Senate President Report to the Board

Meetings:

Shared Governance Council:

We are poised to prioritize and move forward to FaBPAC seven strategic proposals. The value of this is that we are at the tail end of a planning and budget process that seems to be working. From a faculty perspective having a "grassroots" proposal move from idea to fruition will mean a great deal. 

FaBPAC: The first meeting was cancelled but they did meet today, unfortunately I was in a Press Conference speaking about the ACCJC letter.

Reports:

ASCCC Accreditation Institute: In general the conference was very informative and allowed for some great brainstorming. While the Institute didn't give us a "magic bullet" for our accreditation woes, it did serve as a vehicle to see what the Standards are, what other institutions are doing, and what we might do as an institution. The Senate's role in accreditation is to ensure faculty participation in the accreditation document. It is our responsibility to "live the standards". What became clear during the institute as well is that while we thought we'd have a year from receiving notice of our status from the ACCJC (i.e. the letter we are currently expecting to arrive any day,) the reality is that we have a year from when the team came to visit the campus. This means that the clock started ticking in November. Also, we realized that while we need to organize ourselves for the next self-study we need to address the recommendation on budget and planning immediately. Dr. Steinback, Tracy Schneider and I have met as a team and then with IS/P Waits and Rob Simas about re-invigorating our "Recommended Process for Solano Community College's Integrated Evaluation, Planning and Budget". 

Senate Meeting:

• Our Distance Education Committee is working to make it easier for faculty who want to require an in-person final to do so by including language in the schedule of classes that communicates this information to students as they enroll in classes.
  
• The Senate is continuing to update and revise its Constitution. We have started with the duties and responsibilities of our officers and will continue with the amendments next meeting.
  
• The 2010-2011 calendar was brought up for consideration and will most probably be approved at our next meeting.
  
• The Senate discussed the ARCC report narrative, adding faculty perspective to this important document.
  
• Additionally, Ross Beck mentioned that he would be providing the college and the media with "talking points" to help negotiate the ACCJC's report that had not yet been received. Because students and the general public tend to assume that accreditation is only about "good teaching" the Senate asked that it be further clarified in these talking points that we are not on probation because of "bad teaching" and we recommended stronger language to that effect. 

Correspondence from the ASCCC

Jonnah Laroche Memorial Scholarship. Two continuing community college students will each receive a $500 award and one student transferring to a four-year institute will be awarded $1,000. Deadline is February 15^th.

Also, ASCCC President Mark Wade-Lieu's update is also available. We are mentioned, but not too favorably… gulp!

Some Thoughts: