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THE PENNSYLVANIA STATE UNIVERSITY

 

T H E   S E N A T E   R E C O R D

 

Volume 36-----APRIL 22, 2003-----Number 7

 

The Senate Record is the official publication of the University Faculty Senate of The Pennsylvania State University, as provided for in Article I, Section 9 of the Standing Rules of the Senate and contained in the Constitution, Bylaws, and Standing Rules of the University Faculty Senate, The Pennsylvania State University 2002-03.

 

The publication is issued by the Senate Office, 101 Kern Graduate Building, University Park, PA  16802 (Telephone 814-863-0221).  The Record is distributed to all Libraries across the Penn State system, and is posted on the Web at http://www.psu.edu/ufs under publications.  Copies are made available to faculty and other University personnel on request.

 

Except for items specified in the applicable Standing Rules, decisions on the responsibility for inclusion of matters in the publication are those of the Chair of the University Faculty Senate.

 

When existing communication channels seem inappropriate, Senators are encouraged to submit brief letters relevant to the Senate's function as a legislative, advisory and forensic body to the Chair for possible inclusion in The Senate Record. 

 

Reports that have appeared in the Agenda of the meeting are not included in The Record unless they have been changed substantially during the meeting or are considered to be of major importance.  Remarks and discussion are abbreviated in most instances.  A complete transcript and tape of the meeting is on file.  Individuals with questions may contact Dr. Susan C. Youtz, Executive Secretary, University Faculty Senate.

 

                                   TABLE OF CONTENTS

   I.  Final Agenda for April 22, 2003

       A.  Summary of Agenda Actions

       B.  Minutes and Summaries of Remarks

II.  Enumeration of Documents

A.    Documents Distributed Prior to

April 22, 2003

Senate Calendar for 2003-2004

Results of Senate Elections for 2003-2004

Senators Not Returning For 2003-2004

Attendance

 

FINAL AGENDA FOR APRIL 22, 2003

 

A.  MINUTES OF THE PRECEDING MEETING -

      Minutes of the March 25, 2003 Meeting in The Senate Record 36:6

      [www.psu.edu/ufs/recordx.html]

 

B.     COMMUNICATIONS TO THE SENATE - Senate Curriculum Report (Blue Sheets) of

                                                                        of April 8, 2003                                                      

                                                                        [www.psu.edu/ufs/bluex.html]

 

C.     REPORT OF SENATE COUNCIL - Meeting of April 8, 2003

 

D.   ANNOUNCEMENTS BY THE CHAIR - 

 

E.   COMMENTS BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNIVERSITY -

 

F.      FORENSIC BUSINESS -

 

            Senate Self Study Committee

 

                  A Concept for Restructuring and for Improving the Operation and Procedures

                  of the University Faculty Senate

 

G.     UNFINISHED BUSINESS -

 

H.     LEGISLATIVE REPORTS -                                                                                              

 

            Admissions, Records, Scheduling and Student Aid

 

                  Change to Policy 34-68 (Auditing a Course)

 

            Intercollegiate Athletics

 

                  Revision of Senate Policy 67-00, Athletic Competition, Section 2,

                  Eligibility of Athletes

 

I.        ADVISORY/CONSULTATIVE REPORTS -

 

            Faculty Affairs

 

                  Revision to Policy AD53, Privacy Statement                                                                              

 

            Undergraduate Education

 

                  Defining Grading Standards                                                                                                       

 

J.       INFORMATIONAL REPORTS -

           

            Curricular Affairs

 

Status of General Education Implementation:  Certification/Recertification

of New, Changed, and Existing Courses

 

            Faculty Affairs

 

            Time in Rank of Associate Professors

 

           Research

 

                  Update on Graduate Education

 

           Senate Council

 

                  Report on Spring 2003 College Visits

 

           University Planning

 

                  Status of Construction

 

                  Parking Rate Structure

 

           Report of Senate Elections

 

                  Senate Council

                  Senate Committee on Committees and Rules

                  University Promotion and Tenure Review Committee

                  Standing Joint Committee on Tenure

                  Faculty Rights and Responsibilities

                  Faculty Advisory Committee to the President

                  Senate Secretary for 2003-2004

                  Senate Chair-Elect for 2003-2004

 

           Comments by Outgoing Chair Moore                                                                              

 

                  Installation of Officers

 

           Comments by Incoming Chair Bise

 

K.  NEW LEGISLATIVE BUSINESS -

 

L.  COMMENTS AND RECOMMENDATIONS FOR THE GOOD OF THE UNIVERSITY -                   

 

M.  ADJOURNMENT -

 

 

SUMMARY OF AGENDA ACTIONS

 

The Senate held one forensic session, voted on two legislative reports, voted on two advisory/consultative reports, and heard six informational reports.

 

Senate Self Study Committee – “A Concept for Restructuring and for Improving the Operation and Procedures of the University Faculty Senate.”  The Senate Self-Study committee presents several preliminary recommendations that will be debated.  Considerations include the size of the Senate, length and number of meetings, organization of committees and new approaches for receiving reports.  (See Senate Record, Page(s) 15-25 and Agenda Appendix “B.”)

 

Admissions, Records, Scheduling and Student Aid – “Change to Policy 34-68 (Auditing a Course).”  This legislative report recommends the change of the Penn State definition of “full-time” to exclude audit credits.  (See Senate Record, Page(s) 25-26 and Agenda Appendix “C.”)

 

Intercollegiate Athletics – “Revision of Senate Policy 67-00, Athletic Competition, Section 2, Eligibility of Athletes.”  In this legislative report this policy change reaffirms an existing practice that does not permit provisional, non-degree regular, and non-degree conditional students to practice or compete.  (See Senate Record, Page(s) 26-27 and Agenda Appendix “D.”)

