Diane shared that the major problems she encountered as the 2003-2004 Faculty Senate president dealt primarily with a lack of communication between senators and colleges/departments. Her hope is that with departmental representation communication will be improved. She also stressed the importance of the role of senators on commissions and committees and how for shared governance to be effective senators who are members of commissions and committees must communicate concerns/issues to the Faculty Senate. Our challenge is to prove we can have people recognize the Faculty Senate as having influence.

• Sam reported that the Business Standards Certification is being edited and will still need to be presented to CFA. The strategy now is to distribute it electronically and have faculty “sign off” electronically.
• The BOV Finance and Audit Committee will report in November the results of a 90 school survey regarding how they conduct criminal background checks. Linda Woodard will speak to the senate in the future.
• Faculty Review Committee members are still needed. The FRC requires two members (who meet specific criteria) from every college.
• The Legislative Outreach Committee is still active and anyone interested in participating is welcome. The Legislative Outreach Committee meets with local legislators and educates them about faculty-related issues and concerns. Susan Anderson heads the committee.
• The Higher Education Advocacy Day in Richmond will be held in January 2005.
• Karen DePauw is interested in working with an informal group that includes faculty senators to discuss graduate issues.
• Provost McNamee will visit the Faculty Senate in November to talk about the Charter Initiative. Jim Hyatt and Betsy Flanagan will visit in December.
• The Senate Cabinet met for the first time in September.

• Computer Privacy Policy will be revisited by CFA. Also, CFA will be examining the business standards documents developed under BOV directive.

University Council (Jack Cranford): President Steger and Minnis Ridenhour made a presentation to University Council. They emphasized that there will be no change in SCHEV grants or the maintenance reserve fund.

(The following unedited reports were not presented but were written by the respective Faculty Senate representatives to commissions or committees specifically for inclusion in the Faculty Senate minutes.)

University Athletic Committee (Frank Gwazdauskas):

April 22, 2004 meeting

• The annual Athletics Summit Meeting will be held on May 20 and will discuss the Institutional Impact of Joining the ACC. Faculty representatives from NC State and Wake Forest will provide information on academic benefits.
• Lu Merritt reported on Hokie Club activities and said that they had raised over $11 M compared to about $9.5 M up to this time the previous year. There is an endowment of over $23 M for scholarships.
• Tech is in compliance with Gender Equity Activities for the 2002-03 year. The Academic Support Benchmarking subcommittee reported that they had met with the President and Provost and suggested hiring learning specialists, expanding the mentoring program to include graduate student mentors, employing a technology specialist, developing predictors of academic success to apply to all entering student athletes, and expanding transitional programs for freshmen directed at academic success.

September 23, 2004 Meeting

• The Rules Compliance Oversight and Advisory Committee, Gender Equity Subcommittee, and the Academic Athletics Alliance Colloquium Series committee were established for the academic year.
• Reports were presented on missed class time, with golf and tennis teams having the most missed days of class for the year.
• Graduation rates for student athletes at Tech were 65% for 2004, and will be 76% for 2005 compared to 72% for all students at Tech.
• There is a task force established to revise the Comprehensive Action Plan of 1996.
• The colloquium series is meant to update alumni on topics of current interest and may provide a mechanism to add academics into the athletic arena such as the "Chalk Talks" of a few years ago.
• Transitioning into the ACC has gone exceptionally well according to the AD.

  October 26, 2004 Meeting

• The first “Huddle with the Hokies” colloquium will be presented on Thursday, November 18, 2004 at 3:30 PM at the Donaldson Brown Continuing Education Center and will feature Dr. John Lucas, who is a retired professor from Penn State University. He is the foremost historian on the Olympics in the US. He will discuss his passion for the Olympics, which he believes to be the most exciting sporting event in the world. The Faculty Senate is especially encouraged to attend.
• Athletic rosters by academic discipline were presented showing enrollment for athletes at 12% for CALS; 9% for College of Sciences; 2% for CAUS; 15% for College of Business; 1% for NR; 10% for the College of Engineering; 19% for UAAC; and 32% for CLAHS. There are 464 student-athletes among the 20,729 undergraduate population.
• The Athletic Mentoring Program was described. The progress on the objectives set in last year’s benchmarking study was outlined. Exit survey summary information was presented showing a 75% return from seniors. 91% of respondents plan to graduate in the next 12 months. Greater than 75% of students rate academic support at Virginia Tech excellent or good. 87% responded that class attendance was important to coaches; 88% that Tech has the proper perspective with academics; 89% felt the athletic department was helpful in achieving their goals.
• The graduation rates report was presented showing 65% of students-athletes graduated in 2004 compared to 74% for all Tech students and both rates were higher that the 60 and 58% national rates, respectively.
• Discussion of CAP revisions was postponed to the next meeting.

