Faculty Senate Minutes for April 21, 2004

President Auchmuty called the April 21 Faculty Senate meeting to order in the Farish Hall Kiva at 12:15 p.m.

MEMBERS PRESENT: [32]
BUS:     W. Chin, S. Khumawala
CLASS: V. Brady, K. Brown, B. Byrnes, S. Craig, P. Gingiss, J. Kotarba, J. Middents, J. Rushing,
               G. San Miguel, G. Trail
EDU:      S. McNeil, A. Warner, C. White
ENGR:    S. Kleis, G. Paskusz, D. Zimmerman
LAW: S. Huber
LIB:      S. Ferimer
NSM:   G. Auchmuty, D. Blecher, P. Copeland, J. Eichberg, G. Etgen, E. Leiss, D. Wells
OPT:    R. Manny
PHA:   C. Pedemonte
TECH:   K. Greenwood, C. Goodson
GSSW: H. Karger

MEMBERS ABSENT: [20]
ARCH: D. Kacmar
BUS:     M. Parks, D. Rude(w/E)
CLASS: W. Herendeen, A. Jacobson, B. Lange, R. Murray, D. Papell, F. Schiff, R. Weldon
EDU:     M. Connell
ENGR:   T. Cleveland, O. Ghazzaly, T. Helwig
HRM:   K. Titz(w/E)
LAW:   P. Linzer
LIB:     M. Thomson
NSM: A. Ignatiev, K. Kadish
OPT:   S. Quintero

VISITORS:
Thad “Bo” Smith (UHS Board of Regent Chairman), John Rudley (UHS Vice Chancellor and UH Vice President for Administration & Finance), Charles Shomper (UHS Vice Chancellor and UH Vice President for Information Technology), Dona Hamilton (UHS Vice Chancellor and UH Vice President for Legal Affairs and General Counsel), Elwyn Lee (UHS Vice Chancellor and UH Vice President for Student Affairs), Elaine Charlson (UHS Associate Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs and UH Associate Vice President for Academic and Faculty Affairs), Ed Hugetz (UHS Assistant Vice Chancellor and UH Assistant Vice President for Planning & University Outreach), Ed Apodaca (Associate Vice President for Enrollment Management and Admissions), Jerome Freiberg (former Senator and Chair of FS-CoUG), Robert Wilson (UH Chief of Police), Malcolm Davis (UH Police Captain), Roger Byars (UH Police Captain), Brian McKinney (Director, Academic Program Management)

ANNOUNCEMENTS:
Pres. Auchmuty said today is national administrative assistant day and the Senate would like to thank its staff. Mary Brantley, Staff Associate, and Brenda Jones, Office Coordinator, were presented with yellow roses.

The next meeting of the Faculty Senate will be Wednesday, May 12, at 12:15 p.m. in the Kiva of Farish Hall. The guest speaker will be Dave Maggard, UH Athletics Director.

KUDOS:
The Faculty Senate offers kudos and congratulations to the following winners of the Excellence in Research and Scholarship Award: Shiv Halasyamani, Assistant Professor of Chemistry; Steven Blanke, Associate Professor of Biology and Biochemistry; and Paul Hardin, Professor of Biology and Biochemistry.

Kudos also go to this year’s Enron Teaching Excellence Award winners: Lonny Hoffman, Assistant Professor of Law; Carolyn Boone, Associate Professor of Theatre; Charles Dalton professor of Mechanical Engineering; and William Monroe, Professor of English and Associate Dean of the Honors College.

The Senate also offers kudos to the 2004 John and Rebecca Moores Professors: Mark Doty, Professor of English, and again, Paul Hardin from NSM.

Finally, special kudos go to Allan Jacobson, Professor of Chemistry, who has received the 2004 Esther Farfel Award.

REPORT FROM AND DISCUSSION WITH FACULTY SENATE PRESIDENT: Giles Auchmuty
Pres. Auchmuty welcomed the UHS Board of Regents Chairman, Thad “Bo” Smith, to the Senate meeting.

Pres. Auchmuty said the Faculty Senate Commission on University Governance (Fs-CoUG) has been constituted. The four administrative appointees are Elaine Charlson, UHS Associate Vice Chancellor and UH Associate Vice President for Academic and Faculty Affairs; Nancy Rapoport, Dean, Law Center; John Antel, Dean, College of Liberal Arts and Social Sciences; and Earl Smith, Dean, College of Optometry. The first meeting will be April 26, at 1:30 p.m.

Pres. Auchmuty said he had received a copy of the student survey conducted in 2003 by the Dean of Students office (available in the Faculty Senate office). Sen. Wells, Chair of the Educational Policies and Student Affairs Committee, has a copy as well. The survey covered many items. The items of main concern to students were: (1) parking; (2) lack of retail establishments near the campus; and (3) course/section availability. Pres. Auchmuty said it surprised him that students, not faculty, were experiencing difficulty with parking. The first point about this is that the administration is revisiting the question of where to place the new parking garage, an item that was discussed at two Faculty Senate meetings. The other point is that Dr. Rudley and the administration are planning to add 825 new parking spaces in six different areas around the campus. Of these, 770 will be student spaces, 35 for faculty and 20 for visitors. The estimated cost is about $2.4 million or an average cost of more than $3,000 per parking space. The administration is trying to address the parking problem.

The Faculty Handbook revision is almost finished. It should be available by the end of this week, but it will take a little while to be put on the Web.

