Advisory Council on Administrative Policy (ACAP)
Minutes of September 9, 2005 Meeting
Members Present: Bobbi Raub, Bernhard Leinauer, Tammy Anthony, Maureen Camunez, Dario Silva, Tim Nesbitt, Jane Boykin, Tom Rubadeau, Nellie Rosales, Ethel Lynch, Russell Hardy, Ida Chavez, and Phillip Wright.
Alternates Present: Mary Hoke (for Roger Hartley), Steve Hussman (for Kurt Anderson), Kelly Brooks (for William Glenn), Genevieve Bauer (for Sandra Moreno), Ida Quinones (for Beatrice Pacheco), and Roseanne Bensley.
Guests Present: Angela Velasco, Jim Anthony, and Brenda Shannon.
Budget Committee: The budget committee recommendations regarding University equipment have been finalized and submitted to President Martin and Provost Flores. Total requests were approximately $4 million and the committee recommended approximately $800,000 in purchases to the administration. The budget committee recognizes that future equipment renewal money will likely diminish due to decreased funding and enrollment.
Fringe Benefits Committee: The FB committee investigated a request to reduce WebCT course fees and voted to maintain the WebCT course fee as originally implemented. Much of this decision was based on the low-cost of distance education courses at NMSU when compared to other colleges and universities.
The FB committee also investigated a request to compensate individuals for sick leave hour balances in excess of 800 hours. The Human Resources office maintains that there are no funds set aside for repayment of these hours since they are not accrued after an individual exceeds the 800 hour threshold. Therefore, the FB committee voted to keep the sick leave policy as it is currently written by allowing repayment only within the 800 hour increment.
Old Business:
New Business
1. Tim presented a draft agenda template that should be used in setting agenda items for future meetings.
2. Any current ACAP member (including alternates) can submit agenda items.
1. After discussion of the agenda template, a motion was made to use the template presented and for members to present agenda items to the ACAP executive committee by email prior to the monthly executive committee meeting. This motion was seconded and approved
3. For webpage items, the executive committee will make a recommendation to the full committee regarding what should/should not be published to the ACAP webpage. For time-sensitive information, the Chair of ACAP will decide to publish or not and the decision will be discussed at the next ACAP committee meeting.
1. A motion was made to allow the ACAP chair to approve/disapprove the publishing of time-sensitive information to the webpage and to present any conflicting information to the full committee for discussion and vote. This motion was seconded and approved.
1. Tim presented several of these communications and has met with Dr. Martin and others to discuss the current unionization efforts. It is agreed, by all parties, that the Department of Labor and representatives of AFSME be invited to answer the questions sent by ACAP to President Martin. Until these questions can be answered, ACAP cannot make any additional recommendations regarding the unionization effort.
September 8, 2005
I have received the following Committee reports.
FRINGE BENEFITS COMMITTEE – The Fringe Benefits Committee met on August 17th to discuss the two items passed on to them from the May ACAP meeting (Fringe does not meet during the summer months).
ACAP passed along two items:
A motion was made to amend the previous motion to have further study on the cost impact and comparison with other land-grant institutions. There was no second; motion died.
The committee determined that the course fee was needed for the course to be available for staff to take and that the university has no recourse but to pass this fee on to the parent department, should the fee be waived.
Submitted by Jim Anthony
CAMPUS PLANNING COMMITTEE:
The Campus Planning Committee met on September 7 at 3:30 at the OFS Conference Room. Items on the agenda:
The meeting was adjourned around 4:00 p.m. but no date was set for next month’s meeting.
Submitted by Robert Medina
COMPENSATION COMMITTEE: The Compensation Committee has not met.
