Action Item: 11 November 2008
TO:
ACADEMIC SENATE EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE
FROM:
RECORDING SECRETARY
PREPARED BY: RECORDING SECRETARY
Action:
Approval of Minutes
Minutes of the 28 October 2008 AS Executive Committee Meeting
Present: Eve Adler, Teri Bernstein, Suzanne Borghei, Mary Colavito, Judith Douglas, Tina
Feiger, Nancy Hanson, Janet Harclerode, Janie Jones, Amber Katherine, Lesley Kawaguchi,
Lucy Kluckhohn Jones, Walter Meyer, Pete Morris, Melody Nightingale, Eric Oifer, Toni
Randall, Christine Schultz, Eleanor Singleton, Howard Stahl, James Stramel, Michael
Strathearn, Richard Tahvildaran-Jesswein Esau Tovar
Excused: Simon Balm, Lantz Simpson, Sal Veas
Absent: Craig Hammond, Ken Mason, Kathy Sucher, David Zehr
I. Call to Order – President Richard Tahvildaran-Jesswein – meeting called to order at 11:20 a.m.
II. Action Items
A. Approval of the minutes for October 14, 2008; unanimously approved.
B. ASR05-08 Right to Privacy, Howard Stahl, Chair Elections and Rules – To address
concerns about personal information being disclosed without faculty opportunity to opt out.
Right to Privacy
WHEREAS every Californian has a constitutional right to privacy as stated in Article 1 of the
California constitution,
WHEREAS California Civil Code Section 1798 specifically protects personal identifying
information including one’s name, date of birth and age from release without prior written
consent,
WHEREAS the District recently released the names and ages of 570 female employees to
facilitate an external research study without providing any prior opportunity for those women to
opt-in or opt-out of this release,
BE IT RESOLVED that the Academic Senate of Santa Monica College urge the District to
create Board Policy to implement an opt-in and opt-out procedure before any personal data is
disclosed in the future.
Discussion:
Suggestion that there be a process that allows faculty to permit disclosure of information for
the sake of research. Q about how the Senate is involved because the Faculty Assoc would
seem to be more relevant body. Stahl replies that it is not right now a bargaining issue.
Suggestion that more clarity is needed on what the AR seeks to achieve. Richard requests
that there be some work done on the doc before bringing it to the Senate for a vote. Richard
will carry it to the BOT on 11/11. There is consensus on the principle, but it will be tabled
until the next Exec Cmmt when more specific language can be developed for the resolve and
pending a review of what other colleges do regarding this. Clarification that there is no IRV,
but a researcher with an advisory group instead. Richard asks that members send comments
to him and Stahl.
(M/S Kluckhohn Jones/no second) to adopt the AR – motion dies.
C. ASR06-08 SMC Budget Summit – Richard Tahvildaran-Jesswein
No resolution in front of us. Richard, Oifer, and Stahl serve on the Budget Cmmt. Last mtg
Richard and Oifer called for a campus-wide, District-wide summit. College has an $8 million
operating deficit and this year we’re okay due to the reserves. Action is needed. Dr. Tsang’s
position isn’t clear. Richard suggests that we call together managers at a public meeting to
discuss the challenges in Dr. Tsang’s presence for the purpose of developing a blueprint for
a recovery plan. Important for Dr. Tsang to decide how this problem will be dealt with.
The Budget Cmmt unanimously passed the idea of a summit, so Richard would like an AR
demonstrating this.
Discussion:
Mid-year budget cuts are coming and it’s important to begin to address that now. The
community college system is particularly at risk because there’s no $ to pay for growth. Last
year there were 1500 FTES that were unfunded. Q on how this might reflect on the
relationship of goodwill between Richard and Dr. Tsang. Richard doesn’t feel it will
adversely affect that. Administration prefers to delay the meeting date of a summit, but
Richard disagrees. Clarification that there are four administrators on the Budget Cmmt. Q
about whether managers have gotten news of cuts in their own departments. Richard will
ask at their next mtg that there be a rotation and that Lawson and Shimizu advise the
members of the committee to be more accepting of the recommendations that are made.
Mention that PDC funds formerly promised by Dr. Tsang have been cut. Richard explains
that that those funds came from Assoc Students, who had not been consulted. For this
reason, Dr. Tsang pulled the funds. Assoc Students are willing to contribute the funds as
long as students can be meaningfully involved. Q about why DPAC isn’t involved in this
Budget Cmmt discussion. Richard replies that this resolution can move in tandem with
resolutions that come from DPAC.
