RE:
February 26, 2002 Meeting
Dear
Colleagues:
I am pleased to forward the call for
the next regular meeting of the Representative Assembly scheduled for Tuesday,
February 26, 2002 at 3:00 in the MUII room of the Memorial Union. This call is also posted
http://academicsenate.ucdavis.edu/repassembly.htm. Individuals may request a paper copy of the agenda from the
Academic Senate Office (2-2231).
There
are a number of important items on the agenda to which I would like to draw
your attention. First, Chancellor
Vanderhoef will present his annual state of the campus report. I expect his remarks to include discussion
of campus planning for enrollment growth and the impact of potential cuts in
the state budget on the Davis campus. I
will also present a summary of the implementation of recommendations resulting
from our reviews of the academic personnel process over the past 2 years. Of special note is the announcement of the
Faculty Research Lecture awardee. The
person receiving this recognition is always one of our most distinguished
colleagues, and it is a pleasure to recognize his or her outstanding
accomplishments. We are also scheduled
to hear the reports of two special committees. Professors Emily Goldman and Diane Wolf will present the report
of the Joint Committee on Work-Life Balance that I summarized at our last
meeting. The final report of the
Special Committee on Transportation and Parking is also scheduled for
presentation (after being put over from the meeting of October 30, 2001) and
the Assembly will be asked to take action on the recommendations contained
therein. Finally, the Committee on
Elections, Rules and Jurisdiction has proposed several bylaw changes concerning
Representative Assembly membership, quorum rules and the charge to the
Executive Committee.
This
complete agenda package is being sent to all departmental, at-large and
ex-officio members of the Representative Assembly and to department
Chairs. I urge you to check the
membership list included with the meeting call to determine whether you are a
member of the Assembly. We need all
members to attend meetings to enable the Assembly to accomplish its business. This year, we have shifted the meeting time
to start at 3:00 PM to ensure that we can complete our business before 5:00
PM. The sign-in sheet will be available
at 2:45 and roll will be called at the start of the meeting. Please plan to arrive on time so that we may
start and end the meeting on schedule; your prompt arrival also shows respect
for your colleagues. It is important
that any departmental representatives who are unable to attend ask their 1st
or 2nd alternate to attend in their place.
I
look forward to seeing you on February 26th.
Sincerely,
JEFFERY C. GIBELING, Chair
Davis Division
of the Academic Senate
UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA DAVIS ACADEMIC SENATE
VOLUME XXX, No.3
MEETING CALL
REGULAR MEETING OF THE REPRESENTATIVE ASSEMBLY
OF THE DAVIS DIVISION OF THE ACADEMIC SENATE
Tuesday, February 26, 2002
3:00 – 5:00 p.m.
Memorial Union, MU II
1. Minutes of the October 9 and October 30, 2001 meetings – previously distributed
2. Announcements by the President - None
3. Announcements by the Vice Presidents - None
4. Announcements by the Chief Campus Officer - None
5. Announcements by Deans, Directors, or other Executive Officers - None
6. Special orders
A. State of the Campus Address – Chancellor Larry N. Vanderhoef
B. Remarks by the Chair of the Davis Division of the Academic Senate
a. Update regarding Academic Senate Office move
b. Report on outcomes of the recommendations of the Special Committee on
Academic Personnel Processes (SCAPP) and the Special Committee on
the Academic Personnel Process Reforms (SCPPR)
c. Academic Senate review of the use of standardized tests in admission
decisions
7. Reports of special committees
A. Report of the Special Committee on Transportation and Parking
B. Report of the Joint Committee on Work-Life Balance
8. Reports of standing committees
A. Report of the Faculty Research Lecture Committee - oral
B. Report of the Committee on Elections, Rules and Jurisdiction
*C. Annual Report of the College of Engineering
9. Petitions of students - None
10.Unfinished business - None
11.University and faculty welfare – None
12.New business – None
Anita Oberbauer, Secretary
Representative Assembly of the
Davis Division of the Academic Senate
*Consent Calendar: Items will be removed from the Consent Calendar on the request of any member of the Representative Assembly.
All voting members of the Academic Senate (and others on the ruling of the Chair) shall have the privilege of attendance and the privilege of the floor at meetings of the Representative Assembly, but only members of the Representative Assembly may make or second motions or vote.