Submitted by Kelly Brooks
MINUTES
OF THE BOARD OF REGENTS
1. CALL TO ORDER
The Board of Regents of New Mexico State University met in
the theater of the NMSU-Grants Campus in Grants,
Regents Mr. Robert M. Gallagher, President
Present Mr. M. Steven Anaya, Vice President Ms. Laura M. Conniff, Secretary-Treasurer Mr. Steve W. Lewis, Member Ms. Sherry Kamali, Member
Regents Present Ms. Jennifer Burn
Others President Michael Martin
Provost William Flores Dr. Pat Williams Dr. I. Miley González Vice President Ben Woods Vice President Gladys De Necochea Vice President Jim McDonough Vice President Rebecca Dukes Vice Provost Michael Hites Vice Provost Don Birx Ms. Felicia Casados Dean Garrey Carruthers Dean Linda Lacey Dean Robert Moulton Dean Steve Castillo Dean Waded Cruzado-Salas Mr. Richard Kaselow Mr. Michael Rickenbaker Mr. Fred Ayers Mr. Bruce Kite Mr. Tim Nesbitt Ms. Socorro Saenz-Lobato
2. INTRODUCTIONS
Regent Gallagher stated, “I would like to call on Provost Bill Flores to introduce our new CEO here at the Grants campus and give Felicia an opportunity to say a few words.” Prot Flores stated, “We are very happy to be at the Grants campus today. Felicia Casados and some of her vice presidents had dinner with us last night, and today Felicia will be having a reception in her honor.” Felicia Casados said, “President Martin, Provost Flores, President Gallagher, and members of the Board, welcome to the New Mexico State University-Grants campus. I would like to introduce Mr. Stan Carlson, who is our Interim Chief Academic Officer and one of our full-time faculty; Student Services Advisor Beth Armstead; and Mr. Tim Maniaci, a reporter with the Grants Independent newspaper. Thank you for being here.”
Regent
Gallagher stated, “Bill, thank you. Felicia, thank you. As you know, it is a
tradition for the Board to meet once a year at one of the campuses outside of
3. APPROVAL OF AGENDA
Regent Anaya stated, “Mr. President, I would like to add one item at the end for discussion purposes and that is the mascot Pistol Pete.” Regent Gallagher stated, “Why don’t we add 9(c)–at the request of Regent Anaya–on the athletic mascot.” Dr. Martin said, “Mr. President, I had intended to address a bit of that in my comments, if that would be all right?” Regent Gallagher said, “Okay, instead of 9(c), let’s do 10(e) and if after Mike’s comments there’s additional discussion to be had, then it will be on the agenda.” Regent Anaya said, “Okay.”
Regent Anaya moved, seconded by Regent Conniff to approve the agenda to include Regent Anaya’s request. The motion carried unanimously.
4. RESERVED
5. APPROVAL OF MINUTES
(a) Minutes of the July 19, 2005 Board of Regents meeting.
Regent Conniff
moved, seconded by Regent Kamali, to approve the minutes of the July 19, 2005
meeting as presented. The motion carried unanimously.
6. FUTURE BOARD MEETINGS
Regent
Gallagher stated, “Just for informational purposes, our future board meetings
are: Friday, October 28, 2005 in
7. ACTION ITEMS
(a)
Provost William Flores
-1-Approval of the Living the Vision Document (Dean Garrey Carruthers)
Provost
Flores stated, “Dean Garrey Carruthers has been chairing the committee and will
be making the presentation.” Dean Carruthers stated, “Thank you Dr Flores, Mr.
President, and members of the Board. I made a presentation on this in the past
and left a copy with you of the Living the Vision Performance Plan for
Excellence. I would like to make two or three comments and then seek your
approval of the plan. I must remind you that we have simplified the past
process. There are only five goals and twenty-three companion objectives in
this document with which we would expect all the university community to work
toward and to perform. The next comment I would make is that the challenges
you’ve issued to President Martin are all included in the objectives. They are
recruitment of students, retention of students, increasing research funding,
and increasing donations to the foundation. Those are all covered in one of the
objectives and as a consequence, I think we have a real synergy with the way
you’ve challenged the President to manage
Regent Conniff moved for approval, seconded by Regent Anaya, to approve the Living the Vision Document. The motion carried unanimously.
Regent Conniff
stated, “My question is on the grade report. What would you be looking at as
far as the time line Dean Carruthers?”
