-listed courses and interdisciplinary programs.
Susan Brown: The new Dean will soon ask all departments and programs for by-laws. Perhaps
departments and programs that have had problems with the process can update their voting procedures
for new courses.
Yoshiko Fukushima and Jene Michaud: According to the UHPA contract, Lecturers who teach a sufficient
number of units are supposed to be represented in all voting decisions, but the contract doesn’t specify
a number. This is something that department by-laws should consider.
Yucheng Qin: Since developing new courses is usually better for our students, we should simplify
procedures for developing new courses as much as possible.
A motion was suggested but not made to ask the APC and CRC to work together to develop guidelines
for voting procedures on new programs and courses.
Associate Dean Search (Susan Brown): The Senate should send out a call for the Associate Dean Position
on February 1st and review applications as quickly as possible.
At the Faculty Congress Executive Committee, someone commented that the Senate Executive
Committee doesn’t represent CAS, since the Senate is officially comprised of all CAS faculty—which,
however, never appear in large enough numbers for a quorum. Perhaps we can adjust our bylaws to
match current practice in which the Executive Committee votes on important matters.
Meeting adjourned at 3:07.