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FINAL REPORT
October 11, 2000
ACADEMIC SENATE SPECIAL COMMITTEE ON TRANSPORTATION AND PARKING
Charge to Committee (June 5, 1999)
"The Special Committee, consisting of a chair and four other members appointed by the Academic Senate Committee on Committees, will consist of one member each of the Standing Committees on Elections, Rules and Jurisdiction and Faculty Welfare and shall exist for a term that will end at the conclusion of the first meeting of the Representative Assembly (RA) for the fall term of 2000 unless continued or earlier terminated by action of the RA."
"The Committee is charged with studying the administration, funding and oversight of transportation, parking and related services on the Davis campus, and recommending improvements of the same. The Committee shall report its findings to the RA, and shall recommend whether or not a standing committee or joint standing committee or other mechanism should be established in order to serve and represent the interests of faculty, staff and students with respect to transportation and parking issues."
Committee Members
William Davis, Department of Anthropology
Ben McCoy, Department of Chemical Engineering & Material Sciences
Francisco Samaniego, Division of Statistics
Judith S. Stern, Department of Nutrition
Carroll Cross, Chair, Departments of Internal Medicine & Physiology: Med
Sch
John Lee, ASUCD, Ad hoc
Cindy Schulze, UCD Staff Assembly, Ad hoc
Molly Hillard, GSA, Ad hoc
Norma Rice, Academic Senate Office Staff Support
Acknowledgements
The Committee is especially grateful to Transportation and Parking Services (TAPS) Director Brodie Hamilton and to Vice Chancellor-Administration, Janet Hamilton for their candid and insightful presentations to the Committee and for their reviews of several draft versions of the report.
INTRODUCTION
On May 21, 1990, the Universitywide Committee on Faculty Welfare issued a document entitled "Operating Principles Applicable to Parking Policy: The Academic Senate Position." Among its declarations were the following: "Campus administrations should recognize that campus parking for faculty members is, for many, virtually a condition of employment. Convenient parking contributes immediately to faculty efficiency, to the faculty’s ability to participate broadly in university affairs, and to each campus’ sense of community . . . Keeping parking fees as low as possible, so as to preserve faculty good will, is in the best interests of the University." These statements, and indeed the document that contained them, were endorsed by the Systemwide Academic Council and presented to the President of the University.
In 1990, the cost of parking on the UCD campus was, by any reasonable standard, quite modest. The cost of an "A" sticker that spring was $15 per month. At that time, there existed an administrative advisory committee, having faculty, staff and student representation, which met regularly and rendered advice to the administration on parking and related matters on an ongoing basis. Subsequent cannibalization of a parking lot on the site of the planned construction of the new Social Science/Humanities building, and the parallel decision to build a nearby, multi-level parking structure, led to a substantial amount of incurred debt and to the beginning of a steep increase in parking fees.
The Transportation Advisory Committee was discontinued in the early nineties. There was thus no formal advisory process in place as the campus began, in the mid-nineties, its long-range planning in the area of transportation and parking. This planning process culminated in the adoption by the campus administration of the "Long Range Access Plan" (LRAP), which was issued as an official planning and working document in January 1997. The LRAP came to the attention of the Academic Senate’s Committee on Faculty Welfare (CFW) in the winter of 1998 in the course of that committee’s discussions with Transportation and Parking Services (TAPS) administrators regarding parking issues that arose in the CFW’s survey project earlier that year. The CFW was stunned to learn that two new parking structures had been approved by campus administration, and that the LRAP contained several parking fee scenarios, the most expensive (Winter Scenario) of which would raise the annual costs of "A" stickers by 293% (from $324 to $948) and raise the annual cost of "C" stickers by 332% (from $228 to $756) over the ten-year period, 1995-2004 (see Table 1 below). The campus administration actually adopted the Fall Scenario which included projections for annual "A" permit rates moving from $324 in 1995 to $528 in 2000 (52% increase) and $780 in 2004 (141% increase). Annual "C" permits move from $228 in 1995 to $420 in 2000 (74% increase) and $624 in 2004 (173% increase).
At the behest of the CFW, the Representative Assembly of the Davis Division of the Academic Senate approved, in the spring of 1999, the formation of a Special Committee on Transportation and Parking. The charge of that Committee was, in simple terms, to investigate matters related to the availability and cost of campus parking and to make recommendations to the Senate regarding appropriate strategies aimed at securing convenient and affordable campus parking for all faculty, staff and students who have need for it.