Dean Carruthers responded, “I am going to guess about this time next
year we would have the data that would allow us to look at how we did on
improving retention, for example, increasing the search funding, and things
that are noted in here. I think we are going to have to payoff at the margin,
if you will, because in some cases, for example, in the graduation rate we are
behind about 12 percentage points from being in the top tier where we want to
be. So, if we move that up a percentage or two a year, that would be a real
success as far as I am concerned. Our retention rate is a real difficult
problem. We may be as far behind as 20 percentage points from being in the top
tier, but once again, if we make two or three percentage point gains, I’ll have
to come up with a grading scheme that shows we are really making remarkable
progress. It will be arbitrary, there is no question about it, but I think it
needs to grab everybody’s attention. If you don’t come back and grade
performance, then in two years, everyone will have forgotten about this
document and will be allowing something else. It is my intention, as long as I
am with the university, to see that we implement this and that we measure
performance and report back to you.” Regent Conniff asked, “So we should
anticipate something by the end of the year next year?” Dean Carruthers
responded, “I think about this time next year, because of the way our data flow
at the university, it would be about this time of year that we would have the
appropriate statistics.” Regent Anaya stated, “I would like to congratulate you
and your committee. I think this is a good working document, it is easy to
read, it is simple, it is straight forward, and I think it gives us a vision of
where we need to be in the future. It is so easy enough that every employee at
Regent Gallagher
stated, “Dean, I know when I began on the Board about two and a half years ago,
I was a little glassy eyed and probably a bit sleepy when we went through about
a two or three hour presentation of our goals and performance indicators. I
didn’t see that as being responsive to our thoughts and our goals of being a
premier institution and so the president, the provost, and specifically, Dean,
you and your committee should be commended for having a document, as Steve
said, understandable, achievable, and that really holds us accountable. I am a
big believer that our high schools are failing in this state because we have
not raised the bar high enough. Kids will achieve to where you raise the bar
to, and if we would raise the bar here, those kids in high school would achieve
and be better prepared for college, and I think that is part of our
responsibility. I think this document does exactly that to our university, it
raises the bar, it challenges our university, and I think I can assure you,
from the Regents stand point, that at each meeting we will want to pick out one
of those goals and have a report from somebody. The reason we want to do that
is not to check up, but to hear our progress, to see if there are areas that we
need to be considering, and obviously, we know budget is going to be one of
those areas. It is going to take more than your committee, as you’ve said, and
so by asking, I think we are shining the light on the good work that those
people are doing and we want to recognize that. I would say, Dean, as far as
the chair of the committee, I very much appreciate your willingness to do it. I
think we are past the document. We will approve the document, and defer to the
president or provost to do that.” Dean Carruthers commented, “If I told you
that this is the first time that
(b) President
Michael Martin
-1-Approval of the New Mexico Department of Agriculture 20032005 Biennial Report (Dr. I. Miley Gonzalez)
President Martin
stated, “I want to introduce Secretary Miley Gonzalez who will share the report
from NMDA.” Dr. Gonzalez stated, “Good morning. It is indeed a pleasure to be
with you to present this report. I hope
all of you had a chance to read through the material. In the past, we have
given you a three and a half inch binder with text to provide you with a
glimpse of what the department has been doing over a two-year period of time.
