Minutes, 2004

Minutes of Dean’s Council, August 20, 2004.

Discussion items included: Date of faculty retreat, security in the Dean’s office, status of audits, Precision Forestry faculty search, CWWS director, NBII update.

Attending: Bruce Bare, Dave Briggs, Bob Edmonds, Alice Meyer, Sally Morgan, Steve West.

(Note: the next meeting of the Dean’s Council will be on Sept. 3).

Retreat Planning:

A discussion of possible dates for the faculty retreat led to agreement on Tuesday, September 21. The NHS Hall will be reserved for the entire day, in case it would be useful to have the space available for working groups in the afternoon, but the meeting itself will be from 9:00 – 1:00 (roughly), with coffee & snacks to start the day and a working lunch at the end.

Security in the Dean’s office:

To insure security in the Dean’s office (since the mail room is left open and it connects to the Dean’s office via the break room) the break room door will be re-keyed and locked at the end of each day. Until a secretary is hired, Alice Meyer will be responsible for making sure that the door is locked at the end of each day.

Status of audits:

Alice Meyer reported that the state audit, which has been in limbo for quite some time, will be finished shortly. It was delayed because the CE budget was frozen, preventing the final disposition of various transactions from occurring. That freeze has been lifted, so the transactions, which had been submitted many months ago, can be completed. At that point, the audit report can be submitted and that process will be complete.

The internal audit team is still defining the audit plan. They have met with members of the college and have additional meetings planned. They will be looking at processes as well as transactions. The draft report should be issued in October.

Precision Forestry Search:

Dear Bare reported that he is still involved in discussions with the top candidate, but that he doesn’t have any definitive news to report at this time.

CWWS:

The new director, Anne Steinemann, has been in contact with Leslie Wall in the CWWS office concerning transition issues. Bruce Lippke and John Calhoun have communicated with her to initiate interactions on issues of mutual interest and to begin incorporating her into the activities of the College and Dr. Steinemann has been very receptive to that.

NBII:

Discussions with the National Biology Information Institute continue. There will be a teleconference to bring us up-to-date in the early fall; the end result should be CFR’s hosting of a node of the planned data base. This could mean adding a staff person and some computing resources to manage the database. The payoff to the College would be in having the data compiled and in such a form that it can be used to leverage research grants.

The meeting adjourned at 9:05.

Minutes of Dean's Council, August 6, 2004.

Discussion items included: ESC110 /QSci 381 (UWEO remuneration); meeting with President Emmert; update on faculty retreat.

Attending: Bruce Bare, Rick Gustafson, Alice Meyer, Sally Morgan.

(Note: the next meeting of the Dean's Council will be on August 20).

ESC 110/QSCI 381:

CFR has been receiving remuneration from UWEO for the internet sections of ESC 110 (taught by Rob Harrison) and QSci 381 (taught by Bruce Bare). However, it has been pointed out that the tuition fund recapture that UWEO has been giving us is really not appropriate, since University regulations preclude direct receipt of tuition dollars by the units that are based on FTEs of student credits. (For example, when the Law School raised their tuition, they did not directly receive any of the increase based on FTEs
generated.) Accordingly, Autumn Quarter is the last time that these two courses will be supported in this manner. More than likely, students will be able to take them as part of their regular tuition load. This autumn, compensation to the College for the effort in putting the courses on will be reduced to 16% of the tuition attributable to the course (based on 16% of the students taking it who aren't enrolled full-time.) In addition, UWEO will continue to pay for the TAs assigned to the courses.

For the future, we need to reconsider how and whether to offer these internet sections. If the number of students who are not enrolled full time is high enough, we may be well served by offering the courses through UWEO (which brings up the question of whether or not it might be economically attractive to offer a certificate program of some sort to attract these students). Discussion with UWEO are in progress.

Meeting with the new president:

A meeting to introduce CFR to Mark Emmert, the new president of the University, has been scheduled for October 12. There was a discussion of what sorts of things might be useful to present and the best way to do the presentation: what do we need to tell him about what we do and what does "forestry" mean inside the UW and to constituents across the state. We need to demonstrate the diversity of intellectual assets we bring and to demonstrate our role in environmental sciences as well. Cecilia Paul, as Director of Communication, is working up a 2-page briefing document. She and Gordon Bradley have been asked to begin working on a schedule.