University Core Curriculum Committee (Beth Waggenspack and Joe Eska) — October 1, 2004 Meeting

• Three UCCC working groups allow for simultaneous progress on different curricular fronts. The groups are proposal review, planning and direction, and core assessment. Each group will have a convener and will work on projects to be reported back to UCCC as a whole.
• Although the Core Curriculum is frozen until June 2005, provisions allow for new courses in area 7 and for core courses that are the result of changes in departments may be reviewed for core inclusion. Two history courses for consideration of inclusion in Area 7 and four Spanish courses that have been changed were presented for first reading.
• Brief discussion of UCCS 2984, University Core Course Series—Earth Sustainability: This pilot course series was approved by the UCCC at the May 6, 2004, meeting with the understanding that the UCCC would review the proposal at the beginning of fall 2004. Copies of the pilot course series proposal were distributed so that members could review the proposal.
• Brief discussion of the initiative for spoken, visual, and written communication that was approved last spring. A copy of the approved resolution was distributed along with the guidelines for departmental plans. Report was given on the seminars held this summer and early fall to inform departments about the new procedures; about 80% of the departments attended at least one meeting. Each degree-granting program must submit an undergraduate curriculum plan showing a sequenced approach to learning and practicing communication strategies, integrated across the major. The plans are due to the UCCC by December 8, 2004. The UCCC will then be responsible for reviewing the plans and getting comments back to the departments in a timely manner. Letters will be mailed indicating whether all the guidelines have sufficiently been met or whether areas need further clarification and re-submittal of the plan. The role of the UCCC is not punitive but rather to assist in the development of a plan that meets the department’s academic goals for written, visual and spoken communication within their discipline.
• International Strategic Plan Update – S.K. De Datta and Larry Vaughan from the Office of International Research, Education and Development gave a presentation that provided draft text for the International Strategic Plan.

Commission on Graduate Studies and Policies (Rakesh K. Kapania) — October 8, 2004 Meeting

• Dr. Sedki Riad, Professor, Electric Engineering, presented the VT-MENA graduate program, a proposed partnership between the Arab Academy for Science and Technology (AAST) in Alexandria, Egypt and Virginia Tech. The partnership would “establish a resident graduate degree program at the AAST facilities in Egypt to help Egypt and the MENA countries to meet the demand for faculty and professionals in the areas of modern technology and sciences.” Dr. Riad will forward a document electronically to commission members for further review and discussion.
• Dr. Karen DePauw reviewed the Graduate School Business Plan, previously presented to the Academic Affairs Committee [8/22/04] because we “need to have a business plan for the growth of Ph.D. students”. Dr. DePauw discussed the Ph.D. recruitment objectives/strategies and quality graduate education. Dr. DePauw announced that the Donaldson Brown Center will become a Graduate Life Center.

Commission on Research (Frank Gwazdauskas) — October 13, 2004 Meeting

• Goals for ’04-05 were presented by Jim B. Weaver, Chair. Goals include: Examining university policies, practices and procedures to ascertain how they foster or impede research.
• “Housekeeping” matters regarding university centers.
• Dr. Weaver noted from our previous work some “critical questions” that CoR might use to focus future discussions: How does the university choose how to support research and scholarship across diverse areas?; How should we define “return on our investments” in research and scholarship?; How do we maintain support for existing research and scholarship AND germinate endeavors in new areas?; How do university policies, procedures, and/or practices facilitate or impede research and scholarship?
• Dr. Tim Pickering discussed Guideline for Evaluation of University Research Centers and asked for input from a taskforce made up of Tim, a previously reviewed center (a director), and a commission member.
• Dr. Jim Blair commented on the need to review/change the list of university research centers which would be subject to commission review. Apparently ICTAS and IBPHS will not operate as typical university research centers; they will not share indirect costs, faculty will not associate with institutes, and the individuals will be tracked for research success. They will be viewed at ‘value added’ vs. being in competition with departments.
• Dr. Blair discussed the Intellectual Properties Policy Initiative and the IP Committee. The committee will meet next week and their report will be available at the University Council website. There are 150 active licenses that generate ~$2M, with ~$800k going to departments and inventors.
• Dr. Gwazdauskas was appointed commission representative to the VTIP Board of Directors.
• Dr. David Moore gave a report to the Commission on Regulatory Compliance Committees Activities. The Radiation Safety Committee discussed security of radioactive materials and radiation exposures. The institutional review board has evaluated 469 protocols this year and has discussed audits of ongoing and concluded projects. The Animal Care Committee has assessed 227 proposals to date, has semiannual reviews and unannounced federal inspections, has problems with training, and inadequate support staff.
• Dr. Blair discussed the indirect cost distribution policy and stated that changes will be made shortly to the current policy. Currently the state gets 30% of overhead, the capital account gets 13%, the Research Division gets 10%, and the college, department, PI gets 47% with variable rates determined by college. Some of the Research Division portion is allocated to the ASPIRES program. Overhead rates are currently determined by HHS and will be converted to ONR rates for 2005. The major component of the overhead rate is the administrative component which is capped at 26% of the 50% indirect cost charge. He also stated that ASPIRES competition would be available again this year with proposals open to all faculty, with preference to new faculty. Mentoring is encouraged, as is significant cost sharing and letters of support from department heads and deans.

• The Coalition on Intercollegiate Athletics (COIA) has drafted a set of policy guidelines concerning issues of academic integrity and athletics. COIA is seeking comment from all Division IA schools regarding the policy guidelines.
• Further, COIA would like to know if the Virginia Tech Faculty Senate is interested in joining the coalition. Diane Zahm and Brian Mihalik volunteered to learn more about COIA including options for Virginia Tech Faculty Senate.
• There is a need for the senate to make a statement regarding recent denigrating racist incidents. Any comments regarding what this statement should contain can be forwarded to Susanna Rinehart.
• SGA submitted a proposal requesting/requiring faculty members to conduct midterm evaluations. It was not supported by CFA.
• Summer faculty compensation need to be addressed. Sam mentioned that it will be raised at his next meeting with the provost.