Minutes*
Faculty Consultative Committee
Thursday, June 16, 1994
12:30 - 3:00
Dale Shephard Room, Campus Club
Present:
Judith Garrard (chair), Carl Adams, John Adams, Mario Bognanno, Lester Drewes, Dan
Feeney, James Gremmels, Robert Jones, Morris Kleiner, Karen Seashore Louis, Geoffrey
Maruyama, Irwin Rubenstein, Shirley Zimmerman
Regrets:
Toni McNaron
Absent:
Kenneth Heller, Harvey Peterson
Guests:
Senior Vice President E. F. Infante
Others:
Rich Broderick (University Relations)
[In these minutes: Nominees and appointments; administrator credentials; (with Dr. Infante:)
reorganization, administrator compensation; resolution on reorganization; search committees]
1.
Report of the Chair
Professor Garrard convened the meeting at 12:30 and began by noting that there would soon be
another vacancy on the Committee: Professor Louis has accepted a 50%-time appointment as Associate
Dean of the College of Education, which renders her ineligible to serve on FCC. Professor Garrard
explained that she had used the list of names the Committee had previously developed to identify
replacement members; the individual has agreed to serve if elected. The Committee unanimously
approved the nomination of Thomas Burk, Forest Resources, to serve the remaining one year of Professor
Louis's term.
Professor Garrard also reported that Professor Jones has been asked to serve in the office of
Associate Vice President Josie Johnson; Professor Jones's administrative appointment, however, will be
less than 50% time, and Committee members urged that he remain on the Committee. He has agreed to
do so.
Professor Garrard then noted that when Professor Bognanno accepted the position of Associate to
the President, he resigned from two committees, the Blue Ribbon Committee on Teaching and Research
(appointed by FCC) and as chair of the Grievance Review Committee (approved by the Senate). In his
place, she has appointed Professor Kenneth Heller to the Blue Ribbon Committee. In accord with the
action of the Senate Consultative Committee earlier this month, she has asked Professor John Imholte to
serve as interim chair of the Grievance Advisory Committee, with the understanding that his name will
*
These minutes reflect discussion and debate at a meeting of a committee of the University of Minnesota
Senate or Twin Cities Campus Assembly; none of the comments, conclusions, or actions reported in these minutes
represent the views of, nor are they binding on, the Senate or Assembly, the Administration, or the Board of Regents.
Faculty Consultative Committee
June 16, 1994
2
likely be submitted to the Senate for formal approval in the Fall. Professor Imholte agreed to serve.
There are three other committees being appointed, Professor Garrard reported:
One, at the request of the President, will consist of faculty governance representatives to advise
him on the reorganization transition. She and Professor (John) Adams met and agreed that the committee
should consist of the chair and vice chair of FCC (Professors John and Carl Adams) and the chairs of the
three committees represented on FCC: (Educational Policy, Professor Heller; Faculty Affairs, Professor
Feeney; and Finance and Planning, Professor Gray).
Two others will be appointed at the request of Senior Vice President Infante; they will be small
groups to advise him on the appointment of interim vice presidents for research and for student affairs.
He asked for the names of two faculty members for each committee. Professor Garrard reported that she
and Professor (John) Adams had identified possible candidates but had not resolved the issue. The
Committee then identified individuals to serve.
With respect to the organization, and reorganization, of the central administration, one Committee
member asked that the record show that there is clearly no lack of individuals with academic
backgrounds serving as the senior officers of the University, contrary to the assertions made that
appeared in recent minutes of the Committee on Finance and Planning. Of the 14 most senior officers,
12 come from professorial backgrounds. The only two who do not (Senior Vice President for Finance
and Operations and the General Counsel) probably APPROPRIATELY do not come from the academy.
Any claim that the central administration is not staffed with academics is uninformed and should not go
unchallenged.
2.
Discussion with Senior Vice President Infante
Professor Garrard next welcomed Senior Vice President Infante to the meeting, who began his
comments by reviewing his request for nominations for the two committees to advise him on interim vice
presidential appointments. He noted that the present structure of central administration will remain in
place until January 1, so interim appointments will be necessary.
Dr. Infante recalled that a transition team had been appointed for the health sciences, when they
were being reorganized, and reported that the President has asked him and Senior Vice President
Erickson to establish a similar team for the reorganization; he will serve as chair. There are a number of
tasks at hand.
--
Work on the relationship between the governance system and the new provosts; over the
next several months, policies will need to be revised and some traditions examined.
--
Study and make suggestions about the appropriate relationship between the central
administration and the provosts and deans. It will be important to be sure that things are
not being done twice, whether in research, government relations, fund-raising, and so on.
At the same time, there is no need for symmetry among the provosts' offices; a central
career counseling office may make sense for one provost and not for another, for example.
Very important will be the relationships among the staffs.
Faculty Consultative Committee
June 16, 1994
--
3
Examine the operations within Academic Affairs and Finance and Operations. The
University is being divided into sectors, which is academically appropriate; support
services, however, should probably be organized in a functional manner rather than being
divided up. There will be a meeting of people in support service areas to seek support for
this approach. Dr. Infante said he wanted to try to staff the provosts' offices so there is no
net increase in administrative staff.
Discussion then turned to the biennial request and the strategic choices the University faces. A
number of points were touched on in the exchanges between Committee members and Dr. Infante.
Dr. Infante also reported that he has been working on the first draft of a compensation policy for
administrators who hold tenured faculty rank. The basic element of the policy is that there will be two
components to the salary of such individuals: the base faculty salary and the administrative salary. This
would resolve the difficulty of negotiating with administrators returning to the faculty; the faculty salary
would be known in advance. Several points were made:
--
The policy should be directed to the Compensation Working Group for information.