The Special Committee on Transportation and Parking was commissioned to present its final report to the Academic Senate in the fall of 2000. This final Report provides details on the investigations and findings of our 15 meetings and puts forth a collection of principles and recommendations intended for immediate consideration by the Academic Senate and the campus administration. As a courtesy the Committee provided a copy of this Report to Administration and to the Academic Senate leadership on August 4, 2000. No substantive comments were received prior to issuance of this Final Report of October 11, 2000. In order to obtain more comprehensive information and input on parking and related matters, we invited ad hoc members representing the UCD Staff Assembly, the UCD Academic Federation, the ASUCD, and the Graduate Student Association. It is clear to the Special Committee that the entire matter has some urgency. During the course of our deliberations, costs and revenues associated with Parking Services were scrutinized. In the paragraphs that follow, we summarize our investigative findings and the principles and recommendations which we are now putting forward for consideration by the Academic Senate. We also append a listing of the database upon which this report was based.
INVESTIGATIVE FINDINGS
TABLE 1
PARKING SERVICES LONG TERM FACILITY CONSTRUCTION PLAN
Cost
(Winter "most expensive" Scenario)
|
|
New Parking |
|
|
|
|
|
Spaces |
Cost for Structure |
|
|
|
Year |
Required |
Space Only |
Annual A-Permit Rate |
Annual C-Permit Rate |
|
1995-1996 |
416 |
$ 4,992,000 |
$324 |
$228 |
|
|
|
|
($27/month) |
($19/month) |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
1999-2000 |
1,943 |
$18,324,000 |
$636 |
$504 |
|
|
|
|
($53/month) |
($42/month) |
|
|
(1,527*) |
|
($26/month increase) |
($23/monthincrease) |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
2004-2005 |
|
$22,812,000** |
$948 |
$756 |
|
|
3,844 |
|
($79/month) |
($63/month) |
|
|
(1,901*) |
|
($26/month increase) |
($21/month increase) |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Totals: |
3,844 |
$46,128,000 |
$52/month increase*** |
$44/month increase*** |
* Reflects the
number of parking spaces required to be constructed to meet the core
campus utilization benchmark.
** This reflects
projected increases beyond 2000-01 for a proposed Parking Structure #3,
near the Rec Hall. Such a project and any associated rate increases have yet to
be
approved, although Chancellor Vanderhoef does mention this in the context of
"yet to be
constructed" in his 25 June 2000 Davis Enterprise column concerning
parking garages.
*** Over $21 million
of the approximate $46 million proposed to be spent to construct the
required number of structure spaces is for replacement parking.
SOME BASIC PRINCIPLES ENDORSED BY THE COMMITTEE
A university has a unique place in society. It is a center dedicated to teaching and learning, to thinking about and discussing new and old ideas, to exploration, to discovery and to the advancement of society’s highest and most important goals. Policies and actions that serve to facilitate and support scholarly work, that encourage interactions between faculty and students, that make it comfortable and even inviting for faculty to spend time on campus, and that make it easy for both faculty and staff to be generous with their time and talents, are not only wise and far-sighted but are essential for ensuring that the university flourishes. Faculty and staff are the heart of the university. If parking is regarded as a privilege that is extended only at considerable expense, faculty and staff resentment, demoralization, and resistance are certain to increase, to the detriment of the campus environment.
The administration insists that, because of past understandings negotiated with state government, campus parking must be "self supporting." The Committee believes that it is important for the campus administration to give an appropriately narrow interpretation of what "parking" really means. There are great many transportation-related activities that are presently supported by parking revenues. On some UC campuses, some of these revenues have, in the past, been used to support projects that are totally unrelated to parking. We wish to assert in the strongest possible terms that it is improper for parking-related income to be spent on the construction and maintenance of roadways, on methods and modes of alternative transportation, or on general administrative costs for activities not directly related to campus parking.
