COLLEGE OF MARIN

Academic Senate Meeting Minutes
Thursday, March 22, 2007
12:45 -2:00 pm
Student Service Building,
Conference Rooms A & B

Senators Present: Yolanda Bellisimo, Barbara Bonander, Hank Fearnley, Theo Fung, Ron Gaiz, Deborah Graham, Erika Harkins, Patrick Kelly, Arthur Lutz, Radica Portello, David Rollison, Sheri Rollison, Ingrid Schreck, John Sutherland, Blaze Woodlief

Guests: Bernie Blackman, Sara McKinnon, Hoa-Long Tam, Kathleen Kirkpatrick, Meg Pasquel, Laurie Ordin, Linda Beam, Cari Pogan.

Approval of Agenda & Minutes    

Motion made to approve the agenda

• Motion adopted with changes; changes to include issues about the mailroom that will be added to the top of the agenda.
  

Motion made to approve the minutes

• Motion adopted
  

Officers’ Reports

The President reported the following:

• The President is working with the Administration to revise the wording in the schedule regarding wait list classes and late enrollment, an issue brought forward by the Academic Standards Committee.
• A written report was submitted.
  

The Vice President reported the following:

• The AS Officers met with President White; they discussed the basic skills requirement regarding the 30 unit limit as written in the student schedule is student unfriendly and misleading. The Senate Officers called for a revision/rewording of this policy.
  
• The Bolinas Task Force will meet a the end of May. The administration indicated that they intend to pay the Taskforce leader. VP Kelly will follow up and find out where the money is coming from and ask that volunteers from the community be used instead. The Bolinas issue will be placed on a future agenda as a discussion item.
• Elizabeth Tucker reported that the Swing Space meeting for April 2 will be rescheduled for some time during the first week of April. The first group would be Dixon, Dance Landscape and DSPS.
  

The Treasurer reported the following:

• A written report was submitted.
• President Bellisimo notified the Senate that $469.00 had not been deposited from the 2006-2007 school year.
  

Standing Reports

Curriculum Committee

• A Guest Speaker, Cari Pogan, attended to inform the AS regarding the Title 5 regulations: Minimum Requirements for the Associate Degree. Cari Pogan reported the following:
  
• English & Math Requirements will change in 2009.
• If current students enter a new program in 2009, even if they entered CoM earlier, the new program requirements apply.
  
• The English Department's curriculum for English 150 has not been approved by the curriculum committee due to the request for an increase in units and the impact on other programs, specifically nursing. The curriculum committee returned the English 150 curriculum to the English Department for revisions. If the English 150 curriculum does not get approval from the curriculum committee, it cannot move forward to the UC and the State schools for approval.
  
• The CSU system has already issued a warning to CoM to revise the English 150 curriculum; the curriculum has been revised and the concerns of the CSU have been addressed, but the issues with the request for unit increase are not yet resolved.
• President Bellisimo urged the English Department to bring all of their evidence and arguments for the increase in units back to the Curriculum Committee as soon as possible to resolve this issue.
• President Bellisimo will contact the curriculum committee to give this issue priority.
  

Technology Committee

• A written report was submitted.
• Senator Sutherland requested that the Senate contact the Technology Committee to request a faculty representative to give reports on Banner Implementation, attend meetings on the Banner Implementation to inform the faculty at large.
  

IPC/Budget Committee

• A joint meeting between IPC and Budget discussed an overarching vision for Program Review and calendar planning for program review and budget was discussed.
  

Action Items

Procedures for Governance Committee Faculty Appointments

• A motion to adopt the Faculty Participation on Governance Committees Appointments Document with the preamble was made.
  
• Motion passes

Committee Appointments

• Resignations have come from IPC, from Ed Planning, and from the Budget committee. An announcement will go out on the AS new to ask for volunteers. Bonnie Borenstein has volunteered to serve on the Ed Planning committee. President bellisimo asks for the Senate's consent to appoint Bonnie Borenstein to the Ed Planning Committee.
  
• AS gave their consent to this appointment.
  

Discussion Items

Mailroom Issue

• Senator Fearnley made the following motion: "to protest the administrations actions in removing a recent faculty generated document and to urge management to desist from any future actions concerning the removal of any materials from faculty mailboxes or the interception of any electronic mail or voice mail from or to members of the faculty and furthermore, the AS insist that management instructs the mailroom staff to restore the documents that were removed on March 21, 2007."
  

• Senators discussed that concerning the removal of materials from faculty mailboxes; the need for the Admin to create a policy to address this issue--for mail, electronic mail, and phone messages--if one does not already exist was discussed
• Senators come to the consensus that a letter should be sent to the Administration that any materials placed in mailboxes are sacrosanct and shall  not be removed for any purposes and that the Admin respond.
  

• Senator Fearnley made the following motion that will be addressed on a future agenda: The AS call upon the campus police dept. to conduct a full investigation into the possibility that the mailroom be used by unauthorized persons.
  

Requests to Address the Senate on Non-Agenda Items

• No requests
  

Meeting adjourned at 2:03
Minutes submitted by Schreck