We have decided that we wanted to do something to improve that process and the
Biennial Report has a format that is easy to read and covers the things that
we’ve done from 2003 through 2005. It includes the elements that are in the
strategic plan that you approved a year and a half ago, so we tried to take the
elements of strategic planning, the accountability and evaluation process, the
information that is tied to the budgeting developments of the department, and
to provide you with a summary of the various things that the department has
done over the last two years. On page one, there is a summary that I have
written with regard to the report that I think captures most of the elements of
what we identified as ‘critical’ in providing information, not only to the
Board, but to our other constituents, to the industry, to the work that you do
with the legislative group in providing feedback on how we spent the money, and
the kinds of activities the department undertakes. The report that Dean
Carruthers just gave really tries to tie the unique role that NMDA has as a
member of the NMSU system, which is unique in the 50 states–there is not
another department that is organized this way–and to show the relationship of how
we can provide another mechanism from peer to peer institutions for the
outreach and public service component. We really feel comfortable that a lot of
the things that we provided in the strategic plan are now documented in terms
of what ??? for the department
staff in working with the industry. I’d
like to highlight a couple of things. One, we have a team of six of our
Livestock Board members that had official police training in Baton Rouge,
Louisiana to help with Katrina. That team is coming back and we have another
team that will replace them, so the area of food safety and the bio-security
for agriculture, the investment that we have made over the last two years has
really paid off in terms of us being able to play a role in regard to that
particular disaster. Two, when you look at the food, health, and consumer part
of our agenda, last month, we were able to get some of our publicity in the New
York Times and I understand either this past Wednesday or next Wednesday, Time
Magazine will have an article on the things we are doing including
nutrition, obesity, and working with the ??? Program with the schools in
Regent
Lewis stated, “Miley, I would like to say that you all have done a phenomenal
job on this. I have seen a lot of these in the past and this is the best one
that I have ever seen, so I really want you to know that you have all done a
great job and I appreciate that. I have a couple of questions. On our strategic
plan that we did two years ago, we had five of the seven priorities tied to
marketing, right? How have you budgeted with all of your divisions so we can
carry out our strategic plan and yet fit our budget constraints?” Dr. Gonzalez
responded, “That is a great question. In the current proposal for the next
legislative session–since we were flat in our budget process this past
year–we’ve identified internally, a collaborative approach with the College of
Agriculture and Home Economics to have a request that encompasses an
agricultural agenda within each of our divisions and both the college and
departments who prioritized some of the areas.
If you look at this report, there is a major effort in the global marketing
area, as well as local marketing and that is one of our high priorities. We now
have a vacancy to bring on another staff member in our marketing division to
help both in the domestic and the international marketplace. If we can get the
package funded this next go around, then we’ve identified priorities. In this
case, one is marketing and the second is in our regulatory programs with
pesticides. The feed caps legislation that we got this past year and so in our
division for AES–our agriculture and other of our regulatory programs–that would
be the number two priority. We have a quarantine for fruit fly in the north, we
have the border discussion going on with one of the international regulations
for our chile industry and again that is one of the things we are working on
with border issues. So, we have identified internally, two or three high
priorities set next to and paralleled with what we identified for the college
and that is in the area of the food agenda, the food technology, and the food
science. The food processing industry has asked for us to have a laboratory
where we can provide services to them, so they do not have to send it
out-of-state.” Regent Lewis asked, “So, currently, in the budget that we are
living under, do you have any increases or decreases in any of the divisions?”
Dr. Gonzalez responded, “In the current budget, we have taken the budget
numbers that we had last year since we had a decrease in the department funding
and I stayed with pretty much the same dollars.” Regent Lewis asked, “So there
hasn’t been a decrease in the division budgets?” Dr. Gonzalez responded, “A
five percent in each of the divisions, because of the standing that we got.”
Regent Lewis added, “The only thing I would like to say is that with our
strategic plan a lot of our focus is going to be on marketing and I think you
need to funnel in that direction more money and more personnel because it all
ties in with what we are doing here and marketing is how we are going to be
successful. I want to recommend that marketing get what they need.” Dr. Gonzalez
said, “One of the things that we haven’t talked about on the federal side, is
the legislation that we are working with for specialty crops. There are $7
million on the House side and there was nothing on the Senate side. We’ve worked that agenda to see if at
conference we get some of that funding to come and it would be about $150,000
to
Regent
Anaya stated, “Miley, I would like to commend your department. I had an
opportunity about three weeks ago to go up north and visit with some of the
small farmers that your department has been working with. Most of them have
been farming for a long time, but they also have a job at
Regent
Lewis asked, “Miley, could you let everyone know about the green chili
promotion that went on in
Regent Gallagher stated, “My only comment on the report, is what I have come to expect and that is a professional job from your department and this reflects that.” Regent Kamali moved, seconded by Regent Anaya to approve the New Mexico Department of Agriculture 2003-2005 Biennial Report.