 

Faculty Affairs – “Revision to Policy AD53, Privacy Statement.”  In this advisory/consultative report the proposed policy revision clarifies that means of monitoring activities of employees and students with such technologies as video and sound may abridge privacy expectations and may not be used except when necessary to protect the security of the University and its employees and students.  (See Senate Record, Page(s) 27-31 and Agenda Appendix “E.”)

 

Undergraduate Education – “Defining Grading Standards.”  In this advisory/consultative report the Senate voted on three recommendations designed to halt the steady increase in GPAs over the past fifteen years.  (See Senate Record, Page(s) 31-36 and Agenda Appendix “F.”)

 

Curricular Affairs – “Status of General Education Implementation:  Certification/Recertification of New, Changed, and Existing Courses.”  This informational report provides an up-date on the status of General Education implementation and course recertification, as legislated by the Senate in 1997.  The use of ANGEL for collaborative reviews will be presented.  (See Senate Record, Page(s) 36 and Agenda Appendix “G.”)

 

Faculty Affairs – “Time in Rank of Associate Professors.”  This informational report provides information on the time that associate professors are spending in rank, beginning with appointment or promotion to that position.  Analysis by gender, minority status and location is given.  (See Senate Record, Page(s) 36 and Agenda Appendix “H.”)

 

Research – “Update on Graduate Education.”  This informational report examines trends in graduate enrollment, diversity efforts, technology initiatives, and funding programs.  (See Senate Record, Page(s) 36 and Agenda Appendix “I.”)

 

Senate Council – “Report on Spring 2003 College Visits.”  The Senate Officers visit University Park colleges and other units each spring.  This informational report summarizes those visits.  (See Senate Record, Page(s) 36 and Agenda Appendix “J.”)

 

University Planning – “Status of Construction.”  This annual informational report focuses on construction projects at campus locations.  (See Senate Record, Page(s) 36 and Agenda Appendix “K.”)

 

University Planning – “Parking Rate Structure.”  In this informational report, Parking Office representatives will present changes in the rate structure for parking at University Park as well as changes in the location of parking facilities.  (See Senate Record, Page(s) 36 and Agenda Appendix “L.”)

                                   

 

The University Faculty Senate met on Tuesday, April 22, 2003, at 1:30 p.m. in Room 112 Kern Graduate Building with John W. Moore, Chair, presiding.  One hundred and ninety-six Senators signed the roster. 

 

Chair Moore:  It is time to begin.

 

MINUTES OF THE PRECEDING MEETING

 

Moving to the minutes of the preceding meeting, The Senate Record, providing a full transcription of the proceedings of the March 25, 2003, meeting has been sent to all University Libraries.  In addition, it has been posted on the Faculty Senate web page.  Are there any corrections or additions to this document?  All those in favor of accepting the minutes, please signify by saying, "aye."

 

Senators:  Aye.

 

Chair Moore:  Opposed?  The minutes are accepted.  Thank you.

 

COMMUNICATIONS TO THE SENATE

 

You have received the Senate Curriculum Report for April 8, 2003.  This document is posted on the University Faculty Senate's web page.

 

REPORT OF SENATE COUNCIL

 

Also, you should have received the Report of Senate Council for the meeting of April 8, 2003, which appears as an attachment to the Agenda for today’s meeting. 

 

ANNOUNCEMENTS BY THE CHAIR

 

Chair Moore:  At the end of each academic year, a number of Senators complete their term of office, and it is my sad duty to read the list of our valued Senators who will not be returning for next year.

 

ABINGTON COLLEGE
Stephen Stace

COLLEGE OF AGRICULTURAL SCIENCES
Leif Jensen
Dennis Scanlon

ALTOONA COLLEGE
Valerie Stratton

COLLEGE OF ARTS AND ARCHITECTURE
Annette McGregor

BERKS-LEHIGH VALLEY COLLEGE
LEHIGH VALLEY CAMPUS
Kathleen Lodwick

SMEAL COLLEGE OF BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION
Hemant Bhargava
Robert Crum
Peter Everett

COLLEGE OF COMMUNICATIONS
Thomas Berner

COLLEGE OF EARTH AND MINERAL SCIENCES
Robert Crane
William Frank

COLLEGE OF EDUCATION
Roger Geiger
Brandon Hunt

COLLEGE OF ENGINEERING
Kultegin Aydin
Cheng Dong
Norman Harris
Ali Hurson
Elise Miller-Hooks

PENN STATE HARRISBURG
CAPITAL COLLEGE
Richard Ammon
Irwin Richman

COLLEGE OF HEALTH AND HUMAN DEVELOPMENT
Nancy Williams

COLLEGE OF THE LIBERAL ARTS
Aida Beaupied
Julia Hewitt
Christopher Johnstone
John Kramer
Sandra Savignon

COLLEGE OF MEDICINE
Robert Bonneau
Laurence Demers
Fred Fedok

PENN STATE SCHUYLKILL
CAPITAL COLLEGE
Billie Jo Jones

EBERLY COLLEGE OF SCIENCE
James Anderson
Arkady Tempelman

FAYETTE CAMPUS
Sandra Smith

DICKINSON SCHOOL OF LAW
Katherine Pearson

GREAT VALLEY
Roy Clariana

MILITARY SCIENCES
Paul Neiheisel

IMMEDIATE PAST-CHAIR
John Nichols

EX OFFICIO SENATOR
Daniel Larson

APPOINTED SENATOR
Thomas Poole
Karen Sandler

UNDERGRADUATE STUDENTS
Jeremy Adlon
Lauren Applegate
Laura Beck
David Breslin
Meshawn Carter
Jeffrey Corbets
Eric Cowden
Amy Locke
Michael Ritter
Dawn Rupp
Kristen Seabright
Summer Spangler
Macklin Stanley

GRADUATE STUDENTS
Christopher Baker
Gwenn McCollum

We appreciate all that you have contributed to the Senate, and we will miss each one of you.  Let’s show our thanks to these Senators for all their good work.

