The
Regular session – January 24, 2005 - 3:30 p.m. - Jacobson Faculty Hall 102
office: Jacobson Faculty Hall 206
phone: 325-6789
e-mail: facsen@ou.edu web site:
http://www.ou.edu/admin/facsen/
The Faculty Senate was called
to order by Professor Valerie Watts, Chair.
PRESENT: Barker,
Blank, Burns, Caldwell, Catlin, Cintrón, Devenport, Dewers, Dohrmann, Draheim,
Elisens, Fincke, Forman, Frech, Geletzke, Greene, Gutierrez, Halterman, Havlicek,
Hayes-Thumann, Henderson, Houser, Kauffman, C. Knapp, R. Knapp, Lai, Magnusson,
Marcus-Mendoza, Penrose, Raadschelders, Ransom, Rupp-Serrano, Scherman, Schwarzkopf,
Striz, Watts, Wheeler, Wyckoff
Provost's office representative: Mergler
ABSENT: Biggerstaff,
Bozorgi, Bradford, Brown, Civan, Cramer,
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
Announcement: Academic integrity
Campus campaign
Research compliance
Alcohol policy
Senate Chair's Report:
PeopleSoft
Social security numbers on ID cards
Health insurance
Intersession
Parking
OU’s employment trends
HEACO legislative forum
________________________________________________________________________________
The Faculty Senate Journal
for the regular session of December 13, 2004 was approved.
President Boren approved the
resolution passed by the Faculty Senate November 8 endorsing the UOSA academic
integrity statement and applauding the accomplishments of the UOSA Honor
Council (see 11/04 Senate Journal--http://www.ou.edu/admin/facsen/minutes/1104jrn.htm).
Mr. Kirk Garton, from the
Development office, spoke about the 2005 faculty/staff Campus Campaign. Mr. Garton thanked faculty and staff for
their participation in the fundraising campaign last year. Last year, faculty and staff gave $1.7 million. That level of giving helps the Development
office secure gifts from private sources and helps the president secure state
funds. This year’s focus is on participation,
and the goal is 25 percent participation.
Last year, almost 19 percent of the faculty and staff participated in
the campaign. He asked the senators to
encourage the people in their departments to donate. People can give to their own program, school,
or for a certain purpose. At the
suggestion of a faculty member, the campaign this year will include the option
to contribute to a scholarship fund for children of faculty and staff. Contributions can be made by payroll
deduction. Mr. Garton mentioned the
awareness-building activities that raise additional funds, and he thanked the senators
and their colleagues for their support.
Answering a question from the floor, Mr. Garton said those who donate to
the Associates program get a parking permit, and an Associates donation or any
other gift can be done through the Campus Campaign. Associates give $1000 or $500 if they are 39
years of age or younger. Mr. Garton
encouraged the group to e-mail comments or ideas to him.
Mr. Joseph Harroz, Vice
President and General Counsel, and Debra Chionopoulos, Director of Compliance, gave
an update on research compliance. Mr. Harroz
said when he had spoken to the senate a couple of years ago, the focus was on making
sure there was appropriate oversight and the compliance operation served the
intents of the original policy. The
compliance program started in June 2000 after a problem with a research study. Mr. Harroz has oversight of compliance, Debra
Chionopoulos is director of compliance (since April 2003), and an oversight committee
has been put in place. Mr. Harroz said
he would like to give an annual report, at least to the senate executive committee,
of what is going on in the compliance area.
One of the big concerns was how the hotline complaints would be
handled. In the two years the hotline
has been in place, no complaints have been registered. Hopefully, this reflects confidence in the
way the compliance operation is working.
Individuals realize that they can get information and advice from the
compliance office as opposed to calling in on a confidential hotline. In March, the university will submit an
application for accreditation in human research. If we receive accreditation, we will have
gone from being in need of assistance to being one of three universities in the
country with independent accreditation of human research participant
programs. The main areas of compliance are
environmental health and safety, grants and contracts, health insurance privacy
(HIPPA), human research participant protection, medical billing and coding, and
radiation safety. The principles of
compliance have not changed. First,
regarding independence, if there are any concerns or complaints, the compliance
officer can go directly to the president or the regents. Second, compliance is about education and
assisting faculty in their academic endeavors.
Each quarter, the compliance officer reports to an oversight committee that
includes the provosts, vice presidents for research, and deans of medicine so
that the academic officers participate in the decisions that affect academics. Mr. Harroz has put in place a controlled
substance officer and a policy for the proper use, storage and inventory of
controlled substances. A person will be
hired in the near future to handle export control issues.
Ms. Chionopoulos discussed
what has happened in the last year and what the major goals are for next
year. She pointed out that there are specific
departments within the office of compliance and that compliance is for all three
campuses of the university. The
Prof. Burns said his colleagues
in the social sciences had complained that the Institutional Review Board (IRB)
micromanaged some of the projects. For
example, faculty will submit a list of questions that are to be asked of
participants and will be told they need to change the wording of a question. He asked whether the university was erring on
the side of over-control. Mr. Harroz
responded that the IRB should not get in the way of research progress. A lot of work has been done in the last few
months to make the process more streamlined by better educating the researchers
and IRB members. Ms. Chionopoulos added
that all of the members of the two boards had received appropriate training,
either nationally or with a half-day course.
That was not available in the past.