Faculty retreat/College research levels:

No plans have been made yet for a faculty retreat for this fall. Chair Gustafson stated that he felt that any curriculum issues could be dealt with at faculty meetings, but that he would like an opportunity to focus attention on increasing research in the College. Dean Bare stated that he has had conversations recently with both Weyerhaeuser and the Forest Service Research about their interest in working with CFR on developing a research agenda. In addition, the associate deans have been begun an examination of research focus in connection with the New Initiative Team. Funding for research is always an issue; Dean Bare has assigned Brian Boyle to work on legislative support for the college, both at the state and federal levels. More effort will be directed toward involving the research center directors and the arrival of Anne Steinemann and David Mabberley in the fall should help generate excitement in the work of the Center for Water and Watershed Studies and CUH.

In short, quite a bit is happening to increase research levels; more discussion will be needed to continue progress. Dean Bare will work with others to develop the agenda for the fall retreat to be held just prior to the beginning of Autumn cases.

The meeting adjourned at 9:00.

Minutes of Dean’s Council, July 2, 2004.

Discussion items included: Deans’ vacation schedule; meeting with new president in the fall; progress on faculty searches; funding received from UWEO; annual reports, development.

Attending: Bruce Bare, David Briggs, Bob Edmonds, Rick Gustafson, Alice Meyer, Sally Morgan, Steve West. Tom Mentele and Cecilia Paul joined the meeting for the discussion of annual reporting and development.

(Note: the next meeting of the Dean’s Council will be on August 6).

Deans’ vacation schedules:

Dean Bare will be away beginning next week. A schedule will be distributed identifying which of the associate deans will be available (and when) to serve as acting dean until Dean Bare returns to campus.

Meeting with the new president:

We are planning on having Mark Emmert, the new president of the University, visit CFR to get acquainted in October. The schedule has not yet been finalized. Cecilia Paul is preparing a 2 page briefing document or fact sheet to use.

Faculty searches:

CUH/Arboretum: David Mabberley has accepted the position as Director of the Center for Urban Horticulture and Washington Park Arboretum and will hold the Orin and Althea Soest Chair. The appointment, as a full Professor with tenure, is going forward to the Regents in their July meeting. The appointment will be effective as soon as his visa is processed; early October is a likely time for his start.

Precision Forestry: This appointment must be joint with either Earth and Space or Civil and Environmental Engineering. The top two candidates, both of whom were acceptable in Forest Resources, were put forward to both units for a vote. One was affirmed by both (as a joint appointee in Civil Engineering and as an adjunct in Earth and Space Sciences, since it was felt that the ties were much closer and more appropriate in Engineering). Dean Bare has initiated negotiations with the candidate but it is unlikely that those will be finalized until he returns.

CINTRAFOR: the search is on hold until the fall.

CWWS: Civil Engineering has pursued a recruitment resulting in an offer for a Professor WOT who will also lead the Center for Water and Watershed Studies. The salary and startup funds have been arranged by Civil Engineering, with contributions from other units; CFR will provide office space and make the state funding for the Center available to the Director. Response to the offer should be known in the near future.

UWEO course support:

CFR has been receiving remuneration from UW Educational Outreach for the on-line courses taught by Rob Harrison and Bruce Bare. Questions have been raised about the formula used for these distributions and the allocation calculation is currently being reviewed. It is likely that there will be a change in the funding mechanism and perhaps a reduction in funding to the College.

Annual reports

Cecilia Paul, Director of Communications, and Tom Mentele, Director of Development,
distributed handouts pertaining to the CFR communications strategy. Leading the discussion, Cecilia described the two types of annual reports used by some of our peer institutions: the yearbook style, incorporating research publication listings and faculty profiles, and the report to donors style, which focuses more on specific examples of achievements realized from donations. The latter is the type that the College has used in the past. After some discussion, it was agreed that this is a good model to continue. With the target audience primarily donors and alumni, this is the most productive and cost-efficient approach. There was also general agreement that it is better to keep it relatively short. (The goal, for cost control and to streamline printing, is 16 pages.) There was additional discussion of the desirability of making the web pages for the College serve more of the functions of the yearbook-type report (i.e., research areas, recent publications, grant information, etc.) It would be possible to keep it more up-to-date and could have a much greater impact and value for student recruiting than our web pages currently do, and would also be searchable.

Development activities:

Weyerhaeuser is working on the details of a $2 million pledge to the University, from which CFR will probably realize gifts to benefit the Scott Professorship, Washington Pulp and Paper Foundation, CINTRAFOR, and a professorship in Pulp and Paper and Chemical Engineering.

There are three other large potential gifts that are in the works with other units (Earth Institute, Evans School, and Business) that could have a benefit to the College; details will be provided as they become known.