Parking issues, including availability, convenience and cost are certainly among those on which there should be ongoing discussion. This formal consultation might well be augmented by informal meetings between TAPS staff and representatives of faculty, staff and student organizations, as has been the TAPS practice in the past. The Committee believes that the current plan regarding the availability and cost of parking at UC Davis is seriously flawed and it notes that this plan was developed without formal consultation with the Academic Senate or with organizations representing UCD staff or students. We consider that state of affairs to be deplorable and suggest that formal and permanent mechanisms be established for consultation on such matters in the future.
Parking lots, once constructed and paid for, should be credited to the users who paid for them and should not be removed from service without replacement in kind.
The siting of new parking facilities is a delicate matter. The Committee believes that if parking structures are to be built their financing should include sufficient subsidies so that the net cost to users is equivalent to those that would have accrued from asphalt parking in their stead.
Comparisons with parking costs at public colleges in our area, that is, with California State University, Sacramento and with Community Colleges within a 40-mile radius of the Davis campus, seem to us to be the most relevant in establishing parking fees at an institution such as ours.
The Committee wishes to assert that considerations of fairness dictate that the administration should maintain a pricing structure for parking fees that recognizes various constitutencies’ differential ability to pay. It is important to balance cost with convenience and to maintain a highly affordable parking option for UC Davis employees at the lower end of the salary scale. Thus, specially priced options like remote parking, with suitably convenient shuttle service, should be part of the overall parking plan. It would also be appropriate to charge substantially higher fees, including proportionately higher rates of increased fees, for employees who wish the added convenience of parking places reserved for them personally or reserved for them by virtue of an administrative office they hold.
The University of California has, in the past, sought to maximize its budgetary allocation in other areas of campus activity by holding to an ancient "understanding" (about which repeated Committee requests for written documentation have gone unanswered) with the State legislature that campus parking would be a self-supporting activity. This understanding needs to be revisited. New arrangements may well be necessary if the basic principle of affordable parking for faculty, staff and students is to be preserved as a component of a hospitable campus environment.
RECOMMENDATIONS
APPENDIX: DATABASE
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November 14, 2001
To: Clifford Contreras, Director
Transportation and Parking Services
Davis Campus
From: Carroll Cross, Chair
for the Academic Senate Special Committee
on Transportation and Parking
Dear Cliff:
I am writing to you on behalf of the members of the Academic Senate Special Committee on Transportation and Parking. We have read the draft LRAP Options Study with great interest, and have a number of reactions we wish to share with you. We appreciate your meeting with us yesterday to answer our questions and provide us with an overview of the administration’s current thinking on future parking needs and their corresponding funding. We also appreciate the opportunity to provide our input.
As you know, our Committee presented a report to the Representative Assembly of the Academic Senate on October 2000 in which a number of guiding principles were articulated and a number of recommendations were made. We would like to re-iterate our strong support for the philosophies and recommendations that we put forward in that report. Two specific points received special emphasis in our deliberations and in the report itself. The first is that parking revenues should be used exclusively to support parking-related costs, and should in no instance be used to fund other types of campus facilities or operations. The second is that existing parking facilities that are removed from service to accommodate new construction should generate appropriate reimbursement costs to the TAPS budget, and thus to the users of campus parking. Our reading of the draft LRAP leaves us with the distinct impression that our recommendations in these two areas have been, thus far, ignored. We were gratified to learn from you yesterday that the issue of reimbursement for displaced parking is a matter that is currently under discussion in an administrative forum. We look forward to hearing a concrete proposal for dealing with this issue. In the meantime, we will share our thoughts on this point, and on the constraints that we feel should be placed on the spending of parking revenues, since we believe that the draft LRAP fails to handle either of these points appropriately.
The issue of how parking funds are spent is perhaps the simpler of the two. When we examined the budget corresponding to the three plans examined, we find allocations to facilities and operations that are difficult to classify as “primarily” (and much less “exclusively”) parking related. Among these, the building of the South Entry Kiosk and the annual $300,000 allocation to road and pathway maintenance seem to be the most striking. Since the Kiosk, and the several others like it, serves a variety of roles, including those of offering reception, welcome and general campus information, it seems peculiar that the LRAP would classify this as totally attributable to (and thus totally funded by) parking. One might argue about the relative shares that other budgets might contribute to funding this facility, but it would be difficult indeed to make a compelling argument that this share should be zero.
