UNIVERSITY FACULTY
SENATE REPORT
Alfred State College, Alfred
October 21-23, 2010
SENATE PRESIDENT’S REPORT
Ken O'Brien (SUNY Brockport).
PHEEIA, the New York budget process SUNY and the
University Senate : Sen. Dennis Stachowski (D., Buffalo) did his
best to fight for PHEEIA but the Assembly was not on board. The
SUNY operating budget now has been cut by $210 million with no
tuition increase. There has been no viable alternative to PHEEIA
presented except the call to reinstate full funding for public higher
education.
What will all this mean for the system this year? SUNY’s
operating budget has been reduced by $643 million in state support
since 2008. We teach more students but have fewer resources with
which to do it. The results of cuts are showing in the closing of
Nursing program at New Paltz last year and now the suspension of
admission to 5 UAlbany programs. The faculty senate should focus
on its role as the keeper of the academic program and avoid the
“terms and conditions of employment” issues associated with
program closures.
Beyond retrenchment. System administration has developed
money saving plans like furloughs for MC employees and a System-
wide freshmen enrollment cap limiting incoming first-year students
to the class sizes we saw in 2009. UFS leaders will continue to make
efforts to meet with UUP leaders and Faculty Council of Community
College leaders.
A Graduate research poster session called “Research That Matters:
An Exposition of Graduate Research in SUNY and CUNY,” is
scheduled for March 8 in the Legislative Office Building.
Strategic Planning Implementation. We are now in he
implementation phase of the strategic planning process. There are
six Innovation teams and seven Transformation teams as well as a
Steering Committee. The innovation groups are SUNY and the
Entrepreneurial Century, SUNY and the Seamless Education
Pipeline, SUNY and a Healthier New York, SUNY and an Energy-
Smart New York, SUNY and the Vibrant Community, and SUNY
and the World. These groups will recommend programs to move the
plan forward. The seven Transformation teams are Academic
Excellence, Strategic Enrollment Management, Budget Task Force,
Leadership Development, Innovative Instruction, Information
Technology and Shared Governance. These teams will seek
measureable outcomes to make recommendations to move the plan
forward. Along with the strategic planning, governance groups in the
state will work on shared governance best practices.
Other Items of Importance: The raises for the Chancellor’s
leadership team came at a difficult time and have weakened support
for freeing SUNY from some of the oversight of the legislature.
The final section is taken verbatim from Dr. O’Brien’s report available
electronically from Senator White.
“Student Mobility. Much of the work begun last year is reaching
fruition, as new institutional processes are fulfilling the decades-old
promise of student mobility across SUNY. You may have heard of
the disciplinary committees, with faculty from both the community
colleges and the state operated campuses, identification of the four to
six courses in each academic major that we expect each student to
have completed by the end of their second year. In addition, these
faculty groups have created course descriptors, with varying degrees
of specificity that work to make successful seamless transfer a
reality. The success of these processes is due to the efforts of many
different people from across the system, but none is more important
in this final phase than Provost David Lavallee.
The Message from UAlbany. No matter how justifiable it may be,
adding my voice to the chorus of criticism already raised following
the announcement of the closure of five academic programs at
UAlbany earlier this month feels like ”piling on.” Yet, there are two
concerns worth noting: based on Jean-François Brière’s Open Letter,
the news came as a surprise to him and his colleagues, and the fact
that four of the five programs to be closed were languages adds an
ironic note to the Strategic Plan’s identification of “SUNY and the
World” as one of its six Big Ideas.
Having lived through two retrenchments at the College at Brockport
thirty years ago, I know how devastating such events are to a campus
community, not to mention the damage done to individual careers. It
took at least two decades for us to recover, two decades during which
almost every major decision on the departmental level was made
through the lens of how it would affect the department’s position in
the next crisis. Given the understandably dire realities that follow
from these actions for a campus, a program and individual faculty
and professional staff, I would hope campus administrative
leadership would make certain to apprise the campus community of
the range of actions it might have to take, before the specifics are
announced, with the clear understanding that such actions are the
absolute last resort for any administration.
Meetings. Since the last plenary, we have held a number of meetings
and presentations, including a gubernatorial press conference, our
Summer Planning Conference with the Executive Committee, our
Fall Planning Conference last month in Syracuse at which the annual
working agenda for each UFS committee was adopted, and meetings
with Tina Good, Sandi Cooper and Phil Smith are designed to keep
each of informed of what the other’s organization is concerned about
and planning. ”
Written report available.
DAVID LAVALLEE, SENIOR VICE CHANCELLOR AND PROVOST
The Provost’s Office is still concentrating on the Student Mobility
changes that were passed by the Board of Trustees. They have
developed a transfer equivalency online database. The objective is to
find common courses for the first two years of the main majors in the
system. 90% of this work has been done with a few exceptions for
programs that don’t match up across the system like
communications. There are 250 faculty from across the system
involved.
The Provost also spoke about an a freshman enrollment cap which
will limit incoming classes to their 2009 size. There will be
disincentives to campuses that take more freshman than the 2009
levels (ie loss of tuition dollars that will be re-distributed). However,
there is no cap on transfer admissions.
System is moving forward with part time teaching and clinical
faculty excellence awards.
MONICA RIMAI, SENIOR VICE CHANCELLOR, CHIEF OPERATING
OFFICER
Vice Chancellor Rimai reported via telephone due to the flooding
and subsequent challenges to getting the building up and running.