 

Senators:  Applause.

 

Chair Moore:  Last year, we began the practice of acknowledging by way of a certificate signed by the President of the University and the Chair of the Senate those departing Senators who have held positions of leadership or who have served twelve years or more.  This year we are pleased to present certificates of appreciation today to Laurence Demers and Valerie Stratton.  Will Larry and Valerie please come forward?

 

Laurence M. Demers is a Distinguished Professor of Pathology and Medicine at the College of Medicine.  Professor Demers has served four (4) four-year terms as a Senator from Hershey.  During this time he has served primarily on the Senate Committee on Intercollegiate Athletics and the Committee on Intra-University Relations.  Congratulations, Larry, for your years of service and commitment to the Faculty Senate!

 

Senators:  Applause.

 

Chair Moore:  Valerie N. Stratton is an Associate Professor of Psychology at Penn State Altoona College.  She has served on the Senate for eight years.  During that time she has been vice-chair of Faculty Affairs, been elected to Faculty Rights and Responsibilities and served as both vice chair and chair of the Senate Committee on Committees and Rules.  At the present time, Valerie is chair of the Task Force to Review the First-Year Seminar Requirement, a position that will surely keep her connected with the Senate.  Congratulations, Valerie, and thank you for your splendid leadership over the past eight years!

 

Senators:  Applause.

 

Chair Moore:  I want to remind you that you are all invited to attend a reception immediately following the Senate meeting in room 102 Kern Building.

 

On April 4, 2003, Laura Pauley, Chair of the Undergraduate Education Committee, and I charged a subcommittee of the Senate Committee on Undergraduate Education to undertake a long-overdue review of the Bachelor of Arts Requirements.  The committee consists of senators, faculty, and students from Abington, Altoona, Behrend, Berks/Lehigh Valley, Capital, and Commonwealth College in addition to representatives from Arts & Architecture, Communications, and Liberal Arts.  Jack Selzer, Liberal Arts, chairs the committee.

 

The Senate Officers visited the College of Agricultural Sciences on March 31, 2003; this visit concluded visits to 20 Penn State locations during this academic year.  The officers will be meeting with Provost Erickson in early May to discuss the principal topics that emerged during those visits. 

 

The seventh and last issue of the Senate Newsletter for 2002-2003 has been distributed.

 

The Senate Office has a new Administrative Assistant.  Patty Poorman, will you please stand and remain standing.  Patty Poorman recently joined the Senate Office as the Administrative Assistant.  Patty worked for eleven years in the Commonwealth College office.  During that time, she worked for the Associate Dean for Faculty and Research; the Associate Dean for Students and Academic Support; and the Associate Dean for Academic Programs.  As a result, Patty brings many experiences and skills to the Senate Office.  Patty will be working with the Senate Officers, Committee Chairs, and Executive Secretary.  Please welcome Patty to the Senate Office.

 

Senators:  Applause.

 

Chair Moore:  The online Senate Election process, new this year, went very well.  I wish to thank the Commonwealth College Royer Center and Senator Peter Georgopulos for their technological support in the design and implementation of the online ballot.  Typically, 59-62 percent of Senators vote in an election.  This year, 67 percent voted.  Our thanks go to Susan Youtz for initiating this project and for seeing it through to the end.  Thanks also go to the members of the Senate staff who worked hard to make it a success.

 

Let me also mention that usually 60 percent of Senators send back their Committee Preference Forms.  The online system that we used this year yielded an 80 percent response.  Once again congratulations and thanks to our technologically gifted staff.

 

Each year, the Faculty Senate’s Committee on Student Life recognizes outstanding undergraduate students who are graduating with highest distinction and who plan to enroll in graduate study.  This year, there are five recipients of the John W. White Graduate Fellowship.  Each student will receive a $1500 award.  The John White Fellowship is one of the oldest continuing fellowships at Penn State.  The award was established in 1902 by James Gilbert White to honor his father, Reverend John W. White of Milroy, Pennsylvania.  The award recipients will be recognized at an awards banquet on April 28, 2003, at the Nittany Lion Inn.

  

Serving on this year’s review committee were Bill Ellis, chair of the Senate Committee on Student Life and a Hazleton Senator, Jennifer Tingo, Student Life committee member and vice president of the USG’s Academic Assembly, who I believe will be attending medical school in the fall, and Senate Executive Secretary Susan Youtz.

 

The 2003 Fellowship recipients are:

 

Nicole Dirling will graduate this spring from Penn State Erie with a B.A. in Political Science and a minor in International Studies.  Nicole was a member of the Behrend College Honor’s Program and a research assistant with today’s honoree John Gamble.  Nicole will be attending the University of Pittsburgh School of Law.  She is interested in practicing family law.

 

Rebecca Lynn Page will graduate as a Schreyer Scholar with a B.S. in Communication Sciences and Disorders and a minor in Natural Sciences.  She will continue her studies here at Penn State in her department’s masters program; Rebecca eventually plans to earn a doctorate in Communication Sciences and Disorders.  

 

Ninad Pendharkar will graduate from Abington College with a B.S. in Science (Life Science Option) and a minor in Business Administration.  Ninad has been accepted at several medical schools including Penn State, Iowa, and Pittsburgh; he will be making his decision soon and is interested in pediatrics and family medicine.

 

Laura Sander will graduate with a B.S. degree in pre-medicine and a minor in Mandarin Chinese.  Laura will attend medical school at the University of Pennsylvania.  Laura is interested in primary care and working with underserved populations.