(M/S Oifer/Douglas) To affirm and support the call for an immediate District-wide
summit budget mtg to address the challenges that lie before us and to craft a
blueprint to address those challenges in the short term. Vote: unanimously in favor.
Discussion:
Q about what we expect or want Dr. Tsang’s reaction to be. Suggestion that we want to
make a move that ends in a response that is truly productive for the college. Comment that
this is an attempt to do that and we need to know how serious the situation is. Comment
that we faculty need to be part of the solution rather than the problem. Important to make
it clear that we’re calling for collaboration, not confrontation. “Whereas” portions could
express this. Q about whether Dr. Tsang is waiting for the hire of a new budget officer.
Response that this is possible. The Standard Model is a positive discussion that we can be
part of to see what we can do to achieve the best to worst case scenarios. In the I.A.
resolved, that could be incorporated. Comment that Dr. Tsang has ultimate responsibility,
so waiting for the new chief business officer shouldn’t be necessary. There is concern that a
college president is able to leave just prior to the problem coming to a head. Stahl reports
from a meeting he and Sucher had with Dr. Tsang in September and felt that Administration
isn’t facing reality and are postponing the bad news. Richard responds that we can be
strengthened as a shared governance body if faculty are at the table during the tough
decisions.
III. Information Items
A. President’s Report – Richard Tahvildaran-Jesswein
1. Accreditation Update – meeting tomorrow at 2:00 p.m. to be introduced to the
technology for posting information online by steering cmmt members
2. ASCCC Plenary November 6-8, 2008 – at Bonaventure Hotel in L.A. Resolution we
passed locally was approved at Area C and a near verbatim resolution had come through
the Acad Senate in 2005. Statewide Senate has been pushing for exactly what we are
asking for. Suggestion that the cmmts aren’t addressing all the issues that were made,
but we can create a new resolution that speaks to the points that were omitted.
3. Student Evaluation Pilot – After some misunderstandings, we requested that the
District throw out evals for contract tenured fac with 16 week courses so any faculty
could volunteer to pilot the new student eval. Waiting to hear back from the District.
4. Full-Time Faculty Ranking Cmmt Update – new hires still at five. 11/14 meeting. 10
positions will be ranked by the cmmt.
B. Committee Reports:
1. Ken Mason, Personnel Policies – has resigned. A replacement will be forthcoming.
IV. Old Business Discussion
V. New Business Discussion
A. Full-Time Faculty Hiring Plan – At leaders’ meetings they’ve agreed to a plan that gets us
to 60%. Q if there’s an ad hoc cmmt that is meeting. Richard responds that there’s only
been one mtg so far but that there will be more that will include Bernstein, Manion, and
Stahl among others.
B. Library faculty have agreed to talk with Richard and Oifer to come to an agreement as to
the challenges for faculty in that area and what solutions might be. The notion of a
department Chair has been removed from the discussion for the moment until there can be
a wider discussion. Election for fac leader in the library is occurring in Nov and this has
now be called off.
C. AR5113 – Program Discontinuance Process –important for the upcoming budget crisis.
Richard feels it’s imp to review the policy because we are now facing a more immediate
problem than we thought.
Discussion:
The last time that programs were discontinued, there wasn’t a viable process being followed.
It needs to conform with shared governance structures. This must be part of the overall
budget discussion, but important to emphasize that we are opposed to program
discontinuance. Concern that we don’t track student performance in programs well enough.
There needs to be an official tracking mechanism in place. The AR needs to include all of
this including timelines. Concern that this will cause a rift with the FA and that this brings
tension between new hires and cutting of programs. Richard declares that we are most
definitely not in favor of cutting programs – our intent is just the opposite. We advocate
that cuts be kept away from the classroom and that no employee should lose a job. This will
be looked at by the Curriculum Cmmt. Suggestion that “add protections to” the program
discontinuation process. In two weeks, Richard will bring copies of the most recent AR and
discuss this further. May not be good timing to address this before the budget summit as it
may give the wrong impression of what our intentions are. Richard states we want to be
proactive in having a policy that protects programs at the college.
VI. Announcements – Discussion of chronic senator absenteeism. Richard has talked with Dept
Chairs about this.
VII. Adjournment – (M/S Feiger/Katherine ) to adjourn at 12:35 p.m.