The
motion carried unanimously.
(c) Vice
President Woods
-1-Approval
of Aggie Memorial Stadium Improvements - Phase I (Mr. Michael Rickenbaker)
Vice
President Woods stated, “Michael Rickenbaker will be making this presentation,
but I would like to make a few opening comments. Many of us remember last
spring during the session when Governor Richardson came to the campus and
announced the allocation of funds to improve athletic facilities at
Regent Anaya asked,
“What is the total dollar amount for the total build-out? I know this first
phase is $2.2 million, but what are we looking at to make this a first class
facility?” Mr. Rickenbaker responded, “That changed yesterday and it is going
to change tomorrow. We are looking at moving target earned costs. I would like
to say that I could give you a number. I would like to caution that the master
plan is very preliminary. In fact, I’m not asking you to approve a master plan
today, because we are still finalizing it. I would ask that I be able to report
back to you when we have a final for the master plan and to present the entire
stadium and give you those numbers, if you will allow me that opportunity.”
Regent Anaya said, “I was just looking for a ballpark figure. Is it $10 million
or $100 million?” Mr. Rickenbaker responded, “Again, a lot of what we are
showing, really, begins from this point to the similar tower on the other side.
We are probably looking at something in the neighborhood of $20 million. That does not include the other four corners,
which we haven’t really even developed. I would point out that in the plan we
did not show anything in those locations because that is still ??? . We just wanted to make sure that what we are
doing with this was understanding the opportunities for the entire state.”
Regent Lewis asked, “On this ‘phase one,’ are we very confident that it is
going to blend in with the total master plan?” Mr. Rickenbaker responded, “I
will say, that it is still a plan, but I am very confident that this is going
to look like it belongs and the intent will also be to make sure that it
absolutely blends in with what there is there today and allow for continued
growth and expansion.” Vice President Woods added, “The other reason we appear
before you today is because we need to move on this project. The window of
opportunity for construction is from the end of football season to the
beginning of football season, which means we are not going to miss this coming
year. We not only need to have your approval, but we need to seek approval from
the Higher Education Department, as well as approval from the State Board of
Finance–prior to November–draft the design up, get it on the street, and bid
it, so that we can go into construction late fall this year in hopes of trying
to get this work done prior to the end of August next year. We will continue to
work with this, but I think we need to act and step forward to make sure that
we encumber and utilize those funds that have been made available to us.”
Regent Kamali asked, “Can you go back to the
specific improvements on the field house and go into further detail about the
field house?” Mr. Rickenbaker responded, “The improvements to the field house
have been relatively nominal in that we are replacing some of the flooring, we
are making improvements to the air conditioning, and trying to make the place
more user friendly to our athletes. The additional opportunity that happens
with building team spaces is that spaces currently crowded in the existing
facility are freed up by taking those team rooms and moving them into position
and having those team rooms available for additional space within the field
house.” Regent Conniff asked, “On the walkways for the opposing teams, there
was some discussion about being able to get them relocated easier. Does this
help in any way with that?” Vice President Woods responded, “There are two
issues there we have potential conflict with. One, is that both teams come down
the ramp to the floor of the stadium and that will continue to be like that. We
are continuing to explore other ways and I think they placed the UTEP team in
the visitor’s locker room in the old field house for this past game, which
avoided that crosswalk that we used to have over to the Coca-Cola Weight
Training Facility for the past ten years. It is my understanding from
discussions we have all had with the football coaching staff, that they believe
there is adequate space in the field house. The space needs to be upgraded slightly,
but they believe it is more than adequate in terms of space. The real need we
have here is to accommodate our coaches who are currently in the
Regent Gallagher said, “Obviously, this project is
needed and I am glad we are moving as expeditiously as we are. I think there
are three people that need to be thanked besides Ben and his staff for getting
us to that point. You know, the very first time Mike Martin met the Governor,
Mike came with a request. President Martin deserves all the credit for
requesting and reminding the governor of the thought process and the governor
did, out of his capital outlay money, give the $2 million. The $200,000, we
need to thank Representative J. Paul Taylor for putting it in the severance
issue. I did not want to leave that out because there are a lot of capital
outlay needs and a lot of people say, ‘you spend a lot of money on athletics.’