The Faculty Senate has been asked to help organize the inauguration of Dr. Gogue as the UH System Chancellor and UH President early in the fall. The Scholarship & Community Committee has agreed to work on this proposal and Pres. Auchmuty will form an ad-hoc committee to plan the event. He has asked the Senates of UH-Clear Lake, UH-Downtown and UH-Victoria to participate as well as the Student Regent. At this stage there is nothing planned, not even the venue in which to hold it. Suggestions about what to include or exclude are welcome (FSPres@uh.edu). The preference is to keep it simple, but to make it an interesting, aspiring occasion for us. It really should be a celebration.

ADDRESS BY AND DISCUSSION WITH UNIVERSITY OF HOUSTON SYSTEM BOARD OF REGENTS CHAIR: Thad “Bo” Smith
Mr. Smith thanked Pres. Auchmuty for the opportunity to share some time with the Senate. He said he is very honored to be on the Board of Regents and very honored to be a part of a team that is in place at this time of a major sea change in the life of the University. Why? One of the reason is what is going on and will go on in the region. Stop and think. There will be 1.5 million more people by 2015. A lot of the upside of that number will be driven by what goes on here. Dr. Murray said that Houston’s growth historically is job driven growth; not a lot of people come to Houston to retire. People come to find work or go to school.

The other thing that is going to challenge UH is the demographic change that will take place. Mr. Smith said if he is not mistaken, today Harris County has 4 million people. Of this number, almost 60% are Hispanic and African American. This region can’t prosper unless a large number of the population sees the benefits and the merits of higher education and that creates challenges for the University and for the City of Houston. UH has to be the engine that drives diversification and the re-training of the region’s population. That is one of great goals that UH has to achieve.

Where does UH go? Access must be balanced with quality and the University of Houston System has to do both. It is capable of doing both. If the UH System is managed well, it could set the model for higher education in the United States.

The Board of Regents retreat was very productive. The regents heard about population growth and how UHS can address these needs. The main thing is how does the Board of Regents, the universities, the administration, the faculty, and everybody start thinking system and take advantage of the components? How does the UHS break the silence? Does that sound familiar? This isn’t a negative. This isn’t a criticism of anybody. This is organizational development. There has been a tendency to be silent. UHS can’t achieve what it needs to with these challenges without breaking the silence.

Stop and think about the UH main campus. One of the challenges that Mr. Smith gave everyone this weekend was to come up with a better name for the main campus. The same thing goes for UHD. Downtown has a tremendous challenge. Mr. Smith said for now he would use Cullen Campus for UH. If UH wants to be one of the great universities in the United States, heavy on research, great on teaching, great on providing well educated people, with a great Law School, great Engineering, etc., if UH wants that to happen, what has to happen? The administration has to start looking into enrollment management. It has to start looking into more facilities. It has to start looking at teacher-student ratio. Mr. Smith said he heard that UH’s student-teacher ratio was 22 to 1. He added that he didn’t know what the right number is, but he knows it is an issue if this University doesn’t have enough well trained, well qualified faculty. How does UH get more faculty? It takes recruiting. It takes money to retain faculty. Faculty have to be shown that there is an upward mobility for them. There is a whole series of things that have to take place, including strategic, tactical planning for the main campus to get the best quality.

The Board came out of the weekend retreat with a feeling of what it wants to do and what will it take to do it? The Board charged Dr. Gogue and his team to come back with some very specific resource requirements, organizational requirements, personnel requirements, money, buildings, and all of the things that if would take to achieve some of the goals that were discussed. For example, the Board requested a timeline and a sense of what has to be done by the Board of Regents, by the administration, by the faculty and by the community. The same thing applies to UHD. UHD currently has an enrollment of about 12,000. It will probably be pushing 20,000 to 25,000 if it is going to feed the work force needed in this area. What does UHS need to do in the Highway 290 area? If one looks at the demographic growth in Houston, it comes from Montgomery County and to the West all the way back down to Pearland. Everybody can’t come to the main campus; everybody can’t come to UHD. The MITSI has worked well in Sugarland where UHS moved to its clients. What kind of place does UHS need to serve the Highway 290 area?

The Board has discussed Distance Learning. UHS has made a lot of progress. There are lots of examples of distance learning programs. The Board has challenged Dr. Gogue and his team to come back and tell it where UHS is with distance education and give a sense of where these programs have to go and what it is going to take to do that.

Mr. Smith said he would like to listen to the faculty, get feedback and have the faculty ask him questions. This is a chance to say please consider this, etc. This is an unfiltered opportunity for faculty to communicate with the Chair of the Board of Regents.

Sen. Craig said his concern is UH faculty. UH has been on a very tight budget for a while. A lot of faculty are under physical stress. Sen. Craig said he did a study that said faculty salaries have fallen behind by 22% since 1990. In addition there are too few faculty. UH has only 825 full-time, tenured or tenure-track faculty. It used to have over 1000 so UH has lost 20% of its faculty. UH used to have 30,000 students and now it has 36,000 students, that’s 20% more students. The student to faculty ratio of 22 to 1 isn’t accurate. For full time equivalent faculty numbering 825 and 36,000 student, the ratio is more like 45 to 1. Harvard or Princeton have 7,000 faculty and so his biggest concern is that UH’s faculty have been stressed for a while. Retention is going to be hard.

Mr. Smith said he doesn’t think there is a single answer to the issue. There are multiple answers to the issue. One of the things the Board of Regents needs out of the next phase of the strategic planning process is specifics. Regents know it is an issue, but what is to be done about it? Yes, one component is to start a comprehensive campaign to raise more money for more chairs and for more stipends. But what other things have to be done? Mr. Smith said from he has heard, he doesn’t think that UH is unique in having a deficit of faculty. He added that he didn’t think UH was ever going to be in a situation like Harvard or Yale. How does the UHS utilize distance learning? Mr. Smith said something that just knocked him down out during the Regents retreat was information about community college graduates. It was mentioned that a lot of people think student get less education at a community college than at a university; however, community college graduates who go to A&M, Texas, and Houston graduate at the same pace as, if not better than, the people who enter universities as freshman or sophomores. In other words, they are probably better prepared and better students than some university freshman and sophomores.