 

Wendy Zimmerman will graduate from the Commonwealth College/Penn State Delaware County Campus with a B.A. degree in Speech Communication.  She has been accepted at West Chester University’s Communications masters program.  Wendy is a returning adult student with more than 20 years of experience in owning and operating a cooking school and catering business in southeastern Pennsylvania.

 

Congratulations to all these awardees!

 

Senators:  Applause.

 

Chair Moore:  I am pleased to announce that President Spanier has approved the Library Fines Policy that the Senate approved at its memorable February meeting.

 

A list of the topics discussed at the last meeting of the Faculty Advisory Committee to the President may be found on page two of the minutes of the last meeting of Senate Council.

 

May I now ask John Gamble, Professor of Political Science and International Law at Penn State Erie, The Behrend College, to join me at the podium?

 

At the recent Faculty/Staff Awards Recognition luncheon held on March 24, 2003, John King Gamble, Professor of Political Science and International Law at Penn State Erie, The Behrend College, received the W. Lamarr Kopp International Achievement Award for Faculty.  The award recognizes the recipient’s display of excellence in international education through research, teaching, and service.  Professor Gamble well deserves this award for he is an internationally recognized expert in the law of the sea, dispute settlement, multilateral treaties, the teaching of international law, and the effects of new information technology on international law and international treaties. He is the author, co-author, or editor of twelve books and more than fifty articles and eighty conference papers on these topics.

 

Law of the Sea deals with the use of ocean space and involves the need for international cooperation and agreement in regard to such topics as fisheries, pollution, the flow of merchant ships, marine insurance, offshore petroleum, and the special rules governing islands, semi-enclosed seas, superports, and artificial islands.  From 1973-1976, he was Executive Director of the Law of the Sea Institute at the University of Rhode Island.  There, he organized international meetings involving diplomats, businessmen, scholars, lawyers, bankers, and government agencies such as the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the U.S. Coast Guard, U.S. Geological Survey, and similar agencies from many nations.  A proud advocate for the teaching of international law at universities and at law schools, he has served as a Visiting Scholar at Yale Law School and as a Visiting Professor in the Faculty of Law at the University of Victoria and in the Department of Political Science at the University of New Brunswick in Canada.  His articles have appeared in such distinguished legal journals as the American Journal of International Law, the Michigan Journal of International Law, and the German Yearbook of International Law.  He has lectured in Hong Kong, Taiwan, Australia, India, Germany, the Netherlands, England, and Portugal. 

 

In his classes at Behrend College, he has opened the minds of his students to the world beyond the United States.  To do this, he has developed a computer simulation game using country clusters so that each student views the world through the lens of one selected country.  This approach makes them see that the worldview of China, for instance, is fundamentally different from that of the United States, and that Canada, however close, is just not the United States.  In his Schreyer Honors Seminar on Treaties, each student dissects and reports on a multilateral treaty.  This task requires understanding the provisions of the treaty as well as the complex matrix of country relations to the treaty.  Some students in this course become involved in the Comprehensive Statistical Database of Multilateral Treaties.  This project permits analysis of basic statistical information for all 6,050 multilateral treaties entering into force from 1648-1995.  One can easily understand why his students move readily into posts in government, law, and international business.     

 

As an expert in so many aspects of international law and comparative politics and as a professor dedicated to opening the eyes of his students to the many cultures that inhabit this globe, Professor Gamble well deserves the honors that he has received.  Today, Professor Gamble, your colleagues in the University Faculty Senate, a body in which you served so ably from 1990-1994, take pleasure in applauding your achievements and your success.  Congratulations!

 

Senators:  Applause.

 

John K. Gamble:  Since I sat where you are sitting, I know exactly what you are thinking.  You are thinking, God I hope he is brief, and I will be.  And you also probably have a suspicion that I am going to advocate for at least nine more internationally oriented credits for every Penn State undergraduate.

 

I spend perhaps three-quarters of my professional life on international things.  It is not realistic to expect that many of you will devote that amount of your time.  But it is important to understand that internationalization is essential and difficult.  It is essential because it affects both how our students are able to do their jobs and how they are able to be good citizens.  But it is difficult because it must compete with myriad other things for space in an overcrowded curriculum and because it ipso facto is multi-disciplinary.

 

Let me conclude with three very brief examples.  The top of official Penn State letterhead does not have the words United States, or university, or Pennsylvania.  I wonder how that looks to a bright high school student from Zambia.

 

I ask that we remember all of our graduates, with due respect to Cheryl Achterberg, I am less concerned about Schreyer Scholars than about, for example, a wood products graduate from Connellsville who is completing her curriculum now, has worked full-time for the last five years, and will graduate with a 2.85 grade point; I am afraid she might leave us without much understanding of the 190 other countries in the world.

 

As this group knows better than any other in Penn State, faculty can be pit bullish in the way we protect the curriculum.  There is a wealth of internationalization in our blue catalog, but it is not just what is there.  It is what students actually take, and we must make space for internationalization but we need to do so effectively and efficiently and understand that some of the best courses probably do not fit neatly in any one discipline.  Thank you for listening.

 

Senators:  Applause.

 

COMMENTS BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNIVERSITY

 

Chair Moore:  Three hand-held cordless microphones will be used again at today’s meeting.  If you have comments, please wait to be recognized by the Chair and then wait for a microphone to be brought to you before speaking.  Please preface your comments with your name and the name of the unit you represent.  We ask you to supply both those facts so that The Senate Record will be accurate and so that your Senate colleagues will know just who is speaking.  President Spanier is with us today, and I am pleased to invite him to come forward to address the Senate.