Our Committee likewise believes that the contribution to road and pathway maintenance that is drawn from parking revenues is much too large. The campus road and pathway infrastructure serves many purposes, not the least of which is simply allowing faculty, staff, students and visitors to navigate freely around the campus. While State funds have not been used in the past to support the building and maintenance of parking spaces, the same is not true for roads. It appears that parking revenues have been tapped as a convenient source of funds for road construction and maintenance. It is our view that this utilization of parking revenues is improper, except for the small amount of road/parking lot interface that can clearly be regarded as “parking-related”. We recommend that the budget line associated with road and pathway maintenance be adjusted downward to a figure that can be rigorously defended as truly parking-related.
Regarding the matter of reimbursement for displaced spaces, we should say, first, that the issue of appropriate reimbursement for the 1230 spaces that were displaced in the process of construction of the new Center for the Performing Arts is yet to be satisfactorily addressed. The resolution of this issue is of primary importance to the campus, as it is a potentially explosively divisive issue that has implications at virtually all levels of campus life – philosophical, ethical, political, practical and fiducial. We believe that the matter must be dealt with first, before the planning of further parking facilities, because the way it is resolved will largely define the tone for future cooperation in the area of campus parking. An early resolution of the reimbursement issue is important for the very practical matter of setting that baseline from which future parking fees will be calculated. To a person, this Committee feels that the Center for the Performing Arts is a wonderful step forward for the campus. And yet, while applauding this new campus and regional resource, we must insist that the faculty and staff who must drive to work and park on the campus not be disproportionately taxed in the process of securing the Center’s funding.
The issue of reimbursement for displaced spaces also enters into the funding of future construction. We believe that the same principle articulated above applies with equal force to this planned construction. The cannibalization of Lot 41 in the process of building a proposed third parking structure for the campus needs to be addressed. The draft LRAP (Options 1 and 3) make no accommodation for these displaced spaces other than to write them off as valueless. But these spaces have been built from user fees and are, in that sense, owned by the users. Lot 41 is a “permanent” parking lot meant to be used and maintained indefinitely. Any plan to remove it from service, regardless of what is eventually built on the land, requires that the user be compensated. Once the matter in the preceding paragraph is resolved, the resolution should then be applied to Lot 41 and all other future displacements of permanent parking spaces.
There are a number of other issues that seem worth raising. We will raise just one additional issue here, and do so only briefly. Our committee is quite concerned with the potential negative effects of the soon-to-be-implemented restriction on freshman parking. We believe that an alternative such as a remote student parking lot without a shuttle service might be preferable to the current plan. It seems likely that many freshmen with cars on campus would like to have their car available on occasion, but would not need to use it regularly. Remote surface parking would solve this problem. If the lot were restricted to student parkers, it seems reasonable to seek a subsidy from student Reg fees in order to make the parking option truly affordable. In any case, the current restriction seems unwise to us, given our interest in recruiting the best and brightest, including those with cars; perhaps the idea of a remote, non-shuttle lot can be investigated. One other idea: it seems worth investigating the implications of a 95% occupancy rate, given that the goal of a 90% rate results in quite substantial fee increases. A fourth parking structure would surely not be required under such a standard.
We look forward to our further interactions with you on parking and related issues.
Sincerely,
Carroll E. Cross, Department of Internal Medicine
William Davis, Department of Anthropology
Ben McCoy, Department of Chemical Engineering & Material Sciences
Francisco Samaniego, Division of Statistics
Cindy Schulze, UCD Staff Assembly, Ad hoc
Judith Stern, Department of Nutrition
Academic Senate Special Committee
on Transportation and Parking
cc: Jeffery Gibeling, Chair Academic Senate
Janet Hamilton, Vice Chancellor of Administration
John Oakley, Chair Faculty Welfare
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June 28, 2001
To: Larry Vanderhoef, Chancellor
Jeffery Gibeling, Chair, Academic Senate
From: Emily Goldman and Diane Wolf, Co-Chairs, Committee on Work-Life Balance
Re: Recommendations of the Committee on Work-Life Balance
Many families now consist of working parents; thus a work environment that provides both flexibility and support to employees confronted with life-changing events (births, deaths, illness of parents) is essential. An institution that is ‘family-friendly’ will be desirable to new employees, and will gain the loyalty of its current employees. This committee’s charge was to begin the process of building a supportive environment for faculty, staff, students and post-doctoral scholars that accommodates time-consuming and emotionally demanding events centered around family life in its broadest sense. Furthermore, the committee’s most immediate charge was to review UC Davis’ existing parental leave policy, as it is applied to faculty across campus. Below, we outline specific recommendations to the administration about parental leave for Academic Senate faculty; we believe that these recommendations are just the beginning steps to a much broader policy that addresses additional work-life balance issues, such as the care of aging parents, and that will eventually apply to all campus personnel.
