The De Anza Academic Senate
Approved Notes for the meeting of
November 23rd, 2009
Senators and Officers present: Anderson, Annen, Argyriou, Brennan, Cordero, Glapion, Goodwin, Hertler, Hanna, Larson, Lee-Klawender, Maynard, McNamara, Nengo, Nickel, Norte, Schaffer, Setziol, Stockwell, Swanner, and Tao
Senators and Officers absent: Beckum, Botsford, Lathers, Mjelde, Roberts, Shah, and Singh
District Senate President: Alex Kramer
DASB: Classified Senate:
Administrative Liaison: Rich Schroeder Guests: Wendy White
SLO coordinators:
Curriculum Co Chair:
[NOTE: Item numbers are reflective of agenda numbers in the order they are actually taken up at the meeting.]
The meeting was called to order at 2:34, a quorum being present.
I. Approval of Agenda and Notes: The agenda was approved as distributed.
The notes of November 16th were approved as distributed.
President Murphy was pleased to announce a tentative agreement with all collective bargaining units. If and when ratified, the agreements will reduce what has been a 16.3 million dollar problem by 5.3 million leaving an 11 million dollar problem. De Anza’s share of that problem will now be 4.1million, down from 6.9 million. There are a few more bits of good news such as the $500,000 savings from Child Development.
On the darker side, it now appears that the state budget is once again in a large deficit mode, as of this date,with a shortfall of approximately 21 billion dollars.
II. Needs and Confirmations: There were no confirmations. Lee-Klawender and Argyriou spoke to a confusion about the appointment of faculty to the Educational Master Plan Committee.
Fall Plenary Report: Alex Kramer, Setziol, Argyriou, and Lee-Klawender reported. Kramer spoke to the overall quality of the session and informed the group that the session focus on the future of the community colleges had a special poignancy to it at this particular time. He also mentioned that the organizational features of the voting session were impressive.
Setziol mentioned breakout sessions attended and focused primarily on three issues, cell phone addiction of students and the potential need for a college policy statement, minimum qualifications and equivalency for non masters disciplines, and the continuing battle of state versus local control of the Associate's degree. He spoke to two resolutions and an amendment on the latter two topics.
Argyriou mentioned topics of breakouts and then focused primarily on two of them, a budget presentation and prerequisites: content review. With regard to the former she mentioned that the excellence of the presentation left her better informed and better prepared to deal with important aspects of the budget and got her to realize the importance of reviewing what actually happens with budgets after they are adopted. With regard to the latter, she gave the group an update on a transition from using statistical validation to using content review for establishing prerequisites. After this, Argyriou spoke to a general session on threats to academic freedom. Events at Southwestern College (San Diego) call into question how faculty can be protected from reprisal for commenting or demonstrating about anything other than their primary faculty duties. A strong shared governance culture with academic and professional matters explicitly covering budget responsibilities was recommended. Finally, she began a presentation on deliberations about the 50% law which was then taken up by Lee-Klawender.
Lee-Klawender began by focusing on the deliberations about the 50% law and presented a position presented by members of a panel assembled at a breakout on the topic. That idea was to not propose any changes in the law owing to the conventional wisdom that “opening” the topic in the legislature may easily result in a conclusion far from that desired and worse than the current situation. She then also commented on the situation at Southwestern College and informed the group that the American Association of University Professors (AAUP) is using the discussions and results of the Southwestern College situation to assist its efforts in similar situations elsewhere. [Note: the state Academic Senate is affiliated with the AAUP.] Finally, she mentioned that the state Academic Senate had its budget cut 35% by the legislature for this year.
IV. Senate President's Update: Argyriou gave the briefest of budget updates in light of the fact that Brian Murphy had covered much of what she would have covered and said that the majority of the last Chancellor's Advisory Council meeting was taken up by something best handled under Good of the Order.
V. BP 6120 – Graduation Requirements: The group put finishing touches on its proposal for revisions to this Board policy by adding and editing for the purposes of clarity.
VI. IPBT Update: Lee-Klawender and Argyriou both presented this item. The current work of the IPBT is facilitating division discussions of potential future cuts in light of the budget news from Sacramento including looming midyear budget cuts. The terms “Phase I, Phase II, and Phase III were introduced, explained, and discussed in a document shown to the group via the room's document projector. During the discussion phase, an apparent contradictory or conundrumic aspect of what was being requested emerged, essentially an apparent “cut but don't suggest cutting what you can cut”. By the end of the discussion it appeared that offering up something under Phase III would need to be done in the full knowledge that listing it would make it more likely that it would become a target. Setziol reiterated a statement made earlier that, at some point, departments, divisions, the IPBT, and or the Executive Committee should be allowed, perhaps even expected to list items but to say “Don't do that” and explain why not.
X. Faculty Advocacy: Wendy White was present to share a proposed petition addressed to the Faculty Association asking it to make various points to the legislature about preserving “education and other social services” in California. Comments made were mostly that addressing the petition to the Faculty Association was problematic and that, for a variety of reasons, it would be better addressed to the Academic Senate or the college entity itself. During the discussion, it was MSC(Stockwell /Cordero) to extend the meeting for five minutes.
IX. MSA Statement: Stockwell distributed a revised statement supporting employees and functions associated with historically underrepresented groups.
VII. Senator Reports on Division Budget Discussions: Some of the intent of this item took place during Item VI when a few Senators related word from the IPBT to work they had done in their departments and divisions. Other than this, there was no time for this item.
VIII. Budget Reductions: Again, some of the intent of this item took place during Item VI when a few Senators related word from the IPBT to work they had done in their departments and divisions. Other than this, there was no time for this item.
XII. Good of the Order and Announcements: Argyriou announced that consideration of a vote of no confidence in Foothill College President Judy Miner was happening, perhaps at the moment she was speaking, in the Foothill Academic Senate meeting. The ramifications of such a vote will need to be discussed regardless of the outcome of the Foothill Senate's deliberations.
The meeting was adjourned at 4:43