The meeting adjourned at 9:15.

Minutes of Dean's Council, June 11, 2004.

Discussion items included: updates on merit increases for faculty, graduate students and professional staff; progress on faculty searches; open faculty positions; human subjects; internal audit beginning Monday; meeting with new president in the fall.

Attending: Bruce Bare, Bob Edmonds, Rick Gustafson, Alice Meyer, Sally Morgan, Steve West.

(Note: due to scheduling, the next meeting of the Dean's Council will be on July 2, rather than June 25.)

Merit increases:

The Provost has announced implementation details on merit increases. Faculty can be given merit salary increases of either 2% or 0%. If a retention increase is awarded, it must be a minimum of an additional 3%, which would be gained from unused funds in the merit pool or from the merit funds for any open positions. Professional staff merit increases must average 2%. In addition, professional staff can be given an in-grade adjustment of 3% (or any combination of the two that equals 5%). In-grade funding is not provided centrally. For in-grade adjustments, considerations must also be given to equity issues within the College. Graduate students will receive an across-the-board increase of 3.25%. Professional staff and graduate student increases will be effective July 1.

Faculty searches:

Dean Bare is still in discussion with the top candidate for the CUH directorship and hopes to have a resolution soon.

Three candidates have visited in connection with the Precision Forestry search; advice from the faculty in anticipated. The appointment will be joint with either Earth and Space or Civil and Environmental Engineering, so a vote must be taken at other units, which may be a problem because of the time of year.

In the CINTRAFOR search, the top candidate has withdrawn. There is only one outside candidate at present. Because of the time of year, the search is open and the committee will continue looking in the fall.

Open faculty positions:

In autumn quarter searches will begin for the two vacant entry-level positions currently open (positions vacated by Northey and Chalker-Scott). One thing that will be an important part of both searches is to look for cross-campus linkages.

Human Subjects:

Human Subjects issues (especially for student projects) have come up again. When the PI brings in a grant that is exempt, the College needs to have a procedure to verify that it is exempt. Steve West is working on a form and procedure that will go out to the faculty.

Audit:

Alice Meyer announced that an audit of the college will be done over the summer. This is an internal audit and is our opportunity to take advantage of the expertise and advice of the audit department on any management and accountability issues we are concerned about. The auditors are coming for the initial meeting on Monday, June 14.

Meeting with the new president:

Mark Emmert, the president designate, is planning to visit each unit to get acquainted, hopefully in autumn quarter. We have requested a day or half day in October, but the schedule has not yet been finalized.

The meeting adjourned at 9:10.

Minutes of Dean's Council, May 28, 2004.

Discussion items included: Announcements from the Board of Dean's meeting, including Faculty Effort reporting, GSEAC impact, presidential transition planning, course user fee process, UW information services. Also discussed: preliminary planning for the annual CFR retreat(s); Resource committee proceedings, faculty voting requirements.

Attending: Bruce Bare, Bob Edmonds, Alice Meyer, Sally Morgan, Steve West.

Announcements from the Board of Deans meeting:

Renewed emphasis (at the Federal level) to improve faculty effort reporting: discussion of the reason for faculty effort reporting (grant cost-sharing) and procedure (faculty effort certification forms are sent out based on grant budgets). Effort certification is one reason that many grant budgets remain open, as the budget can't be closed as long as there are any outstanding cost share issues unresolved. It was noted that this is imperfectly understood by faculty. In time, Alice Meyer will be taking a look at the College's grant management procedures.

GSEAC impact. The contract negotiated with the graduate students may require some changes in how research assistants and possibly also teaching assistants are hired. There will be a raise on the first of July, but details of implementation haven't been provided yet. Human Resources has been visiting units to explain the changes; Alice will look into a briefing and orientation for the Dean's Council and those members of the administrative staff who are involved in hiring graduate students.

Presidential transition planning: Mark Emmert, the president designate, will be on campus beginning July 12. In his first 6 months on the job, he is planning to visit each unit to get acquainted. We will need to plan for his visit which will probably be 1/2 day in October. There was a discussion of who should be involved and to what events he should be invited (such as the annual Alumni Association meeting and a meeting of the College advisory boards). A handout was distributed listing the sorts of people that may be relevant to include.

Course User Fees: a handout of the University policies on course fees was distributed. Students in some units have approached the UW administration asking for more input on decisions concerning course fees (per the Admin. Regs.) Steve West advised that records are being kept on all the CFR course fees (primarily field trip expense fees) to determine the correct charges and that on average, fees have been reduced over the pat few years, as a result of economies and diligence on the part of the field trip planners. A spread sheet is available for review if questions arise.

