ACADEMIC COUNCIL MEETING MINUTES

September 11, 1997

Approved as corrected 9/18/97

Announcements:

The Truman Foundation will sponsor summer workshops for current sophomores to assist them in polishing their proposals and to distribute more information about the Rhodes and Marshall scholarships. The Council agreed to indicate to Truman that the College would send 2 to 3 students. The cost to the College would be approximately $1000 per student. There will be an open house for students interested in the Truman Scholarship on September 24, in Thayer III at 11:30 a.m.

The Council discussed the ongoing problems with acquiring copyright clearance for materials used in classrooms and the library. Dean Keedy said the Copyright Clearance Center provides this service on the WWW, accessed through an established account with the provider. When the need arose in MNS last week, calls were place around campus only to find that several departments subscribe to copyright services, e.g. the graduate school, library loans and the bookstore. The possibility of having an account accessible to all CAS departments is being explored.

The Council discussed problems with late delivery of faculty computers.

The recent reduction in law and graduate school tuition waivers has been questioned by some faculty. However, Dean Atkinson said that the Executive Council revisited the issue at its last meeting and reaffirmed its decision to waive only 50% of post-baccalaureate tuition for employees, spouses and dependents. She said that when viewed in the context of other employee benefits, the Tuition Assistance Program reaches a limited number of employees, where benefits such as retirement are available to all employees and, therefore, must take priority in budgetary matters. The savings from the reduction in tuition waivers was estimated at $125k in 1997-98. Note: The Executive Council is committed to providing educational opportunities to dependents and will continue to give full tuition waivers in the undergraduate college.

Agenda Items:

1. Wendy Washburn reported on the post-mortem held last week for New Student Orientation. For the most part Parents Preview and NSO were declared a resounding success. Some areas needing refinement are: the turn-around time for the Foreign Language Placement testing and results was too tight, 2) the inaugural run of the computer administered Math Proficiency Test experienced some technical problems. Fast work on the part of Tom Olsen and NSO organizers saved the day. 3) Two CAS departments failed to man their tables on time for the Academic Fair.

2. Anne Price joined the Council to discuss the 1998-99 Academic Calendar. Labor Day will fall on September 7th in 1998--a full week later than usual. If the current faculty approved principles are used to build the calendar, the fall exam schedule will run through December 23 (the day before Christmas Eve), with grades due two days after Christmas. Alternate calendars are being reviewed by the Council for discussion with the faculty at the earliest possible date.

3. Price also reported that classroom space for spring semester is critically over-scheduled in periods 2, 3 and 6. Some classes will need to be moved to less-used periods of the day. The deans will be consulting with department chairs soon to head off the classroom crunch in the spring. Requests for fall class schedules will go out November 1, and the Council will establish limitations on the maximum number of sections scheduled in each period.

4. Dean Atkinson reported on the recent meeting of the institutional Budget Committee, operating this year under a new structure. Simply put, the process was previously conducted by two groups: the Budget Staff developed detailed estimates for consideration by the Deans of the three schools; and the Deans Council reviewed the budget recommendations with much of the rationale needing to be re-stated. The new structure consolidates staff and officers in one group, chaired by the Vice President for Business and Finance and including the Director of Budgets and Investment, the Controller, the budget officers for each of the three schools, the Vice President for College Relations and the Secretary of the College. It is hoped that the single-tiered platform will save time and contribute to a more informed decision making process.

5. The Dean also reported that an increase in van charges to take place immediately. Rich Bettega will be communicating with the heavily affected departments and programs.

   Van Charges - 1997 (Revised)
   

   Van Pool: $30/user/day, +$.085/mile (30 miles to 100 miles); +$.65/mile (over 100 miles); fuel is provided by Van Pool account.

   Shuttle: $0.95/mile--charged to Campus Safety account; Van Pool account pays fuel Campus Safety pays shuttle driver labor cost.