The more expert board members are doing the reviews, so things should continue
to improve. Mr. Harroz said some rough
edges needed to be worked out in the export control area. Bringing on a control officer will help. He said he would be glad to meet with
individuals who are having problems.
Prof. Kauffman said a
colleague in education had to take a study through the IRB and also the PR
office. He asked who was drawing the
line between academic freedom and legal issues.
Mr. Harroz replied that the issue had been a hot topic but had been
worked out with Public Affairs. Academics
need to handle word choices themselves. He
suggested that Prof. Kauffman ask the IRB chair whether the issues had been
resolved. There is a regents’ policy on
publications, so notices that go out in newspapers need to go through Public
Affairs.
Prof. Cintron asked how the
problem with arsenic in the water was resolved.
Ms. Chionopoulos said the university put in place a corrective action
plan, which was approved by the DEQ. We
are in the process of converting to the public water system. In the meantime, we are within the federal
guidelines for arsenic levels in our water on this campus.
Continuing his comments on
legal issues, Mr. Harroz discussed the new alcohol policy and its impact on faculty. He said there should be no difference in a
faculty member’s liability than there was before the policy. The goal was to address underage binge
drinking. The policy will not prohibit faculty
members from celebrating the completion of a Ph.D. at their house, assuming the
Ph.D. student is over 21. As long as
students are legal, there should be no impact on professors and their
activities. One of the concerns is about
faculty who sponsor student groups. Under
OU’s policies, any university-recognized student group has to have a faculty or
staff sponsor. The alcohol policy should
have no impact on any enhanced liability for people who advise these groups. Two items that speak to student organizations
that have alcohol gatherings are the annual plan and the school night
restriction. Beyond that, there is no
impact on an advisor’s role. There
exists a potential for liability, just as before the alcohol policy. Faculty and staff sponsors need only to act reasonably. If a problem occurs and the sponsor is sued,
the university will represent and indemnify him as long as he was not acting fraudulently,
recklessly, or illegally. The threat of
litigation should not keep people from being involved with students.
Prof. Havlicek said his
understanding was that student organizations could still have alcohol at
functions if they made sure everyone who was drinking was of legal age. Mr. Harroz said that was correct, as long as
proper control was enforced, the function was held on a Friday or Saturday
night, and it did not take place in residence halls or fraternities.
“Last
senate meeting Senator Karen Rupp-Serrano had asked about Oracle’s purchase of
People Soft. Presently, the Norman
Campus uses PeopleSoft’s Human Resources management system and is implementing
their financial management system. We
hear from IT that at this time there is no cause for concern. ‘We are on track to meet our goal of insuring
continuity of critical University operations by migrating end-of-life legacy
administrative batch systems to industry-standard. Oracle is committed to supporting PeopleSoft
customers. The estimated revenue from
software maintenance fees for existing PeopleSoft clients is close to $2
billion. It would not be in Oracle’s best
interest to drive these customers to a competitor. It is worth noting that OU runs PeopleSoft on
an Oracle database. Therefore, we will
not be as affected by the merged product in the long term. However, the loss of a major competitor in
the enterprise software industry will cause maintenance costs to climb more
than in the past. It is in our best
interest to lock in price increase caps as soon as possible.’
“You
had raised a concern in our last meeting about our new health insurance cards
showing our social security number.
Fortunately, our new
“Please
take notice of the latest Benefits in
Brief sent to faculty from the Human Resources Office. It explains how some prescription drugs
require pre-certification and urges patients to contact their physician and
request that documentation be sent to
“In
today’s student paper, The Oklahoma Daily,
an article discussed the problem of upper-division classes being
overfilled. Many upperclassmen are
having difficulty fulfilling required courses due to the university’s record
enrollment. The administration has come
up with several temporary solutions, including hiring visiting faculty, renting
lab space at other universities and working with departments to allow
substitutions for overfilled required classes.
The areas of study particularly hard hit are nursing, pre-medical,
business, and political science. In
light of this problem, there is an even greater need for intersession courses
to be offered. If you are interested in teaching
during intersession, please contact Mark Pelfrey at 325-2899.
“Additional
parking, a topic that comes to the forefront as we see all of the new building
on campus, is being addressed. There is
money earmarked in each building project’s budget for adequate parking. In addition, it is now a priority for parking
to be made available before construction begins.
“If
you are interested in OU’s employment trends, you may want to refer to the
report for fall 2004 faculty and staff, which will be available on the
provost’s web site under institutional research.
“Finally, members of the
executive committee attended a forum hosted by HEACO on the challenges and
opportunities higher education will be facing with the 2005 legislative session. Several state legislators were present,
including Senators Cal Hobson and Glenn Coffee and Representatives Susan
Winchester and Jari Askins. Chancellor
Risser’s top priority is the passage of the capitol bond issue for higher
education buildings and facilities. The
last time a higher education bond issue of this magnitude passed in the
legislature was in the late 1960’s I believe.
Senator Al Schwarzkopf, our legislative relations committee chair, can
answer any questions you may have on the topic.”
The meeting adjourned at 4:18
p.m. The next regular session of the
Faculty Senate will be held at 3:30 p.m. on Monday, February 14, 2005, in
Jacobson Faculty Hall 102.
____________________________________
Sonya Fallgatter, Administrative Coordinator
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Roger Frech, Secretary