Mission College Academic Senate

Ext. 5413

Unapproved  Minutes

Thursday, June 15, 2006

 

I.          Call to Order/Roll Call

            The meeting was called to order by President Catherine Cox at 5:00 p.m.

 

Senators

   A

   P

Senators

   A

   P

Beggs      (Ext. 5188)  AAS

 

    X

Mancini   (Ext. 5413)  AF/HM

 

    X

Braun      (Ext. 5355) Pres/Tech

   X

 

Martin     (Ext. 5356)  Tech

    X

 

Brichko    (Ext. 5222)  CATA

     

    X

Moles      (Ext. 5113)  ESL

    

    X

Cogswell (Ext. 5388)  AAS

    

    X

Ostrander  (Ext. 5274) Stud Dev.

 

    X

Cox        (Ext.5164)  CommSvc

 

    X

Paicius    (Ext. 5413)  AF/CATA

 

    X

Juncker    (Ext.5229)  Comm

    

    X

Perlas      (Ext. 5041)  Stud.Dev.

    

    X

Kashima  (Ext. 5319)  ESL

 

    X

Rounds    (Ext. 5288)  Comm

     

    X

Laird      (Ext. 5186)  SocSci

    

    X

Smebye   (Ext. 5305) CommServ

    X

 

Lavallo    (Ext. 5399)  Math

    

    X

Szabados  (Ext.5289)  CATA

    X

 

 

 

 

Ting       (Ext. 5330)  Math

    X

 

 

II.        Approval of the Minutes

            The minutes for the meeting of May 25, 2006, were accepted and approved as submitted   (M/S/U – Perlas/Kashima).

 

III.       Order of the Agenda

             No changes were made to today’s agenda.

 

 IV.      Oral Communication from the Public

            It was suggested that Aaron Malchow be given the opportunity to clarify some points on the Brown Act relative to the information provided at the District Academic Senate meeting.  Aaron stated that the citations noted on the Brown Act were paraphrased and were not direct quotes from the law.  It was assumed that the Brown Act was familiar to the Senators as it governs the activities of the Academic Senate.  Aaron stated that he was very careful to avoid presenting a negative attitude on the issue of possible Brown Act violations and District policy improprieties; it was intended that individuals reach their own conclusion from the information provided.  Relative to the outline on improprieties, it was pointed out that there are three separate occasions that demonstrate possible violations of the Brown Act, as well as District Policy, since the Board never met to authorize a discussion with Mr. Kao and Chancellor Arterberry.  Along those lines, the connection between Item #1 and Item #6 on the Possible Improprieties document is not explicitly stated.  Since Board policy indicates that Board members cannot officially act without direction from the Board of Trustees, a Board member cannot schedule a meeting to conduct District business without the Board's approval (Item #6).  As a result, if a Board member scheduled a meeting without that authorization being made public, that would be a violation of  the Brown Act (Item #1)

                                   

            A Senator stated that the China Initiative should have been placed on the Board’s agenda, discussed by the Board members, and any action on this issue reported by the Board of Trustees prior to any action being taken.  Trustee Schwartz has specifically stated that he called the meeting between himself, Mr. Kao and Chancellor Arterberry.  The matter never went to the Board until after the tickets were purchased. 

 

            It was stated that the information provided on this matter will be helpful to the Technical Assistance Team from the Academic Senate for CCCs and Aaron was acknowledged for his excellent work.  President Cox thanked the Senate members for keeping the discussion during the District Academic Senate meeting to the issues of transparency and accountability.

           

  V.      Information & Announcements 

            No announcements or information items were presented at today’s meeting.