The purpose of parental leave policies is to help faculty, and ultimately other campus community members, to incorporate new members into a family within the context of a demanding career. Existing parental leave policies fail to meet this basic requirement, and thus do not create a supportive environment that effectively enables UC employees to be both good parents and good workers. At the current time, women are most affected by the demands of new family members. As women continue to enter the academic workforce in increasing numbers, the ability of UC Davis to recruit an outstanding and diverse faculty will hinge on having a strong support system for issues of vital importance to women, like parental leave. In addition, as more men and dual career couples participate in the rearing of their children, these programs will universally serve to recruit the best faculty to UC Davis.
It is absolutely essential that family friendly policies be implemented in a fair and even-handed manner across campus. They must be widely understood and supported by department chairs, deans and campus administrators. While it is recognized that family leave decisions may be tailored to the needs of individual faculty, it is also essential that the University establish a basic, fundamental leave policy that can apply to all faculty, regardless of departmental affiliation or duties. These policies must be designed both to maximize flexibility for the faculty member and to allow the ‘home’ department of that faculty member to fulfill its obligations to the campus community. These policies must be consistent with the recommendations of the Chancellor's and Provost's Task Force on Faculty Recruitment (May 1, 2000), the goal of which was to develop recommendations for recruitment to ensure that the campus hires excellent and diverse faculty.
The purpose of the University is to teach the next generation of leaders and to conduct scholarly investigations that serve the people of the State of California. The committee was cognizant that to complete this mission, it is paramount that the University attracts the best students, recruits the best faculty, and supports the creative and scholarly efforts of its faculty. To recruit and support the best faculty, issues of work-life balance are critical to the University. Indeed, the University should be a model institution to explore and develop new ways of handling these important issues. In that spirit, the committee offers the following recommendations:
1. The goal of the following recommendation is to provide department chairs and deans with the necessary funds to accommodate parental leave requests. While most faculty are likely to want teaching-load reductions, some may desire other forms of support based on the nature of their workload. This recommendation is designed to allow faculty flexibility in putting together a support package.
Recommendation: Creation of a centralized pool of funds for department chairs and deans to support faculty duties while on parental leave. These resources would be located in the Office of the Vice-Provost - Academic Personnel. A centralized pool of funds would be an equitable campus-wide solution that would ensure no unit is unduly burdened.
2. The goal of the following recommendation is to ensure that faculty, deans and chairs have easy access to information regarding parental leave policies and that faculty members have an advocate for their interests should conflicts arise over implementation of parental leave.
Recommendation: A central information contact person should be designated so that faculty members, deans and chairs have easy access to information regarding parental leave policies. Faculty members can consult with this person to become informed about options concerning parental leave, and to discuss ideas and options before finalizing a formal request to the department chair. We recommend that this person be senior staff within the Office of the Vice Provost – Academic Personnel. The individual should have the authority and ability to provide contextual and advisory information and interpret policy in a way that fosters the family friendly intentions of the policy. Senior faculty advocates, one male and one female, should be appointed by the Campus Advisory Committee on Work/Life Issues (see recommendation 7) to consult with faculty, provide oversight of policy implementation, and advocate on the faculty member's behalf should conflicts arise over implementation of parental leave.
3. The goal of the following recommendation is to articulate specific leave policies for the purposes of caring for a child that will be both feasible, and will make UC Davis an attractive working environment for current and new faculty. The recommendation balances the needs of faculty who are faced with a period of increased emotional and physical demands with the needs of departments to plan for the delivery of their undergraduate and graduate curricula. In addition, the recommendation is intended to provide faculty with the maximum amount of flexibility in planning for a period of absence from work and in managing the transition back to a full workload.