 

Graham B. Spanier, President:  Thank you, John, and congratulations on that impressive footwork between the two podiums.  I certainly second the motion on internationalization; that is, indeed, very important.  Another area that I think is of growing importance to us at Penn State is the area of engagement with students.  I just came from a lunch that Vice Provost Jacobs hosted honoring Clem Gilpin, who is a professor at the Capital College, Penn State Harrisburg, with a luncheon in his honor and the other nominees for that award—The President’s Award for Engagement with Students.  A very impressive array of work that so many of our faculty, including many of you here, are doing in the area of engagement with students.  That award has been made possible by a generous endowment that has been provided by an alumnus who has caught on to the importance of that idea.

 

As this academic year begins to draw to a close I want to say how pleased I am with so many things that have happened at Penn State this year.  I think it has been a very, very good year in many ways, which I have described in my remarks to the Senate over the course of the year.  Sometimes things pop up or there are distractions out there which make us think that maybe we are under siege a little bit, but if you take the big picture and I try to do that, I think things are going very well at Penn State.

 

I am often asked to give an update on what is happening in Harrisburg, so to speak, and by that I do not mean Penn State Harrisburg.  I mean the capitol with the governor and the legislature.  We hear quite a bit about the legislature because it is in the news every day and it could lead us to think that things are difficult, and they are to a degree.  But in the face of what looks like appropriation cuts that will be occurring because of the fiscal situation in the state, I think Penn State continues to move ahead.

 

I think it is a fundamental law of physics or something that when there is less money to spend, when there is less money to be appropriated, elected officials expect an even higher level of accountability.  They may actually be taking away money from our base budget, giving us less money than they have in years, and expect more from it.  Now maybe they have not taken economics classes but it is hard to deliver when that is the situation, but we do hear that.  We hear it in Pennsylvania in meetings we attend.  We also hear it in Washington in meetings I am asked to attend.  I think I can understand it to some degree because they know that, as federal or state appropriations for things that are important in our budget are pulled back, they know one of the responses--in addition to our belt tightening and in addition to cuts--one of our responses is to raise tuition.  And when tuition is raised elected officials get criticized for that as well as university administrators, and they do not want to be criticized for raising tuition.  But it is part of what has to happen, of course, to keep the university fulfilling its mission.  So I understand what is happening, and it is difficult, but we are doing a very good job I think.  You and your department heads and deans and vice presidents and others in the university are doing a pretty good job here to keep up with all of the things we have to keep up with, even in the face of cuts in our appropriations, so I continue to be optimistic about it all.

 

We have now launched something called the Penn State Grassroots Network.  I suspect not many of you have heard about it, but it is a very important initiative actually sponsored by the Penn State Alumni Association.  We have well over 400,000 living alumni at Penn State and well over 200,000 of those are in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania.  This is a very active network of loyal alumni who want to help us get our message across.  So one of the things I have been doing is going around as we have been mobilizing our alumni through this grassroots network to become stronger advocates for Penn State in their communities and with elected officials.  I will be meeting with our Harrisburg area alumni tomorrow night to launch the effort there.  We did one in Pittsburgh, the week before last.

 

We have a great story to tell despite these tuition increases that have been presented to our students.  We also have a great story to tell about our overall admissions and enrollment profile.  I get an electronic report from John Romano and his folks every Monday morning on the admissions activity for the prior week updated with the latest information, and this week’s report shows that we are ahead 5,536, if I am remembering the number, applications over where we were at the same time last year.  That is quite remarkable.  So yesterday we went over, I think, 78,000 applications to Penn State, which is, as I say, more than 5,000 ahead of the same time last year, and we still have a lot of applications that will come in at this point.  Most of the admissions activity, of course, is behind us, and students are now in the process of deciding--even this week is a big week for deciding what offers they are going to accept at which school.  But we will continue to get applications of course through the summer.  And I think it is fair to say that we have a stronger pool this year.  The students who are accepting our offers are probably the strongest entering class of students we will have at Penn State university-wide.  We are continuing to increase the enrollment of minority students, even at the same time that all of these other trends are occurring, we are very proud of that.

 

We are doing all of this at a time when our overall enrollment is going to be relatively stable.  We might be up a few, but our goal is to hold the enrollment relatively stable.  At University Park we are in that zone now where we want to be; we do not expect to grow.  About half of the other campuses are about where they want to be--not too much room for growth--and the other half of the campuses do have some excess capacity and could grow.  The changes are modest and, depending on the campus, the enrollment challenges are greater some places than others, which in part parallels demographic trends that are occurring in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania with high school graduates, college bound students and so on.  So we have a very good picture in terms of Penn State’s popularity and how we are competing with other universities.

 

I think all of you in addition to all of our students received an email from Provost Erickson recently about the problem of peer to peer file sharing.  It is not a problem of peer to peer file sharing per say because there are some great things that can happen with peer to peer file sharing, but it is the illegal or inappropriate use of peer to peer file sharing technologies that is a great concern on college and university campuses throughout the country right now.  As some of you know, I co-chair a committee with the president of the Recording Industry Association of America.  I am representing the higher education community in that effort.  Our next meeting is tomorrow in Washington when we will discuss potential solutions for how universities deal with this.  I think Provost Erickson has received maybe 400 or 500 email responses back from our students.  Fortunately, he has not shared all of them with me, but he is answering them, and he gives me a sample of some of the more interesting exchanges.  It is fascinating to see how our students view this topic.  Most all of them acknowledge that they would not go into a store and put a CD in their pocket without paying for it, and some, when the parallels are pointed out, they readily say, “I understand, thank you for bringing it to my attention.  I am bad, and I will never do it again,” and they see the light and that is pretty interesting to see when that happens through an educational effort.  The others have some very interesting views of the corporate world and of right from wrong and of some interpretations of what it means to have something called the Internet and to have a computer on your desk and other things. 