If you look at the total picture on campus, it is very well balanced. It is
something that is needed. It has been a priority of the Governor for our two
major universities in the state, and I am pleased that we are this point.” Regent Conniff moved, seconded by Regent
Lewis, for approval of the Aggie Memorial Stadium Improvements - Phase I. The
motion carried unanimously.
(d) General Counsel, Mr. Bruce Kite
-1- Approval of
Adoption of the Annual Open Meetings Resolution
Mr. Kite stated, “Annually, and
typically in the month of September,
I come before you with
the requirement, as imposed by State law, that the Regents determine what type
of notice requirements it is going to abide by for the upcoming year of
meetings. The resolution that is before you–which will be corrected to reflect
today’s date of September 8, 2005, as opposed to the originally scheduled
meeting of September 9, 2005–repeats what has been the traditional approach of
this institution and the Board over the last several years, in that written
notice of regular board meetings will be distributed to the Regents and to the
press at least five days in advance. Special meetings that need to be called
will also receive three days advanced written notice, and for emergency
meetings, as much notice as possible will be given depending on what the
emergency is. The resolution is before your approval and essentially reflects
what has been tradition of this institution.”
Regent Anaya moved, seconded by Regent Kamali, to
approve the Adoption of the Annual Open Meetings Resolution as presented. The
motion carried unanimously.
8. CONSENT CALENDAR (voted on by one motion, or moved to Action or Informational Items)
(a) Approval of Revised New/Expanded Research, Public Service, Statewide Instruction, and General Intercollegiate
Athletics Program Requests for FY 2006-2007
(Vice President Jim McDonough)
(b) Approval of Scope/Budget Increase for NMSU-Grants Mechanical Improvements (Mr. Michael Rickenbaker)
(c) Approval of Zuhl Collection Addition (Mr. Michael Rickenbaker)
(d) Approval of Baseball Locker Room Addition (Mr. Michael
Rickenbaker)
(e) Approval of Report on the Post-Tenure Review Process (Provost
William
(f) Approval of Proposal of University Scholarships (Provost William
Flores)
(g) Approval of Property Disposition/Deletions (Mr. Steve
McCarty/Mr. Steve Ziehl)
(h) Approval of Office Lease Renewal, 1300 Luisa Street, Suite 7,
Santa Fe, NM Santa Fe County (Mr.
Fred Ayers)
(i) Approval of Lease for Storage Compartment B-8-A, 1300 Luisa
Street, Santa Fe, NM, Santa Fe
County (Mr. Fred Ayers)
Approval of Renewal of Lease,
Board
of Regents Minutes
September
8, 2005
Page
15
(k) Approval of
Renewal of Lease,
(l) Approval of Lease Agreement, 2 Acres Unoccupied Land, Located 3.36
Miles South of
(Mr. Fred Ayers)
(m) Reserved
(n) Approval of
Real Estate Lease,
88310,
(o) Approval to Name Louis F. and Jane Kazda Control Systems Laboratory
(Vice President Rebecca Dukes)
(p) Approval to
Name Room 101 in the
after Vaughn D. Corley (Vice President Rebecca Dukes)
(q) Ratification of Employment Agreements for Michael Morris, Assistant
Coach, Football; Andrea Hanson, Assistant Coach Women’s Equestrian;
Pamela Breummer, Head Coach, Women’s Equestrian; Kristen Thomas,
Assistant Coach, Women’s Equestrian; and Richard Ulm, Assistant
Coach, Track and Field (Mr. Bruce Kite)
Ratification of NMSU Policy Manual (Ms. Diana Quintana)
Regent Lewis moved, seconded by Regent Conniff, to approve the
Consent Calendar as presented.
Regent Anaya asked, “On agenda item 8(a), are we revising this budget?