Mr. Smith said he didn’t know whether that information is right or wrong but it shocked him. He asked why and somebody replied, “Who do you think we use to teach freshman and sophomore courses?” UH is not using as much of its full-time faculty as community colleges do. Again, it gets into accreditation issues. Mr. Smith said he asking the faculty and administration to address that issue. He added he doesn’t want to hear that UH should throw more money into it. Money is one of the questions, but what else should be done?

Sen. Copleland said that Mr. Smith had mentioned that UH ought to become the best urban university it can be. Why set the University’s sights so low? Everyone ought to be saying that UH needs to be a good university, a great university. It should go up against UCLA. Mr. Smith said he doesn’t have any problem with that. What he wants is to differentiate UH from other Texas universities; he doesn’t want UH to become Texas A&M or the University of Texas. UH has a different mission.

Sen. Huber said he could ask whether the Board of Regents retreat was announced in advance, according to the Open Meetings Act, but he wouldn’t do that. Mr. Smith said he invited Todd Ackerman with the Houston Chronicle to the retreat. He got there about 11:00 a.m. and stayed most of the day.

Sen. Huber said he was delighted to hear about possibility of UH-Downtown growing. It is an opportunity to use the light rail. UHD can double in size without having twice as many parking places. That is part of where the increase should be. What the Board should do with UH is say 30,000 is ample and stop enrollment there. UCLA is a good model. UH has the same kind of advantages. The other model to keep in mind is CUNY for educating the children of immigrants.

Mr. Smith said the Board has challenged itself and the administration to look for models. UHS doesn’t have to invent ways to do things if somebody else is doing something well, there is a model that UHS can study and adapt.

Sen. Byrnes said, along the lines of enrollment management and the teacher/student ratio, what is the primary goal of UH? Is it to take as many students as possible or to really work to graduate the more qualified students?

Mr. Smith said that is a great question. He said he didn’t think it should ever be a goal to take as many students as possible unless the University can give them the support they need to give them a chance to graduate. He said on this campus, across the colleges, UH has to set specific goals based on the capability of faculty and the availability of resources. How many students are there in CLASS right now? Mr. Smith said he would hope that John Antel, Dean of CLASS, Dr. Gogue and Dr. Strickland are looking at whether is that the appropriate number. Should that number be tweaked? Enrollment management for that college or even part of that college is something that needs to be reviewed. One of the greatest things UH has done in the past few years is the Scholars Community where incoming freshman are given mentors and have an opportunity to go through classes together and have a place to go to talk to people. UHD’s open admissions doesn’t mean totally open. They have to figure out a way to graduate their students.

Sen. Trail asked why should this campus be burdened with the football team? Mr. Smith said athletic program has to get a lot closer to fixing itself than it currently does. The Board of Regents, the administration and the Athletic Director are working on this. The program has to raise some funds and get some coaches who know how to win. Mr. Smith said he thinks that all the people on the Board of Regents share his view that great universities have great athletic programs. He said there are lots of models across this country. Will UH’s athletic program ever be self-sufficient? Mr. Smith said he doubted it. Even some of the great ones aren’t, but there doesn’t need to be a drain on resources. They need to step up. They need to raise money. They need to market. They need to be sell tickets. They need to put a product on the field that the fans want to come and see. $10 to go to a basketball game is a bargain, but it’s only a bargain if it is a fun program to watch.

Sen. Copeland said what if athletics doesn’t do those things. Mr. Smith said then they get somebody else who can do those things. There is no excuse for having a failed athletic program.

Sen. Copeland asked isn’t there a way to limit failures simply by giving them a budget? Mr. Smith said they have a budget. Sen. Copeland said they keep spending more money – they spend money like there is no tomorrow. $10 million a year in the past two years. Mr. Smith said they had to buy off two coaches.

Sen. Copeland said that was a financial decision that didn’t have to be made. Put a value on the athletics program. Is it worth $20 million? Then they should spend $20 million. If it is worth $2 million, then we shouldn’t spend more. How much is it worth? Mr. Smith said right now it’s about $7 or $8 million. Sen. Copeland said $10 million a year over the past two years. Mr. Smith said what was set as its goal? $8 million or what? There have to be goals.

Sen. Copeland said the goals have never been close to being realized. Mr. Smith said there is new management.

Sen. Ferimer said UH can’t seem to pick winners. Mr. Smith said he thinks UH has two winners now. Coach Briles is a winner; he is a class act. He is a man of integrity. He is well thought of in his profession. The kids like him and he understands they are here for an education. Mr. Smith added that he thinks Tom Penders is a great one to build a program. Dr. Gogue, Mr. Maggard and he did a lot of due diligence with the situation. The point is well taken.

Sen. Copeland said it is even more important for UH to set a value on athletics. If it is worth $20 million a year, then spending $10 million is indeed a bargain. Mr. Smith said the strategic plan will help him work towards what UH thinks the value is.