 

We received a wonderful email from an alumnus this morning who is a songwriter and whose livelihood depends on this and writes songs for some very important and popular groups out there and talked about what it is like from his end and how grateful he was for Provost Erickson’s email out there.  Because you know it is not just a few Brittany Spears out there that we are thinking about when we do that it is about a lot of other people who own intellectual property and have rights to it and are concerned about their livelihoods.  So it is an issue that we are working on from a number of different directions and I am pleased to see that it is getting the attention and the visibility that it has.

 

I want to make my annual pitch.  Commencement is coming up two weeks from Friday or Saturday or Sunday depending upon which commencement you are in.  Commencement is really the best time of the year.  I mean if you have ever sat in your office on a bad day and wondered why you are in this business and whether it is worth the grief just go to a commencement and see what you contributed to.  See the excitement there and see the end product and how happy our graduates and their families are.  Everybody ought to go to commencement and be a part of this, and frankly some of you do not go very often.  And there are a few people--I am looking around--who have never been.  Now some of you are the regulars--you are always there and God bless you for doing that--but everybody ought to do it, so I really encourage you to get out and go to your commencement.  If you have a cap and gown wear it; you can be a muckety-muck.  If you do not have a cap and gown or cannot afford it, tell your department head and maybe they will spring for it, or, if you do not like wearing caps and gowns, go anyway and sit in the audience, but it is a great thing to do.  Nobody should be complaining about it because I have to go to 15 of them.  I have to go to about 15; Rodney Erickson goes to 15; we split them up.  That is all we do for three days.  Then we race down to Hershey and do the medical school graduation and race back from that so I mean we are all over the place, so no complaints about going to one commencement.  I really encourage you all to try that out and do it.  The Graduate School Commencement, that is a whole interesting experience in its own right as well.  I know many of you are there when you have doctoral students because you are hooding them, but that is a great thing to see also.  So that is my pitch for today, and now I would be happy to take some questions.

 

Eileen M. Kane, Dickinson School of Law:  President Spanier, have there been efforts to involve students more broadly in discussions of the intellectual property issues, not just copyright and patent issues?  All these as you are aware are usually controversial not only with the Internet but just shifting intellectual property norms in general.  Are there efforts to involve the students in acquainting them not only with the law but the underlying policies and involve them in discussion whether the policies are actually furthered by the laws?

 

President Spanier:  Yes, to a degree.  When our students now receive their email accounts and when we sign them up for use of the network they have to read a little bit about it and we try to do it in such a way that we think they really read it as opposed to just clicking the button and going through an educational process there.  We have an overall educational program that involves posters and general awareness.  We try to encourage stories in the Collegian about it, every so often there might be an email from Rodney Erickson.  As I go around and talk to student groups--when I am in the residence halls this is a topic I have been talking about recently--students are actually very interested in talking about it, and they are very forthright in explaining what they are doing.  They know I am not there to get their name and turn them in, but it has been a part of my learning experience to meet with student groups and to talk to them about what they are doing and what is in their head because I am trying to represent their thinking in a national community.

 

About three or four weeks ago I testified before the House Judiciary Committee in Congress.  I do not think it was covered in the papers here, but there I was on behalf of the higher education community with the CEO of the recording industry sitting next to me, and they said it was the largest turnout they have ever had for a hearing of this committee in Congress.  I do not mean in the audience; I mean of the congressional representatives.  It was fascinating to hear what they had to say about it and, you know, talking about our students, and I wish some of our students could have been there to hear what people in Congress were saying.  Some of it was pretty extreme, I must say.  There were a couple of congressmen who said that they are going to lock our students up, and I said we would have to build a lot of prisons actually if you are going to lock up everybody that illegally downloaded a CD, and I reminded them, we are an educational institution, not a law enforcement agency.  We like the educational approach, and, if the students are doing something, give us a chance through our educational program or, if it gets bad, through judicial affairs to work it out from an educational standpoint.

 

Members of Congress are very, very serious about this and have said in no uncertain terms that they will pass legislation if we do not solve the problem within the higher education community; they will pass legislation, and we will not like it.  Since that time they have sent me a letter which says this very explicitly, and they have done something that is somewhat unprecedented.  The chair and the ranking member of the committee wrote me a letter giving me some deadlines on behalf of the higher education community, and I have to have a letter in their hands by May 1, 2003, giving them a progress report and every 45 days thereafter telling them what kind of progress we have made in solving this problem.  I do not mean we, Penn State.  Penn State is doing a lot of things right, and I think we are handling it in an appropriate fashion…but nationally the higher education community is way across the spectrum of responses to this, and that is part of my challenge chairing the committee.  Sorry, long answer to that, but it is an interesting topic.

 

Kathleen L. Lodwick, Berks-Lehigh Valley College:  I think my esteemed colleague from Erie has gone, but I wanted to bring up this issue of why we cannot have the official name of the university and the country in which we have the university on the letterhead?  When I first came to Penn State, I looked at the letterhead and laughed because I had been to a session a year or so earlier on fraudulent credentials in the academic world, and the first red flag is a name you cannot find in the directory, and of course you cannot find Penn State in any directory of institutions of higher education in the world because it is not the official name of the place.  You know, if we apply for a grant from the federal government we have to say Pennsylvania State University.  If I write a letter overseas I always have to type on the letterhead USA.  Is there some reason why we cannot put the official name of the university in the letterhead?

 

President Spanier:  Today is the first time in my combined 17 years at Penn State anybody has ever raised this question, and I am the complaint department for the university and I thought I had heard everything.  If a perspective student from Nigeria is applying to Penn State and does not know we are in the USA that could be an issue on their end, but, anyway, I will ask the logo and university relations folks to think about it.  Well, it says University Park, PA so the idea that we do not know it is in Pennsylvania--that might be stretching it a little bit, and if they do not know it is in the USA…I do not know.  I have never had a problem with it, but, if others of you have had problems along these lines, send an email to the complaint department gspanier@psu.edu, and you know we will see about it.  No promises though on that one.