Recommendation: The total period of leave and modified duties should be one year (12 consecutive months). The academic appointee will receive his/her approved salary as well as all benefits during the entire leave. The first six months of leave should consist of complete release from teaching and administrative duties. The second six-month period should be active-service with modified duties (AS-MD) status. During the AS-MD period (months 7-12) the teaching load should be at most 50% of the academic appointees’ normal teaching load during the AS-MD time period. The academic appointee should be released from all administrative and committee responsibilities during the entire 12 months. It is the responsibility of the Dean and Chair to ensure workload is not increased before or after the time of leave. This policy applies to each academic appointee.
4. The goal of the following recommendation is to develop a policy for dealing with the special needs of multiple births or simultaneous adoption. These events create an additional burden on families, beyond those associated with single births or adoptions.
Recommendation: The Campus Advisory Committee on Work/Life Issues (see recommendation 7) should examine, as one of its first orders of business, a policy related to multiple births, specifically whether or not each child should be counted as a singular event and how to calculate appropriate periods of parental leave.
5. The goal of the following recommendation is to ensure equity in parental leave policies across the ranks of the faculty and flexibility in how “extending time on the clock” provisions are implemented. Current parental leave policy recognizes how childbirth and adoption affect progress through the ranks at the Assistant Professor level by extending time on the tenure clock for up to two years for two births or adoptions. No such provision exists for post-tenure merits and promotions. Women who give birth after tenure are currently being hampered by having to defer for merits and promotion to Full Professor. Current practice also prevents faculty from deciding when they would like to extend time on the clock within the Assistant Professor rank.
Recommendation: Progress through the ranks of the faculty ladder may be interrupted for up to two years for parental leaves at any and all steps on the academic ladder, without prejudicial consideration, and at the discretion of the faculty member. Faculty should be allowed maximum flexibility in determining when they want to add extra time as part of the "extend time on the clock" policy. As part of this policy, junior faculty should be permitted to extend the tenure clock by one year prior to the appraisal.
6. The goal of the following recommendation is to ensure broad knowledge and support of parental leave policies throughout campus administration.
Recommendation: The Office of the Vice Provost – Academic Personnel should develop and deliver training geared to work-life balance issues as part of the annual new faculty orientation, department chair workshops and faculty meetings. Faculty, chairs and deans should be required to attend.
7. The goal of the last recommendation is to attend to a wider range of work/life issues and to the needs of staff, post-doctoral scholars and graduate students as well as faculty. While adopting or giving birth to a child is an important and time-consuming event, other family management issues receive less attention, but are often as demanding on personal and professional lives. These include care of aging and ill family members, or the death of an immediate family member. Moreover, single and/or childless employees also face work/life balance issues. Creating a "family friendly" campus and one that is committed to the goal of promoting work/life balance for all its employees, a goal articulated by UC Davis' leadership, is a large undertaking, requiring sustained and high level effort and attention.
Recommendation: Create a Campus Advisory Committee on Work/Life Issues. The Committee should advise campus leaders on the needs and concerns of UC Davis employees and their families, and identify, recommend and advocate for family-supportive policies, programs and practices, and for general work/life balance for all campus employees. The Committee should have representation from faculty, staff, post-doctoral scholars and graduate students. Subcommittees of faculty, staff, post-doctoral scholars and graduate students should be convened to assess and monitor their respective leave policies. The faculty subcommittee should consult and collaborate with the appropriate Academic Senate committees. The Campus Work/Life Advisory Committee should collect data on current practices and policies at UC Davis and other institutions, supervise the implementation of the recommendations made by this committee, and evaluate and fine tune these policies. The Committee should receive sufficient funding and staffing to carry out its charge.