--
This was the policy in place for years; why was it abandoned? No one knew, nor could
any reason for dropping it be identified.
--
"Negotiations" between the administration and the departing administrator can be
embarrassing, often involve lawyers, and the individual really has no bargaining position.
This would end those difficulties.
--
The administrator's superior should make the decision about BOTH parts of the salary,
because a full-time administrator will have foregone teaching and research; the faculty
portion of the salary, if left in the hands of the dean and department head, would not be
raised because little or no faculty work would be done. To have it any other way, it was
argued, would be a strong disincentive for faculty to accept administrative appointments-even though they might do so, as a good citizen, for a few years.
--
A fixed policy may not be possible. There will likely be some individuals who will not
accept this arrangement; the University will have to decide how badly it wants to hire him
or her. But the idea is a good one.
Committee members turned to the central administration reorganization. Several issues were
raised.
One Committee member noted that the College of Biological Sciences (CBS) has occupied
different positions in the several versions of reorganization--but that none of the plans have taken account
of the links between the biological sciences and the health sciences. Another inquired about the financial
authority of the provosts and whether or not they would participate in University financial planning (yes,
according to Dr. Infante). There are also problems with the location of the College of Human Ecology.
Will the coordinate campuses be at a disadvantage, with decisions decentralized, with respect to
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June 16, 1994
4
sabbaticals, single-quarter leaves, and research and teaching grants? Will these be centrally funded or
will each campus have to pay for them out of their own budget?
Dr. Infante pointed out that these are second-order questions, but ones that the President does want
worked out. It is not clear what should be centralized and what should be decentralized, he said, and
while he favors decentralization as much as possible, it is clear some activities will have to be
centralized. In the case of promotion and tenure, the provosts and chancellors will have the final word (as
is now the case with the Duluth chancellor).
With respect to the collegiate organizations, Dr. Infante argued that this is an ADMINISTRATIVE
organization, not an intellectual one. The clusters will consider the intellectual issues, and there is one
for the biological sciences. But the problem, it was pointed out, is that the language of the reorganization
calls for protecting the core of the University and to be guided by academic issues, not geographic--by
administratively separating the biological sciences from CLA and IT, coordination of core academic
programs becomes difficult, and that is a central academic concern. The failure to recognize the
connection with the health sciences is also a problem.
Dr. Infante acknowledged that there are problems with the structure of the biological sciences at
the University; since they are everywhere, they are nowhere, and do not receive the visibility they should.
One Committee member pointed out that there are two discussions going on: First, there are
existing units and they must be in some administrative structure, so CBS must be somewhere. Second,
the biological sciences exist in various units and there must be thought given to their future. Dr. Infante
agreed, and noted that only the first is being addressed. It is assurances about the second that must be
made, it was said.
Committee members then discussed for some while the span of authority of the provost for the
arts, sciences, and professional schools. The Committee made it clear it supported the reorganization,
but also wanted it understood that there should be no assumption that all the problems will somehow
work themselves out--they must be addressed as the reorganization is taking place.
Two issues raised by the deans were the possibility of an additional provost (which Committee
members agreed might be considered) and the possible conflict between the Academic Affairs vice
presidents (research, undergraduate education, and so on) and the provosts. One way to address the
question of the provosts is to try to determine, as had the Campbell Committee, whether or not the
professional schools are to be a part of the undergraduate mission. If not, a separate provost might be
considered; if they are, then the existing proposal should be implemented. It was also noted that the
President is also Chancellor of the Twin Cities campus.
Professor Garrard thanked Dr. Infante for joining the meeting.
3.
Resolution on Reorganization
The Committee turned its attention to a draft resolution prepared by Professor (Carl) Adams
pursuant to the discussion at the last meeting of the Committee. After making editorial changes, the
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June 16, 1994
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Committee unanimously adopted the resolution, which follows.
The Faculty Consultative Committee commends President Hasselmo for initiating
actions to improve the effectiveness, accountability, and efficiency of the University's
central administration through a restructuring of roles and responsibilities. While we
understand that organizational performance is affected by many factors other than
organization structure (for example, staffing and systems), we expect that the proposed
changes will simplify the lines of authority for major operating units, clarify system and
campus responsibilities, and differentiate staff and line activities. We also expect that the
proposed changes will better distribute administrative responsibilities.
We are mindful that the proposed changes are potentially very disruptive to
individuals and offices and therefore should be pursued with appropriate consultation and
care. Nevertheless, we believe that it is critical to the success of these changes that an initial
first approximation of reassignments of individuals and responsibilities be accomplished as
quickly as possible. Many important details remain to be determined before the proposed
outline of changes can become fully operational. With this in mind, we support President
Hasselmo's leadership, his outline for the reorganization of the central administration, and
we urge the President to move with urgency to see that all the important details are
determined. We stand ready to assist in this endeavor in whatever ways that we can.
Professor Garrard was asked to send the resolution to the President and to the members of the
Board of Regents.
4.
Search Committees
The Committee then developed a list of faculty nominees to serve on the five search committees
that will be appointed for the two new provost and three vice presidential positions (arts, sciences, and
professional schools; agricultural, biological, and environmental sciences; research and Dean of the
Graduate School; undergraduate education and student development; outreach). [The names were
provided to the President the day following the meeting.]
Professor Garrard adjourned the meeting at 3:20.
-- Gary Engstrand
University of Minnesota