 

Patricia A. Book, Outreach and Cooperative Extension:  President Spanier, I just wanted to ask your perspective on something that I find inconsistent:  that is, I note that governors and legislators around the country are making pretty significant cuts in higher education and seemingly getting away with it without a huge public outcry.  Yet, when universities respond to that downward pressure by increasing tuition, people—parents and alums and others—start hammering the administration and the trustees for that and you mentioned legislators as well.  But it seems inconsistent or a lack of understanding of the relationship between state support and tuition, and I was just curious about your perceptions on that and also your thoughts about how serious are efforts to limit universities’ ability to raise tuition.

 

President Spanier:  There is actually legislation that has been introduced in Congress which would limit tuition and put certain new accountability standards on universities as a part of this concern.  I do not think--and I certainly hope that legislation does not go anywhere because putting price controls on universities would be completely the wrong approach.  They are taking some of their concerns from the K-12 arena for calls for greater accountability and trying to apply them to higher education, and I do not think that works well.  There is only one public school system in any community, and if you have issues with it you had better deal with the issues, but universities are in a very competitive environment.  A prospective college student has many choices, and we have to manage efficiently.  If we set our prices too high, students are not going to apply, and they are not going to come, and that is an economic problem, and it is also a social problem.  I do not think some of the same concerns apply to us in higher education.  I think there is something of a shift occurring in the political world and in the psyche of our country as more and more people do go to college and as it has become actually more and more accessible to more people through financial aid and through expectations that now develop over the high school years and even before.  There are more and more people in our country who see higher education as a private good rather than a public good.  As people see higher education increasingly as something that benefits the individual, as opposed to benefits the society, then their thinking is, well, why not let the person who is benefiting pay for it and the data are there.  The data show that the difference between a high school degree and a college degree is worth about a million dollars in your lifetime earnings.  That is the average difference right now, so people say, well, what the heck, pay for it.  But what people fail to understand when they look at a university like Penn State, is that an investment in Penn State, is an investment in the public good.  It is not just a private good we are providing to our students.  Investment in higher education comes back to benefit us several times over.  Even if it is a purely economic argument, those extra earnings mean that we will all pay more taxes.  We will be paying more taxes than other people, and those taxes are what supports the community, and supports the state, and supports the country.  And, if you are concerned about economic development, you are producing a more productive and highly educated workforce.  That contributes to the public good.  If you are interested in technology transfer, the research that our faculty are doing and the good work that we do through PENNTAP and through the Ben Franklin Partnership and through Eva Pell’s operations and our development of intellectual property, our patents and licenses and so on.

 

This year Penn State moved into the top ten in the number of patents awarded.  These are tremendous benefits for our country, and we have good data to show that, if you give Penn State a dollar, it is going to contribute several dollars back to the state.  We can make that argument, but I think people are not really grasping it, so what is happening is that they are viewing higher education less as a public good, more as a private good and, this is my terminology, in effect what they are doing is putting higher education on a voucher system.  You know, put more money into student aid and then let people take the student aid wherever they want.  But the problem with that is that the student aid is never quite enough, so that we do have students who cannot even afford to go to a modestly priced place like Penn State, and I worry about those folks out on the margin who we might be closing out.  We are just barely able to keep up with it now, but in the next three or four years that gap is going to be great enough if things keep going the way they are that some people might not be able to come here.

 

In fact, as you all know the state’s investment in Penn State is as modest as you would find almost anywhere in the country.  The per capita investment in higher education, in Pennsylvania is 47th in the United States.  Okay, now you take the state that is ranked 47th, and we get far less per student as you know than the University of Pittsburgh, or Temple University, or Lincoln University or schools in the State System of Higher Education, so we hardly register on the charts for what we are getting.  And with last year’s cut of almost five percent and this year’s proposed cut of five percent, that number is actually going down, the per student amount is going down rather than getting higher.  It is completely going in the wrong direction, so I think these are some of the societal forces that are out there, and you know I am trying so hard to combat them through our legislative relations, through public relations and image making efforts at the university, going around talking to groups about it, and mobilizing the grassroots network.  I hope it makes a difference.  The hard part about it is that the state is running a $2.5 billion deficit and, frankly, our analysis at Penn State is that it is bigger than that.  That does not solve the problem even if they do that kind of budget cut, so we feel, yes, we have to do our fair share, and nothing that I am saying should in any way be considered to be critical of the governor and what he is having to contend with right now.  I think he would really like to help us and will, but you know there are all these forces operating right at the same time.

 

Chair Moore:  Any other questions?  Seeing none, thank you very much, President Spanier, for meeting with us today and answering our questions.

 

President Spanier:  Well, on that optimistic note.

 

FORENSIC BUSINESS

 

Chair Moore:  Agenda Item F, Forensic Business.  Today we have our first forensic session of the year, and it appears on today’s Agenda as Appendix “B.”  It comes from the Senate Self Study Committee, and it is titled, A Concept for Restructuring and for Improving the Operation and Procedures of the University Faculty Senate.  Senate Council has set aside thirty minutes for this forensic discussion.  The purpose of this discussion is to provide all Senators with the opportunity to comment on the committee’s report so that the committee will be able to revise the report during the summer.  If you have opinions but do not get the chance to express them today, send them at a later date to George Franz at gwf1@psu.edu.  The more the committee hears from you, the better will be their final report.

 

Murry Nelson has requested permission to speak today.  We will proceed by discussing first proposal number four, Size of Senate and Length of Office.  George Franz, Chair of the Senate Self Study Committee, will lead the forensic discussion.