Sen. Warner asked how does UH look with the legislature? Is there anything coming out of the special session and what do faculty need to do to work with the Board of Regents and others? Mr. Smith said one thing that he has heard from two-thirds of the leadership is that they are going to find ways to reinstate the excellence money. From the Governor, he has heard that when funding is reinstated he wants UH to bring some programs that he can support that are going to create jobs. There is a willingness to give the University money. It’s a case of what comes first the chicken or the egg. For UH to get research funding, normally it has to have a professor and his team and a lab. One doesn’t just go get the research. Lt. Gov. Dewhurst was on the campus. He is a Houstonian. An interesting comment that he made was that he had no idea how beautiful the campus was. Mr. Smith said he doesn’t think UH does enough to communicate what the heck is going on around here. Every day, every week as a Board of Regents member who is actively engaged, he hears about something new that is been done on this campus or the other campuses. Once the comprehensive campaign is finally established and kicked off, it will help to promote the University but everyone has got to get much better at telling the UH story. It is not one story; it is a multitude of stories. It is so tough to communicate today because everybody is so busy. It is not the job of the Houston Chronicle to tell UH’s story. It is UH’s job. Mr. Smith said he has no idea what is going to come out of this particular legislative session. The Board is preparing for the session that starts in 2005. One of the things that the Regents have to do is to go into with the legislative leadership and tell them what UH is doing to be accountable. Mr. Smith said he has been told that UH is a lot further down the road on the accountability measurement than some of its competitors. Everyone has to communicate.

Sen. Eichberg said one of the primary aspects of UH’s mission is to educate. He asked for Mr. Smith’s impression about supporting the business community here and what is his assessment of the support that UH is going to get? Mr. Smith said it is improving. When he came in as chair, one of the things that he articulated to the Board of Regents was that UH had to reach out to the leadership of Houston. What is leadership? It’s the business community. It’s the medical center. There is another group of leadership in the social area. Mr. Smith said UH has got to make friends with these people. UH has to articulate its needs. Tell them what the challenges are and then get them to help the University. Mr. Smith said he has talked to a lot of CEOs who have retired. He tells what UH is trying to do. The response has been: “tell me what I can do to help you.” UH has got to build the bridges and insure that there is traffic going over the bridges. It’s more than just asking for money. UH needs to get them involved and help them understand what the challenge is. What does the community want? How does UH respond to that? What can they do to support the University? Mr. Smith said he thinks the market place is ready to get behind UH.

Sen. Copeland asked what criteria make a good member of the Board of Regents? Mr. Smith said somebody who has passion for the school. It is somebody who is not trying to use that appointment for a self-serving opportunity. It is somebody who can set his/her own interest aside and articulate the interest and perspective of the UH System. Somebody who will set his/her own preference aside and really do something for the good of the University. Somebody who makes him/herself available, not just for a Board of Regents meeting, but to do the missionary work in the community and find time to go to graduation and find time to come sit down with a dean.

Mr. Smith said he has a request. He has talked about challenges. Mr. Smith said he will give the faculty the same challenge that he gave the administration. It is easy, as an employee of this University, to raise an issue, but the successful organization historically and going forward in the future is an organization that has people -- staff, faculty, administrators -- who not only raise issues but are willing to get engaged in finding a solution to the issues. Faculty have a good chance. UH has a good administration that comes in with a clear slate. Without the progress that has been made in the last six years, UH would not be able to try to go through what it is getting ready to do. The thing that he would ask faculty to take back to their departments is: “let’s try to find solutions to some of these issues and then let’s find ways to articulate them.” The Board of Regents is going to put pressure on Dr. Gogue, Dr. Strickland and their team to spend more time down in the colleges and getting out in the departments, but everyone has got to help that communication get started. UHS has to come up with some solutions. It is not going to solve all the problems in six months but it would be nice to have a plan to follow. Mr. Smith said he appreciates what the faculty do. He added that he appreciated everyone giving him some time today. If anyone has a particular question or comment for him, Mr. Smith said everyone knows how to get in touch with him.

COALITION ON INTERCOLLEGIATE ATHLETICS ELECTION OF DELEGATES
The results of the election of 2004 Coalition on Intercollegiate Athletics is:

BUDGET & FACILITIES COMMITTEE, CHAIR – Saleha Khumawala
The Budget and Facilities committee met on March 31. Thanks to John Rudley, Vice Chancellor/Vice President for Administration & Finance for making Jim McShan, Tom Ehardt and Craig Ness available for the meeting. The topic of discussion was the University budget. They presented FY04 comparative data for UH (available in the Senate office). The next meeting will be April 27 at 3:00 p.m. in the Senate Conference room. The topic is the faculty rebuilding plan. The Budget Committee is going to take that up. Senators who are interested in this topic or who have an issue for the committee to consider, please contact Sen. Khumawala at x34829 or Saleha@uh.edu.

COMMITTEE ON COMMITTEES, CHAIR - Anne Jacobson
COC has met twice since the last Senate meeting. It presented two proposals to the Executive Committee that, in turn, conveyed to Dr. Gogue for discussion. The proposals concern: (1) moving the reporting of the AA/EEO office from the General Counsel to the President or Provost; and (2) forming an Ombuds office. Both proposals are being discussed and are expected eventually to come before the senate for a vote.

The COC is also working on filling 67 vacancies for next term on the UH Standing Committees. There was a 61% increase in responses to the annual Committee Preference Survey, so the COC was better able to spread out committee assignments. (Thanks to Sen. McNeil for putting the survey on a web site.) Faculty chosen for committees may receive a call from a COC member to make sure they are still willing to serve. Nomination letters will be sent later this summer.

The Grievance Committee elections have been completed. A total of 99 votes were cast this year. Congratulations to the following faculty elected to three year terms: Richard Bannerot, ENGR; Garret Etgen, NSM; Jerry Paskusz, ENGR; and Barbara Stewart, TECH. Also, congratulations to Audrey Taylor, LIB, who was elected to fill the one-year term. The Faculty Senate thanks all who were willing to stand for election and to all the faculty who participated in this example of shared governance.