UW Information Services: in response to on-going questions about Information Services, Computing and Communications prepared a graphic demonstrating what sort of things they do across campus and the stage each activity is in. (Chart is at www.washington.edu/computing/directions/iss.html.) A discussion ensued as to how this compares to the services the CFRIT group provides. Steve West pointed out that our small size means that it is not feasible for us to have a programmer to make personalized programs (although it was noted that many programs within the College have computer specialists). For administrative computer programs, there is always the possibility of sharing the expenses through the Small College Information Technology Sharing Group.

Other items:

Preliminary planning for the annual CFR retreat: the desirability of having separate retreats for faculty and staff was reviewed. The faculty retreat will be in September. Alice indicated that she wants to use the staff retreat for procedural review and training and felt that it would not be possible to do before October.

Resource committee: The Resource Committee consists of the Dean's Council and the Chair of the Elected Faculty Council. After meeting two weeks ago, in lieu of the regular Dean's Council meeting, draft minutes were prepared, but they became outdated and inaccurate almost as soon as the meeting was over, as investigation of the various proposed outcomes uncovered new information. It was agreed that this will be probably be a frequent occurrence, and that it will be less confusing and more accurate to not publish the minutes until after the requests have been fully researched. Once the requests have been researched and reviewed and recommendations submitted to the Dean for his consideration, the resulting memo will function as the minutes of the meeting, as well as a record of the ultimate decisions.

A question on voting procedures on faculty appointments has come up. All matters concerning specific actions pertaining to faculty personnel issues such as appointments, tenure, merit, etc. must be approved by a majority of the eligible voting faculty. Procedural matters, however, can be decided by a quorum majority of the voting faculty at any meeting where the threshold for a quorum has been met (for example, a vote by a quorum majority could decide that email balloting is acceptable, but could only vote on an appointment if the quorum majority equaled at least 51% of the faculty eligible to vote). Further information can be found at the Academic Human Resources Web site (http://www.washington.edu/admin/acadpers/policies/voting.html).

The meeting adjourned at 9:15.

Minutes of Dean’s Council, April 30, 2004.

Discussion items included: Messaging and images for the College in the Capital Campaign; Role of the Visiting Committee; Announcements.

Attending: Bruce Bare, Bob Edmonds, Rick Gustafson, Alice Meyer, Sally Morgan, Steve West. Guests: Brian Boyle, Tom Mentele, Cecilia Paul.

College message in the UW Campaign: Tom Mentle and Cecilia Paul showed the various components of the graphic design images for the UW and for CFR as they are evolving for the Capital Campaign. Publication Services has been working with our images for a number of years; some of the same team members are working on the imaging for the UW, and the next step will be to adapt our images in such a way that they reinforce and coordinate with the UW images.

A similar process is taking place in the message presentation. The UW slogan will be “Campaign UW: Creating Futures”; the proposed CFR counterpart: “Creating Futures since 1907.” It was noted that this has the not inconsiderable benefit of calling attention to our centennial year, which will be during the Campaign. As a corollary to the slogan, the UW has identified 5 impact areas: health, environment, economy, community and culture. It was anticipated that many units would not be able to identify all 5 impact areas for themselves, but in our case, it should be fairly straightforward – what we do has a demonstrable impact in each area. Now it is a matter of identifying stories that provide clear examples and procuring images that reinforce the messages.

The messages have been reviewed with some outside groups, most notably the Visiting Committee and the Volunteer Committee. A handout was distributed of the 4 unifying themes that have been developed for the college (Educating generations of leaders for natural, managed, and urban environments; Creating a vision for protecting and using the forests of the world; Advancing research, technology, and training to sustain human communities; and Transforming world-class education in an urban-to-wildland living laboratory). Each of these was paired on the handout with a photographic image; Cecilia noted that there is a dearth of images that are high-quality enough to be useful in the publication process; she asked that people be on the look-out for possible images. Rick commented that there isn’t much in the materials as they are now to emphasize our technology, so that is something to especially watch for.

Central Development is going to be using 2 of the stories we submitted as part of the “Showcase” at the official roll-out of the campaign; one is on urban ecology and the other the Rare Plant Care. In addition, they have identified several stories for inclusion in a storybook that will be distributed as part of the campaign materials. These stories concern the recovery of the bald eagle population, the Wind River canopy crane, and the work being done with the native Indian tribes.