 

SENATE SELF STUDY COMMITTEE

 

A Concept for Restructuring and for Improving the Operation and Procedures of the University Faculty Senate

 

George W. Franz, Chair, Senate Self Study Committee

 

George W. Franz, Delaware County Campus:  I have very little to say.  The point of this forensic session is to hear from you so that the committee can go back this summer and come in with a report in the fall.  I just want to explain two items that may be confusing in the report.  In Appendix A some dotted boxes appeared that are not supposed to be there, so around the Executive Committee and the Graduate Council, Undergraduate Council, Admissions, Records, Scheduling and Student Aid and all the subcommittees of Faculty Affairs they are all supposed to be solid blocks.  Something happened in the transmission that changed that.  The only dotted line on that Organizational Chart should be the dotted line that goes from the Faculty Senate to the Graduate Council and that structure simply reflects the Graduate Council side--the current relationship and current structure.  In Appendix B there was some question that some people are confused about the difference between the chart at the bottom and the numbers for Commonwealth College.  What we have done is show two different ways of calculating multiple location organizations and the only one where there is any impact because of changes in representation based on rounding occurs in The Commonwealth College.  It does not occur at Berks-Lehigh Valley or at Capital.  So with that, the floor is open for discussion, and we are discussing item four, the size of the Senate and the length of the term.

 

Leonard J. Berkowitz, York Campus:  With your permission I will address all of the major topics at once rather than jump up and down five times.  I speak from the perspective of someone who has served as chair of the University Faculty Senate, an elected member of the Faculty Advisory Committee to the President, and chair of three different Senate committees.  I also speak on behalf of five other recent Senate chairs some of whom could not be here today.  We have some serious reservations about a number of the proposals that have come from the Senate Self Study Committee.  Perhaps our most serious concern is the proposal to include the Executive Secretary of the Senate in the new version of the Faculty Advisory Committee called the Executive Committee.  The Executive Secretary of the Senate is a staff position, not an elected representative of the faculty.  That person is selected by the Provost and serves at the pleasure of the Provost, and to make that position a permanent member of the Faculty Advisory Committee to the President we find highly inappropriate.

 

A second concern is the proposed change in Senate Council.  There may be some merit in considering changes to Senate Council.  In some years it has seemed to be as dysfunctional as it has been useful, but we still have two concerns with the specific proposal.  First, asking chairs of committees to serve on these councils is adding already to heavy loads especially for faculty who are not based at University Park.  Second, having two of these chairs also serve as council chairs and as members of the new version of Faculty Advisory Committee is really adding to heavy service loads.  Third, we worry that the drastic reduction in Senate size where we move from one in twenty to one for every thirty-five faculty will make it nearly impossible for the Senate to do its work in committees, and it will reduce our ability to make sure that important constituencies are represented on important committees.  In this case, we are not concerned about people representing their constituencies in the power sense but in the sense of making sure that all perspectives are heard in committee discussions.  It is a very bad thing if legislation and policy are shaped without careful attention to all aspects at the university that might be affected.  It is even worse if those policies get implemented.  I am afraid that both will happen under the proposed changes.

 

Finally, we have some concern about the legislative limit to the length of the Senate meeting to one and a half hours.  Perhaps that is a good goal, but to make it legislation as is proposed by the Senate Self Study Committee would limit and in fact eliminate the flexibility of the chair to extend a meeting if we find the discussion merits continuation of the meeting.  Much of our time is already taken up with non-Senate business.  I timed today, which was not atypical; we began the Senate business after 50 minutes, so that would leave us 40 minutes for the entire business of the Senate if we were to accept the proposals here.

 

George W. Franz:  Can I ask a follow-up question?  If you think this cut in size from one to twenty to one to thirty-five is extreme, what would you suggest as the size for the representation.

 

Leonard J. Berkowitz:  A small change might be reasonable.  I think the Senate Self Study Committee identified the idea correctly:  we need to make sure that representation on committees is done properly.  As a start perhaps the cut to one for every twenty-five might be a nice, prudent, conservative way to reduce the size of the Senate, which has grown because the size of the faculty has grown, without jeopardizing things too much.

 

Murry R. Nelson, Non-Senator, College of Education:  Thank you, I speak as a guest and former chair of the Senate, and I appreciate the opportunity to speak from Chairman Moore.  I want to echo what Leonard just said; we have talked and I wanted to make sure that it was seen that his representation of five past chairs was indeed accurate.  We know that Leonard has a tendency to stretch the truth, but in this case it is not the case.

 

I wanted to just speak then to two things that he said because I do not have anything to add on the others.  The last one that George had just asked about, I think one to twenty-five is a more realistic attempt by this body to make something that would be workable and not run the risk of having committees that are very small.  We already have some committees that are small and, having worked with trying to staff committees at the beginning of the year when we anticipate these people will actually show up for meetings, it is very difficult to fill some of the committees.

 

The second is the issue regarding the reformation of the Senate Council.  I think this would be, as Leonard said, onerous for a small number of people rather than a great number of people.  I think that, particularly for people, as Leonard said, from distance locations that come here, having to come more than once or having to represent a larger and different constituency at different meetings, I think, is very difficult, and I think one of the things that I have heard when we would go to different campuses is the lack of support at times for people who serve on the Senate.  We have often said that it is important that Senate duty be recognized as more than just another committee.  I think that I could support to some degree this change if there were an agreement by CEOs at each of the campuses that there would be a commensurate reduction in the load of a Senator who was in this kind of position.  I think it is asking too much and at the same time it asks a Senator to essentially cut off his or her opportunities for the kind of teaching and research that they would like to do because of the tremendous amount of service that they would be required to do.  I think it is always good to be doing this kind of self study, I t