EDUCATIONAL POLICIES & STUDENT AFFAIRS COMMITTEE, CHAIR – Dan Wells
The last committee meeting was held March 21. In attendance were Dan Wells, Carole Goodson, Sara McNeil, George Trail, and Michael Parks. Not in attendance were Kenneth Brown, Ted Cleveland, Michael O’Connell, Guadalupe San Miguel, David Zimmerman, and Peter Gingiss. The committee is currently considering a number of issues.

The committee is current working with Brian McKinney and an ad hoc committee to develop a list of FAQs (frequently asked questions) to assist students and faculty better understand the current Academic Honesty Policy. The student FAQ is almost finalized and will go up on University website soon. The faculty FAQ just beginning to be developed.

The committee is in the process of developing a policy to govern textbook selection and potential conflicts of interests. The necessity for a policy was brought on by student complaints and an internal University audit. At the last meeting the group tentatively agreed on the basic tenets of the policy which would include: Basic academic freedom in choosing textbooks for classes should be retained by the instructor; potential for conflicts of interest should be avoided; where reasonable, student costs should be considered. The policy will likely require a third party review of required educational materials in which the instructor derives financial benefit.

The committee is also looking at undergraduate admission standards and recruiting practices for new and transfer students with the aim of making policy recommendations to the University Administration. Ed Apodoca will address next EPSAC meeting.

The committee is reviewing the Religious Holy Days policy, revised by the Undergraduate Council. The main change in the updated policy is being mandated by the state and does not require that students inform instructors of Religious Holy Days that they plan to observe at the beginning of the semester, but can do so at any time.

The next meeting of EPSAC will be April 28 at noon in the Faculty Senate conference room.

FACULTY AFFAIRS COMMITTEE, CHAIR – Howard Karger
The Faculty Affairs Committee voted on and passed the proposal below on Leave Policy Recommendations. This policy was originally drafted by the University Commission on Women, which approved it on March 8, 2004.

Faculty Probationary Period:

Responsibilities Related to Care of New Children: A faculty member who serves as primary caregiver to a newborn or newly adopted child during the tenure probationary period shall, upon written request, be granted an exclusion of one year from the countable years of service comprised within the tenure probationary period [for each birth/adoption]. (See also section on Primary Caregivers.)

Significant Responsibilities Related to Elder or Dependent Care: The demands of caring for dependents (such as children, ill or injured spouse, or ailing parents) may seriously affect the time and energy faculty have to devote to their professional responsibilities during the tenure probationary period. Upon written request, a faculty member shall be granted an exclusion of one year from the countable years of service that constitute that individual's tenure probationary period.

The university provides emergency leave with pay in the event of a death within the immediate family or a documented miscarriage by the faculty member or spouse. Immediate family or spouse's immediate family is defined as spouse, children, parents, brothers, sisters, grandparents, or grandchildren, including in-laws. Emergency leave cannot be accumulated. Length of emergency leave shall be determined at the discretion of the President or his/her designee. Other reasons besides death of a family member may also be available, at the discretion of the President, according
to state law.

SCHOLARSHIP & COMMUNITY COMMITTEE, CHAIR - Joseph Kotarba
The Scholarship and Community Committee met on April 14, 2004. Committee members present were Joe Kotarba, Barbara Rose Lange, Ruth Manny, Fred Schiff, and Suzanne Ferimer. The committee continued its task of examining university relationships and communication with various constituencies in the community. Ms. Louise Howell, Director of Community Relations for the Cultural Arts Council of Houston/Harris County (CACHH) attended the meeting. Ms. Howell noted that CACHH’s major task is to distribute funds derived from the city’s hotel tax to arts organizations and individual artists. Funded projects are those projects that contribute both to the artistic dimension of Houston, but also to tourism. The tourism requisite is a recent condition applied by the state legislature. It effectively eliminated funding for small, neighborhood arts organizations that traditionally provided services to local public schools and children in general. Proving the value of one’s art to promote tourism is a very difficult task.

CACHH provides more money to UH than to any other institution of higher education in the area. Ms. Howell indicated that UH faculty can help CACHH several ways: (1) by submitting creative proposals for funding; (2) by serving on review panels; (3) and by promoting CACHH’s programs to the university community. The committee agreed that the range of work subsumed under the rubric of art is very wide at CACHH, thus encouraging faculty from the social sciences and humanities to consider working with CACHH.

Gael Stack, Professor of Art at UH, is First Vice President of The Arts Council Board of Directors.

Pres. Auchmuty said one of the things that the strategic planning is going to initiate is an academic calendar for the UHS. This should help everybody know what is going on at all the universities.

VOICE MAIL ISSUES AND COMMENTS:
Sen. McNeil said she distributed a summary of the voicemail issues and comments that were collected through conversations with individuals and through the FSComms@uh.edu e-mail address. Senators were asked to review the document for accuracy. Sen. McNeil will take this information to the IT and Computing Committee on Thursday. Sen. McNeil reported on the following issues:

Issue 1:
Faculty and Staff members do not understand why the voice mail system was changed.

Issue 2:
Faculty and Staff members think the new voicemail system is inferior to the previous system.

Passwords were erased.
Setup had to be done again and again. Most users had to set up our systems twice (ormore) even though some of us had done it almost two weeks prior to the switch.
Setup takes longer.

Issue 3:
Faculty and Staff members think that training and documentation is insufficient.