 

VI.       Administrative Business/Actions/Appointments

  A.      Committee Appointments 

            1.  Hiring Committee for Dean, Workforce & Continuing Education – Cathy explained that a request has been made for two faculty members be selected to serve on this committee in addition to Haze Dennis, with one replacing Cliff Monroe.  There were four volunteers:  Jeff Cormier, Jeff Nelson, Pat Hudak and Anna Szabados.  The Senators elected Pat Hudak and Anna Szabados by written ballot.  Daniel Sanidad will be notified of these appointments

            2.  President’s Report - President Cox advised that she will provide written reports to the Senators periodically and distributed the following report at today’s meeting: 

 

            Senate Roundtable, 6/6/06:

  • Chancellor Arterberry informed us that the District’s FON has been revised downward as of May 2006, from 369.1 to 343.1 – this will need to be taken into consideration this year when prioritizing hiring requests.
  • Discussion of district enrollment focused on the need for growth so that we make base in 2006/07.  If we don’t make base, the district risks losing $3.9 million of permanent funding, leading to a downward spiral overall.
  • The Chancellor has been contacted by an “interested party” who read about the China trip in the Mercury-News article, and wishes to discuss an “opportunity of association” with a university in Shanghai.  It is not at all clear at present what this would entail.  Right now all that has been requested by this party is a chance to meet with Stan and talk about this idea.  Both Angelica and Cathy informed Stan that we would be carrying this information to our respective Senates, and he indicated that he would be keeping us updated as he receives more information.

 

            GAP, 6/7/06:

  • Enrollment: Antoinette Wheeler, Dean of Instruction, is heading a committee looking at enrollment and will be calling on faculty leaders to work with the Office of Instruction on ways to deal with various aspects of enrollment management.  The Senate will be included in this process.
  • Mission College’s 30th anniversary is 2007.  Planning is just beginning and will really begin in the Fall, but it was decided to reserve the dates of April 27 & 28 for most of the events – a Friday evening and all day Saturday.  Discussion included the need for student involvement as well as the possibility of using the anniversary events as a tool for recruitment and community outreach.
  • Accreditation Update: information was distributed about a proposed I.S. project to provide storage and retrieval of documents necessary for accreditation via the Web, including minutes, agendas, reports, etc. of various campus and district shared governance committees.  This will require a uniform naming scheme to facilitate indexing and a proposal from IS was distributed.  The naming scheme is not yet finalized.  Daniel Peck is the contact for this project at Mission.
  • Draft district and college Facilities Rental Procedures were distributed for review and comment.

 

            DBAC, 6/14/06:

  • FCMAT will be coming in to do a financial analysis of the District by invitation.  It will not include the Land Corp. except as a possible source of income for the District, since the Land Corp. is technically not part of the District.  They will begin sometime in August or September.
  • The tentative budget for FY 06/07 was presented.  It’s expected to be available online by early July.  Final budget is expected sometime in September.  As of right now, the budget shows a surplus; but that could change.  “Challenges” identified include the fact that ongoing expenditures exceed ongoing revenues by some $3.7 million (based on negotiated items), and the fact that if enrollment does not recover we face ongoing permanent losses of up to $4.7 million.
  • According to the state budget update of 6/10, the state budget will provide 5.92 COLA and 2% enrollment growth.  The report is available at http://www.ccleague.org/leginfo/budget/
  • DBAC operating procedures were discussed and quorum clarified as 1/3 of membership which must include representatives from each college and the District as well as an Academic Senate representative, a classified representative, and a manager.  There can be overlap – a single person can represent both a college and classified staff, for example.
  • Use of the bond interest from investments of unspent Measure H money was discussed and a document was distributed detailing the priorities for this money.

            Money from the waiver of the FON penalty by the Board of Governors will be allocated to the colleges based on FTES percentages, and the colleges will be responsible for determining how that money is to be spent (one-time expenditures only, no salaries).  Must be spent on “academic and academic support purposes.”  

 

VII.     Adjournment

            The meeting was adjourned at 5:20 p.m. (M/S/U – Juncker/Perlas).  These minutes are respectfully submitted by Grace Hazán, Academic Senate Secretary.