Notes - October 11, 2004

De Anza Academic Senate
Approved Notes for the meeting of
October 11th, 2004

Senators and Officers present: Annen, Bresnan, Bryant, Cole, Cordero, Dolen, Dunn, Goodwin, Hearn, Jensen-Sullivan, Joplin, Logvinenko, Lopez-Morgan, Mitchell, Moreno, Mosh, Salah, Schafer-Braun, Setziol, Sheirich and Winters
Senators and Officers absent: Castano, Illowsky, Mujal, and Rashall
DASB Student Representatives: James Liang
Classified Senate:
Administrative Liaison: Christina Espinosa-Pieb
Guests: Karl Schaffer and Tim Shively

[NOTE: Item numbers are reflective of agenda numbers in the order they are actually taken up at the meeting.]

Mitchell asked the group to hear a guest presentation before proceeding to the tentative agenda. No one objected.

John Politoski, representing the New York Times, made a presentation to the group, including a packet of materials. He told the group that apparent readership on the De Anza campus (based on numbers of free copies picked up from various locations on campus) was as high as at Stanford, something about which he thought the group could be impressed. He explained that he had met with the members of the De Anza Associated Student Body and the college deans to talk about services offered by the Times. In response to questions he also mentioned that different days of the week and different times of the year found the Times offering substantial feature sections that could be of significant use in classes. In fact, he said, some professors use the Times as a constant resource for their students who find their assignments tied to Times articles. He also mentioned that various workshops presented by experts will be available to the college free of charge if enough students subscribe.

The meeting was called to order at 2:49, a quorum being present.

I. Approval of Agenda and Notes: The Agenda was approved as distributed. The notes of October 4th were approved as distributed with minor corrections and a small addition.

II. Needs and Confirmations: In Illowsky's absence, Setziol tried to muster the enthusiasm and overall joie de vivre with which Illowsky presents these items. Confirmations were made to Tenure Review Committees as proposed on the September 27th Rich Schroeder spreadsheet previously distributed with the following changes: the addition of Elaine Lee and Anuradha Khanna to the Alexander Kramer committee, moving Margaret Stevens to the Wendy White committee and Terry Ellis to the Ameeta Tiwana committee, the addition of Donna Stasio and Lydia Hearn to the Matt Abrahams committee, Jean Miller and Lydia Hearn tot he Marc Coronado committee, Chris Kwak and Mike Gough to the Scott Osbourne committee, and Dan Mitchell to the Vernon Gallegos committee. The last of these was as a result of a coin toss breaking a tie vote in the Creative Arts division.

III. Executive Committee Orientation: Setziol took the group through most of the various Education Code and Title 5 provisions pertaining to Academic Senates and asked the Senators to become knowledgeable about all areas covered such that they could at least answer questions raised by anyone on campus as to whether or not the Senate had a legitimate interest in a particular topic. It was asked how a topic raised could get on the Senate agenda. Mitchell responded by saying that, ordinarily, if a Senator brought something forward by Wednesday afternoon, it would appear on the agenda for the following Monday's meeting. He concluded by reminding the Senators of their basic representative responsibilities.

IV. Courses Into Disciplines: Setziol asked for a deadline of November 1st for Senators to turn in corrected versions of their division's report. This was accepted without objection.

VI. Textbook Policy: Mitchell began by saying that the item on the agenda was slightly unfortunate in that it didn't say "Course Materials". He then went on to present the latest draft in general terms, informing the group that the intended tone of the document was to present best practices as opposed to a list of fixed solutions to specific problems. He also announced that the previous draft's section on "Faculty Selling Textbooks" had been added to the "Faculty Authored Texts" section.

Mitchell asked for specific new language in areas of concern about omission, clarification, position etc. Discussion began at the beginning of the document and the central issue of individual faculty as opposed to collective faculty choice. It was brought up that a majority could impose its will by putting a specific list of approved texts on a course outline and that this needed to be addressed in the document. Other considerations expressed were about intellectual property rights especially with regard to part time faculty and the need for more clarifying language in general and specifically with regard to sequential and prerequisite considerations. Karl Schaffer and Tim Shively distributed a wholesale revision of the section on choice. Clearly, additions will be made to the sections on cost, and faculty authored texts and that significant discussion will be required for the section on choice,

VII. Other Stuff for the Good of the Order: The group was asked whether or not the MandM dispenser known as JiMM should be returned to Jim Linthicum to give to his grandchildren. Great concern was expressed about the safety of the children given the fact that the dispenser has been handled by Academic Senate types. The group dissolved in a muddle. The meeting was adjourned at 4: 28 p.m.

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