Sen. Wells said he never got cut off on the old system. The new system cuts him off in mid-stream all the time. Sen. McNeil said she would add that to Issue 2.

Pres. Auchmuty said Mr. Shomper has been pro-active in working on these things and is prepared to make changes. Pres. Auchmuty added that he has asked Mr. Shomper to hold off on any changes until after the end of the month. The reason nothing has been changed so far is that the Senate wanted to know what the issues were and it didn’t want to do any more changes that might affect things during the semester. As soon as the semester is over there will be many improvements.

REPORT ON CAMPUS SAFETY: Robert Wilson, UH Police Chief; Malcolm Davis, UH Police Captain; and Roger Byars, UH Police Lieutenant, Patrol
Chief Wilson said Senator Kerry will be at UH tomorrow. This will involve UHPD with security for the event. Chief Wilson said he had brought with him Malcolm Davis and Roger Byars. Captain Byars is in charge of patrol and now parking enforcement. Captain Davis takes care of the investigations.

Chief Wilson said there have been eight robberies on the campus in the first four months of the year. Last year there were seven in that same period of time. UHPD has been pro-active in pursuing the offenders in these cases. Of these robberies, three were conducted by two individuals who are now in custody. These individuals were being sought by Carolina PD, Houston PD, Missouri City PD and probably others. They were from an alternative high school. They used a shot gun. One is being held in Harris county jail, no bail, and the other is in custody on a $30,000 bail.

Other robberies are being investigated. In one of the cases the victim didn’t even look around so there is no physical description on the robber. That makes it very difficult for the police. Chief Wilson pointed out that most of these people don’t come from the surrounding neighborhood, which includes the area from Highway 59 to Spur 5 and from the Gulf Freeway to Wheeler Street. UHPD has statistics for this neighborhood that compare favorably to other areas in Houston.

UHPD has a number of programs it is working on and ultimately will be implemented in the not so distant future: (1) A security officers program. The officers are given to a specific unit. UHPD hires, trains and supervises the security officers but they work in a specific unit under a dean or director. UHPD has extended this service to the rest of the UHS universities. The University can’t have officers every place so the security officers supplement the police department. They have direct communication with the officers. (2) A close circuit television system. Eventually cameras will be all over the campus. Currently there are cameras in certain areas. UHPD is concerned about the exterior parking lots around the perimeter of the campus. UHPD is in the process of retaining a company to come in and put cameras in strategic locations based on crime activity in these areas around the campus. There is going to be a central monitoring station by the police department. That station will have direct radio access with the officers in the field. (3) Parking enforcement has been placed under UHPD. These security officers have been asked to participate in UHPD’s security programs, so when they are out in the parking lots, they can watch what is going on around them in addition to writing parking tickets. Their vehicles will be marked with large patches on the doors so they look like almost a police vehicle. The idea is that they will report on activities in the lots and people will see them out there. (4) A walk-in-the dark program. Faculty, staff and the students are invited to join UHPD and go for a short walk around certain areas of the campus to identify areas of concern so they can be corrected. That has been very productive. A number of areas on the campus have been covered in this way. (5) Hedges around the parking lots have been trimmed so that the officers and patrol cars driving by can see what is going on in the parking lots. Lighting has also been increased in these areas. (6) The number of Code B telephones has been increased. There were quite a few here before, but there weren’t enough and they were not in the right strategic position. UHPD has added some more. The telephones have little blue lights that flicker in the dark. If someone pushes that button UHPD knows where it is coming from and an officer will come. Eventually the plan is to put cameras with these phones so UHPD can see what is going on around the site. (7) UHPD has had an increase in personnel. The administration has been very kind in that regard. Dr. Rudley is very sympathetic to the issues and to the number of people UHPD has. The department has been authorized to add two positions this fiscal year and will be getting two more next fiscal year. That still puts UHPD at less than two officers per thousand population on the campus but it is a lot better than it used to be and it is really going to help the department a lot. (8) When parking garages are built, UHPD is hoping to have a small police substation in each of these. A police substation is being added to the new Library complex and another one is planned for a Scott/Holman location. (9) UHPD has a saturation unit. Whenever UH has a real crime, like these series of robberies, UHPD has two or three person teams working in the area. The teams include a male and female mix. One of them wanders around the campus where robberies have occurred while two others survey them from a distance, waiting for someone to approach the individual.

Chief Wilson said he has statistics for the area. Anyone interested in obtaining a copy should call or e-mail him (x30580/RBWilson@uh.edu). The Houston Police Department produces an electronic computer program with a web site so one can bring up a certain portion of the city and see what the statistics are for crime in that area. For UH’s area the information is only current through January and February. They don’t have March or April yet. Chief Wilson has the information through April, and he said he could assure everyone that all of the numbers are significantly greater than those for UH.

Sen. Pedemonte said he read in the student paper there was some concern about security on the campus. He added that he has not seen any answer from the administration. Specifically, a student complained yesterday that she tried to call security but phone was not working. Why is this? Chief Wilson said he didn’t know the answer to the question, but he would be happy to look into it. If there is an issue, UHPD will look into it, especially if it is a blue light phone that didn’t work. UHPD needs to know that.

Sen. Kotarba asked about weekend surveillance. He said it seems like there aren’t nearly as many security people going through building on weekend. Has that been slowed down? Chief Wilson said, no, that has not been slowed down.

Sen. Kotarba mentioned that students often hold the doors open with chairs during the weekends. Chief Wilson said UHPD finds doors propped open everywhere. Police correct it as soon as they see it but sometimes they don’t see it.