Respectfully submitted,
Emily O. Goldman Diane Wolf
Political Science Sociology
Co-Chair Co-Chair
Dott Burton Patricia Conrad
Coordinator, Administrative Policy Pathology, Microbiology
and Immunology, SOVM
Carol Kirshnit Debra Long
Academic and Staff Assistance Psychology
Michael McCarthy Connie Melendy
Food Science and Technology Office of Academic Personnel
Ann Orel Jerry Powell
Applied Sciences Hematology
and Oncology, SOM
Sharon Strauss Ed Taylor
Evolution and Ecology Agricultural and Resource
Economics
Chih-Ling Tsai Pat Turner
Graduate School of Management Office of the Provost
Robin Whitmore
Women’s
Resource and Research Center
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REPORT OF THE COMMITTEE ON ELECTIONS, RULES AND JURISDICTION
TO: Representative Assembly of the Davis Division of the Academic Senate
Proposed Amendment to DD Bylaw 73(C)
Justification
The Special Committee on Personnel Process Reform (SCPPR) proposed an amendment to the DDB 77, the bylaw governing the Committee on Faculty Welfare. That amendment was tabled at the Representative Assembly meeting in Spring 2001 in the face of objections from the Chair of Faculty Welfare. On reconsideration, the Executive Council believes that the purposes of the amendment would be better served if the review of salaries was made on the same five-year cycle as the general review of the personnel process and that the duty to conduct it rest with the same body (the Executive Council itself). The purpose of the salary review remains as it was originally to keep the Senate informed of its relative position with respect to salaries paid to faculty at other universities with the emphasis on maintaining salaries that are competitive with those universities with the highest reputation.
Present Wording Proposed Wording
73. Executive Council 73. Executive Council
(C) (7) New (C) (7) To collect, starting in Fall
2003 and every year thereafter, and
to report to the Representative
Assembly and publish to the Divi-
sion comparisons of academic
salaries of the Davis Division with:
1.other divisions of the University of
California; and 2. a comparison group of universities of higher status than UC Davis whose reputations we wish to emulate. The second group should comprise both public and private universities, and its composition should be revised from time to time as appropriate.
Justification:
A ruling of the University Committee on Rules and Jurisdiction interpreting existing Senate bylaws and Regents’ Standing Orders concluded that Faculties must have an elected executive committee and a dean may not serve as chair of the faculty by virtue of his or her office. No exception is made for small departments. Subsequently, an amendment to Academic Senate Bylaw 50 (C) codified that ruling and also forbade deans from even being elected to serve as chair of the faculty. Davis Division Bylaw 137 has long been inconsistent with (even the unamended) Academic Senate Bylaw 50 (C), probably as a result of a drafting error. It is now clearly inconsistent with the amended version. It seems for example, to say that in small departments the dean is not to be an ex officio member of the executive committee, even though he or she is required to be by Senate Bylaw 50 (C). DDB 137 clearly needs to be brought into line with Academic Senate Bylaw 50 (C). Since the rationale for forbidding deans from serving as chairs of a faculty – despite the fact that they are members of the Senate – was to avoid excessive entanglement of the Administration with the independent functions of the Senate implied by shared governance, the proposed amendment goes further than Academic Senate Bylaw 50 (C) and forbids anyone with substantial administrative responsibility from serving as chair of a faculty. This would rule out, for instance, faculty with part-time appointments such as associate deans, as well as other full-time administrators, but not department chairs.
Present Wording Proposed Wording
137. Each Faculty is authorized to 137. Each Faculty is authorized to
organize, to select its officers and organize, to select its officers and
committees, and to adopt any procedural committees, and to adopt any pro-
rules and regulations consistent with cedural rules and regulations con-
Bylaws and legislation of the Academic sistent with Bylaws and legislation
Senate and the Davis Division. The dean of the Academic Senate and the
of a college or school shall be an ex officio Davis Division. The dean of a
member of the executive committee of its college
or school shall be an ex
Faculty except in faculties of colleges and officio member of the executive
Schools, which are substantially coincident committee
of its Faculty. No
with departments of the same name. The member of the Division holding
chairperson of a Faculty and
members of an administrative title of
its executive committee shall be
chosen by Chancellor, Vice Chancellor,
the faculty. Dean, Associate Dean or titles
with
equivalent levels of admini-
strative
responsibility may serve
as
Chair of the Faculty or of the
Executive Committee. The Chair of
a Faculty and members of its
Executive Committee shall be
chosen by the faculty.
Amendments to Improve the Probability of Obtaining Quorum at RA Meetings
Rationale
Over at least the last six to eight years, a number of meetings of the Representative Assembly have failed to reach a quorum or only reached a quorum long past the announced starting time or dissolved for lack of quorum before important business was completed. The several amendments to Davis Division bylaws proposed below aim to improve the prospects for establishing and maintaining a quorum.
Two principles guide the amendments: First, to be representative the Representative Assembly must include a broad spectrum of participation from all parts of the campus. Hence, the solution of simply lowering the threshold for a quorum below the current 50 percent plus one rule was not entertained. Second, the elected and appointed members of