Ms. Rimai gave a detailed PowerPoint presentation (Budget 101 Part
A) to explain some of the complexities of the SUNY budget. We
have been told that the presentation will be made available on the
SUNY website.
NANCY ZIMPHER, CHANCELLOR
The Chancellor took questions from each of the sectors and
responded to each. Although asked to comment, she did not respond
to any specific questions about the program suspensions at UAlbany.
The Chancellor presented her next phase of the strategic plan referred
to in the President’s report. This is the implementation phase where
smaller groups of experts from around SUNY will work on
implementation recommendations for the outreach and internal
improvement of SUNY.
The Chancellor also spoke about the need to mobilize the SUNY
constituency. Legislators told her that she had no constituency
however there are half a million SUNY students and almost 100,000
faculty.
TINA GOOD, PRESIDENT OF FACULTY COUNCIL OF COMMUNITY
COLLEGES
Presented the organization and representation of FCCC. One
delegate from each campus and a very small budget for travel and
plenary sessions. The CC presidents provide funding to FCCC as
they see fit which can be a source of conflict when difficult
resolutions are considered.
There has been a positive working relationship between FCCC and
SUNY Faculty Senate that will hopefully continue.
As community colleges see increasing enrollments they worry that
the SUNY freshman enrollment caps will negatively impact their
students wishing to transfer.
UNIVERSITY CENTER SECTOR CONCERNS/QUESTIONS
The following list of concerns comes from Pete Knuepfer’s (Binghamton
University)
The University Centers Sector is concerned about the recent events at
UAlbany and the ability of University Centers to fulfill their missions
in the absence of core subject areas. We are concerned that the
shared governance process was not followed when making the
decision to suspend admission to programs at UAlbany. We feel
strongly that any comprehensive research university needs to protect
the core elements of its curriculum. Accordingly, members of our
sector worked on a resolution to present to the Senate. There is also
concern that these steps are circumventing the protections offered in
faculty contracts through collective bargaining.
We recognize funding within SUNY is complicated but there is still
confusion about the “reserves” that the Chancellor spoke about in her
testimony to the NYS Legislature. We wonder how much of
SUNY’s reserves can be utilized to cover budget deficits on
individual campuses and SUNY as a whole?
We appreciate the Chancellor’s understanding of the challenges of a
research university. We thank her for her advocacy to offset the
higher costs of operating research universities and ask her to continue
to advocate on behalf of the research mission of SUNY. We, as
SUNY Faculty need to remind our legislators about the impact of
cuts on both student completion and our research mission.
We are concerned about the reduction in support for EOP and EOC
programs that allow access to low income New Yorkers. We need to
continue to champion the cause of equal access and student diversity.
Reports for the Following Committees are available:
EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE
AWARDS COMMITTEE.
OPERATIONS COMMITTEE
GOVERNANCE COMMITTEE
GRADUATE AND RESEARCH COMMITTEE
STUDENT LIFE.
UNDERGRADUATE COMMITTEE.
ETHICS COMMITTEE
RESOLUTIONS
Resolution on Consultation with Governance, passed
Resolution on the Suspension of Programs at the University at
Albany, passed
REMINDER OF THE FACULTY SENATE PAGE
Although material is slow to appear on the site, eventually the full text of
motions passed should appear:
http://www.suny.edu/facultySenate/.
Respectfully submitted,
J. Philippe Abraham,
Shadi Shahedipour-Sandvik, and
Daniel D. White
SUNY Faculty Senators
University Faculty Senate
Executive Committee
156th Plenary
Alfred State College
October 23, 2010
Resolution on Consultation with Governance
Whereas SUNY campuses are facing extraordinary financial pressures, and
Whereas campuses may be forced to consider program consolidation, suspension or
elimination, and
Whereas the procedures for reaching such decisions have not always involved
appropriate consultation with existing governance, and
Whereas SUNY has clear policies for establishing and revising programs, and the impact
of program consolidation, suspension or elimination is as significant to a campus as the
establishment of programs,
Therefore, Be It Resolved
The University Faculty Senate urges System Administration to ensure that campus
administrations and existing governance bodies employ formal procedures for
consultation before reaching any decisions regarding program consolidation, suspension
or elimination.
156-01-1
Resolution on Consultation with Governance
Passed
October 21, 2010
University Faculty Senate
University Centers Sector
156th Plenary
Alfred State College
October 23, 2010
Resolution on the Suspension of Programs at the University at Albany
Whereas the core mission of a comprehensive University Center is to deliver an education and to do
research of national and international repute
Whereas one of the six big ideas of the SUNY strategic plan (“The Power of SUNY”) is “SUNY and the
World” which emphasizes SUNY’s global mission
Whereas the motto of the University at Albany is “The World Within Reach”
Whereas the administration of the University at Albany has suspended admission to the following
academic programs: Classics, French, Italian, Russian, and Theatre
Whereas these academic programs are part of the core mission of a comprehensive University Center
Be it resolved that the actions of the administration at the University at Albany compromise the core
mission of that University Center and compromise the ability of SUNY to fulfill its global mission as
articulated by “The Power of SUNY” strategic plan.
156 02 1
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Resolution on the Suspension of Programs at the University at Albany
Passed
October 23, 2010