Sen. Craig asked how does someone get a camera placed in a specific location? Chief Wilson suggested that he contact UHPD and specify the area of concern and what the issue is.

Sen. Craig asked are cameras expensive? Chief Wilson said they are relatively inexpensive. UHPD is still in the process of selecting a vendor. Physical Plant is actually in charge of acquiring cameras. Call the Physical Plant and ask for Giovanni, who will take down the information. The information is then put together to determine the source of funding. They will go from there.

Sen. Ferimer said she had a leak in her unit on a Sunday. She tried calling the Physical Plant and nobody answered. She tried calling the University operator, but it doesn’t operate on weekends, so she called the police and they were very nice. Is that what people should do? Call UHPD first? Chief Wilson said UHPD has contact numbers for the Physical Plant people and others, so call the police.

Sen. Copeland said so many people have cell phones these days so, if someone sees an emergency on campus, is there a better number to call than “911” to get directed to the police department. Chief Wilson said there are two numbers people on campus can call. With 911 the dispatcher stops the call at the county level for Houston and, if they find out it is on campus, they redirect the call to UHPD. The direct emergency number for UHPD is 713/743-3333.

REPORT FROM AND DISCUSSION WITH THE UNIVERSITY OF HOUSTON SYSTEM ASSOCIATE VICE CHANCELLOR AND UNIVERSITY OF HOUSTON ASSOCIATE VICE PRESIDENT FOR ACADEMIC AFFAIRS: Elaine Charlson
Dr. Charlson said: (1) The transition of Enrollment Services to Academic Affairs is expected to be completed by June 1. That move includes Admissions, Registration and Financial Aid and Scholarships. Dr. Strickland and Dr. Lee have been working together on this. They have talked to the staff in Enrollment Services and to the Council of Deans. This evening they will meet with the student leaders.

Dr. Lee said there are a number of reasons why this was suggested to Dr. Gogue. One of the reasons is that the PeopleSoft project dealing with students has been reassigned in terms of leadership to the Provost and the major future implementation will occur in the enrollment area. He added that the administration was going to meet with the students leaders around 3:00 p.m. to discuss this idea.

Dr. Charlson continued: (2) Scholarships for freshmen. She received a report last week from Dr. John Hardy, Chair of the Scholarship Committee, who says that UH has been getting applications from really excellent students, the best he has seen. She added that the average SAT score of these 637 students was 1340. As of April 14, the committee had made offers in scholarships amounting to $2.7 million to 637 students, which comes to an average of about $4200 per student. Dr. Charlson said the Scholarship Committee tweaks the amount of scholarships based on the anticipated cost. They were looking at the average cost of tuition and fees for a 14 hour semester load next academic year, which is anticipated to be about $6220. The letter that she got from Dr. Hardy also included a request for over $200,000 more for 63 students who haven’t yet gone through the process. She had to go back to Dr. Lee and ask for more money. She has done this several times this semester because there are such good students. If funding is available, it is anticipated that there will be an additional 150 awards because there are some students who just missed the cut-offs. These include students who are really high in one of the criteria but not so high in another. The committee goes back and looks at these students individually and hopefully will be able to make some awards there. (3) Faculty Hiring. Recently there has been some discussion of the minority make-up of UH faculty. The goal is to have a faculty that looks as much like the student body as possible. The composition of the tenured and tenure-track faculty is: 3.5% African American, 11.1% Asian, 5.8% Hispanic, and 79.6% other. It is obvious that the only way to change these percentages is incrementally, so she looked at all the new tenured and tenure-track faculty who started at UH during 2003. At that time UH hired 49 tenured and tenure-track faculty, including 8 African Americans, which is 16.3% of the total group hired. UH’s student body is 13.2% African American. UH hired 9 Asians which is 18.4% of the group hired. There are 18.6% Asians in student body. Also hired were 7 Hispanics faculty which is 14.3% of the group hired, which compares to 17.8% in the student body. UH also hired 25 faculty in the “Other” category which includes International, Native American and Caucasian. That is 51% of the group hired and the student body in that same “Other” category is 50.4%. At the present time there are 61 searches approved and 18 tenured and/or tenure-track faculty hires either completed for 2004 or pending. (4) Renovations are planned for 40 classrooms with funding of $500 million. Dr. Charlson said she wanted to acknowledge the commitment of Dr. Rudley to this on-going effort to renovate classrooms because that is why this money is available. There will be several auditoriums in this group. It is intended that these renovations will take place in Agnes Arnold, Melcher Hall, GSSW building, the KIVA, Technology Annex, Engineering, PGH, Hilton, Melcher Gymnasium, and SRI. The plan is to address issues in buildings that didn’t get attention last year and then complete some of what was done last year. Dr. Rudley is committed to trying to do as thorough job as possible. It just can’t all be done all at once. Naturally, this will be done with minimum disruption. Dr. Charlson said she appreciates all the cooperation that she has gotten on this project. The hope is to finish the renovations before the fall semester starts.

Sen. Paskusz asked the Scholarship Committee includes the Ellis-Anderson Scholarships? Dr. Charlson said these are awarded separately, so there are a lot more than that.