One important key to success in the campaign is to have the themes and slogans incorporated in the way we present ourselves to the outside, not just in campaign documents and mailings, but in all of our other messages, too. For this reason, it is especially important to give Tom and Cecilia feedback on the messages and any additional stories or photographs.

Role of the Visiting Committee: Brian Boyle talked about the most recent meeting of the College Visiting Committee, which took place at Pack Forest, to give the committee an orientation on the plans for the new lodge and particularly the certification of the forest there. It was a very successful meeting, with the committee engaged in the ideas presented. It is very clear that the Visiting Committee wants to fulfill an advisory role. Without having what they consider a meaningful role, they will not remain involved. For example, there is considerable interest in participating in the Lands Committee.

They are also very interesting seeing high quality faculty in the college. They would like to see hiring based on research capability, rather than to replace old faculty. A role they would particularly relish would be to participate in developing research directions and in helping define areas for faculty hiring. Dean Bare noted that he had had a similar conversation with an executive from Weyerhaeuser last week regarding faculty hiring (and President Huntsman made the same point last year.)

The suggestion was made that the members of the Visiting Committee should assist in recruiting new members for the committee. There is a concern about keeping the level of participants sufficiently high-level enough; they could help recruit their peers.

Announcements: Dean Bare presented several news items:

$5.3 million has been made available for classroom upgrades (4.0 for classrooms and 1.4 for technology upgrades for classrooms). An announcement will be out soon requesting proposals. It was noted that this will probably not be a place to get funds for renovation the space that is being vacated by the library. That funding will be requested from the provost’s office.

Mark Emmert, the president designate, will start in mid-June and will be on campus after mid-July. In the fall, he plans to spend a substantial block of time (1/2 day?) with each school/college to learn about what they are, what issues they are dealing with, etc. We will want to start preparing for that in the near future. Dean Bare lunched with Pesident Huntsman earlier this week. E reported that President Huntsman was very pleased with the status report on the college and feels that we are definitely headed the right way now.

Another task to begin thinking about is preparation for the fall retreat.

A request has been made to use the CUH greenhouse for transgenic plants; the Dean has decided to deny that request. Funding is being sought by the PIs for the renovations necessary to use Bloedel 114 for a plant growth room.

A question was asked about the time frame for the Precision Forestry search. There is concern that none of the applicants will meet the qualification level for a joint appointment, as specified in the position approval and posting. The timetable has been further complicated by the absence of a substantial number of the committee members until fall. Dean Bare will meet with heads of the other units involved to see if there is a way to keep the process on track.

He met with Scott Rutherford of Civil Engineering recently to discuss a possible search for a research professor in water resources management. The person hired could conceivably take the directorship of the Center for Water and Watershed Studies. Although the topic has been stimulated by a person who is interested in the Center, the issue of funding still remains. While the potential candidate has a good track record for funding, funds to backstop the salary for two years would have to be identified before the job could be posted and the position would have to go through a regular search process. CFR would remain the home of the Center, but the primary appointment of the faculty person would be in Civil Engineering, assuming they are able to secure necessary funding.

The meeting adjourned at 9:30.

Minutes of Dean’s Council, January 9, 2004.

Discussion items included: Distance learning accountability, grad student unionization, new endowment matching fund, sound transit route.

Attending: Bruce Bare, Bob Edmonds, Karen Russell, Sally Morgan

Distance learning accountability: General discussion of adding a TA for the distance learning section of the ESC110 class introduced the question of the best ways to ensure quality teaching in a distance learning situation, as well as how best to account for the funding. No policy decisions were reached.

Graduate student unionization: The PERC (Public Employment Relations Commission) ruling has been issued: Research Assistants will be included in the bargaining unit with other graduate student appointments. The University has been meeting with the union representations on the process that will be followed. Within the near future, an election must be held for the eligible graduate students. Based on the PERC ruling, it is expected that the election will include any graduate student employed 10 or more hours per week, including teaching assistants, graders, readers, tutors, trainees and most research assistants.

It is important that no one on faculty or staff say or do anything that could be construed as an attempt to influence any of the eligible voters.

Endowment Matching Fund: The University has established a matching fund of $120 million for new professorships, fellowships, etc. The sources include $20 million from internal UW funds, $20 million from Founding Donors and $80 million from matching donors. (No further details were provided on the funding.) It will be a 50% match; conditions and requirements will be forthcoming.

Sound Transit: A map of the most recent iteration of the route for the Sound Transit Tunnel was distributed. It appears now that it will run to the east of campus, by Husky Stadium.

The meeting adjourned at 9:00.