UPDATE ON UH SYSTEM STRATEGIC PLANNING PROCESS: Ed Hugetz, UH System Assistant Vice Chancellor and UH Assistant Vice President for Planning and Outreach
Dr. Hugetz said the steering committee has now met several times; most recently with the Board of Regents on Monday afternoon. The Board reviewed with the steering committee their sense of the hearings held on each campus. The focus is on where the universities are as a system, which at this particular moment is a very loose confederation. The universities do very few things together. The issue is what value is the system. From the Board of Regents point of view these four universities report to them as a system. They hire a chancellor, vice chancellors, and the administration but once that administration was folded into this campus seven years ago most of their work has been really focused on this campus. Very little has been done to promote system-wide efforts. The exceptions have been the System Centers at Sugar Land and Katy. These were collaborate efforts, but with mixed results. They have been able to offer quality education to people in these areas in a fairly efficient effective manner. This has prevented another university from starting in Sugar Land; something the State can’t afford. It has been a cost effective way to deliver instruction in a growing area of the city. The image of the System, in terms of it being the UHS administration, is still negative. People don’t seem to have a use for the UHS administration. So the steering committee is trying to shift things to look at the UHS as being the four universities. They are four entities that do report to a common chancellor and do report a common Board of Regents and are seen politically by the State of Texas as one of the six systems in the state.

The question is what further partnerships and projects that could the four universities as a system work on together. This would not involve a huge structural change, but joint projects. Projects being considered include the possibility of developing another System Center on 290 and one in Pearland. The Medical Center has requested a program that will serve the 65,000 employees who work in that particular location. These are niche programs that fit those particular areas. The thought is that instead of any one university trying to do that, the universities partner together and share the rewards together.

One of the most interesting developments is the idea of this campus becoming more selective. This will impact the other universities because more and more of the student enrollment will move to UHD, UHCL, Sugar Land and to other parts of the city as this campus becomes more selective. There have been a series of meetings, including one between all of the universities’ deans. They openly talked about UH becoming more selective, raising its admission standards, becoming an institution that was trying to recruit the most highly qualified competitive students in the Houston area. There was a lot of criticism early on in that meeting, but by the end of the session the conversation had gone to a point where a number of the other deans told the UH deans that they need to go for it. They said the gulf coast area needs a high quality public university and this is the right time; this is the perfect moment for UH to make its move. In an earlier meeting of the Faculty Senate Presidents, when this issue was raised, there was a similar reaction and outcome. Finally, the full group recommended that UH be the flagship institution and that it move forward on raising its admission standards and that it fill the niche that this area needs.

An events calendar is going to be put together. This will give every body a sense of what is occurring system-wide and will have some idea of the intellectual life at each the universities.

The Faculty Senate Chairs requested that the System look for conferences or occasions for faculty to be brought together on subjects of common interest. It turns out that Ron Milles, the Chair of the UHCL Faculty Senate, who is a biologist, and UH Faculty Senate President Auchmuty have some overlapping research interests. Dr. Hugetz said he asked Dr. Milles when was the last time he had visited with any of the faculty in the biology department at UH? He hadn’t visited in 15 years. Dr. Hugetz said the steering committee is looking for ways to develop interconnections. This will take time, but by looking at occasions to bring bodies together when there is a mutual interest, then the universities can start to develop relationships and trust that give a purpose to them as a system.

Where is the strategic planning process right now? The Board of Regents meeting was very successful. It gave the steering committee a whole lot more work to do. They want the committee to write up a description of every project. What would be the cost? What would be the timeline? Who will be responsible? They want to review these details on May 4. The Board of Regents will then prioritize the list and come back to the steering committee with an agenda. We will then bring that agenda back to the Senate to share what the plans are.

Sen. Karger said he understands the strategy of UH being excellent, but how are resources going to be allocated to the faculty to match these goals? It has to be followed up by serious resources in terms of retention, recruitment, and opportunities that provide a draw for faculty to stay on campus. Sen. Karger said build the infrastructure first and, when that infrastructure is in place, naturally the school will go on to excellence. He added to try to do it with 825 faculty members and 36,000 students seems to be wishful thinking. Dr. Hugetz said one of the best things that has done, and which he would like to bring to the Senate at some point, is John Rudley’s financing model. Dr. Rudley has created a model that looks at different levels of enrollment. If UH wants to improve the student faculty ratio, from where would that money come? What is the prospect of the state providing funding? Representatives from the legislature have told universities not to look for any money from the State. This coming legislative session is to cover public schools. If the economy improves, and it is, and sales tax revenues are doing very well that will go into the public schools. UH is planning a big endowment drive but it is not going to support this. This is frankly a balance year. Universities are going to have to raise deregulated tuition. That will be the main source of funding for these goals. Dr. Hugetz said in this round of discussions, the students were incredible. UH is significantly raising its designated tuition and about 75% of that is going into the hiring of faculty. As the strategic plans move forward the System has to find other revenue streams to support its goals. The models look at what percentage of increase would be on tuition.

Pres. Auchmuty said the main thing about this process is the universities have gotten a lot of information that they never before had. Almost everything in this system has gone up, except the number of faculty at UH. The number of faculty at all the other universities has gone up, IT people, student services people, and all the other groups have gone up. Faculty at UH are the exception and nobody seems to know why, but it has become very clear to everybody that this is the number one priority. The modeling shows all the other universities in the system are much better shape than UH is.

Dr. Hugetz said no one has given up on getting state funding. The state has a public need to give the same kind of broad base support to higher education as it does to public education. The administration will be as aggressive as it can to get that support. Still for the System to move on these goals it has got to be realistic about where to get the money.

CENTER FOR SOCIAL RESEARCH PROPOSAL: Howard Karger
Sen. Karger said a luncheon meeting was held on April 2. It was very successful. The next meeting will be May 13 with the Center Directors and an ad hoc committee on the center. Sen. Karger said that once the proposal is ready go, it would be very helpful if faculty members from various colleges their colleges to sign up as faculty associates. It doesn’t mean that the faculty member has to do anything but at least it demonstrates support for that center. He added that he hoped to get 100-200 names.