What is the actual request here? Is it revising that $3 million dollar K-12
(r) outreach?” Vice President McDonough responded, “After we brought the
schedule to you at the last meeting, we were asked to review it and it was
brought to our attention that we left two programs out, and in the revised
schedule, we
had the ENLACE Program and the
have asked for an additional $500,000. That is the only change in the
schedule except for the branches where they’ve revised theirs downward
a little bit by about $147,000, so the increase is for a little over $330,000.
We would ask for your approval so that we can send this on to the Higher
Education Department for their approval.”
The motion carried unanimously.
9. INFORMATIONAL ITEMS
(a) Reappointment of Members to the NMSU Labor Management Relations Board (Board of Regents President, Bob Gallagher)
Regent Gallagher stated, “I want to take this opportunity to announce that I have reappointed the three members that were appointed earlier this year to the Labor Management Board.
Because of how their terms were, we needed to reappoint them for another one-year term. We have been very happy with all three and pleased that all three have agreed to serve another year. Those members are Gerald Burke, Charlie Apodaca, and Karen Becklin.”
(b) Grants
and Contracts Expenditures for FY 2005 (Interim Vice Provost Don Birx)
Dr.
Birx stated, “The first thing I would like to do is to introduce the two
associate vice provosts for research who have been very instrumental this past
year in working on the cluster concept and implementing some of the ideas that
bring together faculty across campus and they are: Wynn Egginton and Chris
Fields. This past year was one of the best years we have had in research
expenditures. The core rate of research increase was between 14 and 15 percent.
It ranged across much of the units on campus. The Physical Science Laboratory
grew over 20 percent in expenditures, so on the whole, is one of the best years
we’ve had as far as research expenditures go and research expenditures are one
of the primary categories in which they define and measure research comparative
to our peers. Now, you will see in that first sheet of your report that it says
expenditures to date, $181,130,516.12 versus last years of $160,696,345.44.
That represents far more than just research, so when you look at it the numbers
that we showed on the chart for the briefing at the Regents retreat, what we
tried to do was normalize things, to pull out part of the figures that NSF
uses, so the number that we used there is approximately $130 million for
research on campus. During the past
year, we worked on, first, developing and implementing the concept of research
clusters. It is a faculty driven process where faculty from across campus are
coming together and participating. We
received funding from President Martin, which I think has spurred a lot of that
growth, and the research clusters have asked to allocate most of that funding
to looking at and working on large proposal efforts, so I think that would be
appropriate utilization of funds. Second, the president and provost established
mini-grant process where five have been awarded to date and five more could be
awarded before the end of the year. These focus on primarily seeding activities
that will lead to significant research endeavors in the future and promote
scholarly research in patents and in scholarly articles. We have redesigned the
web page to focus on clusters and to present a unified format. We are certifying ourselves as a Hispanic
serving institution under Title V of the Higher Education Act. We are using the
financial data from their reports that we have. We throw out those that did not
file any reports and in doing that we came up with 52 percent in low income
requirement, which is the second requirement. You have to be 25 percent
Hispanic. We are proposing an undergraduate research program that you approved,
and we have organized functions on campus to satisfy audit requirements. With
the support of the provost, we are moving the University Research Council to be
more representative of top research endeavors on campus and we are going to be
moving it to what is called a Research Fellows Board and it will involve those
on campus that are in the top ten percent in papers and in articles. This will be a process that will take several
years, but we felt there was a need to have representative leadership across
the campus of those that have succeeded; they could be mentors and
representatives for the faculty on campus in research endeavors. We have
established two associate vice provost positions, one will focus on program
development and external relations and the other on the development of
strategic partnerships for the clusters. We have focused on federal relations
at NMSU. We’ve made them based on strategic priorities, so that we moved two
last year and we’ve moved two this year and presented ourselves within the
cluster format and what strategic directions are. We had a growth in extension
between 14 and 15 percent and the core research expenditures have ??? the
decline of last year. We are working to develop a non-tenured track research
faculty track–in other words–one of the things we do not have at NMSU is a
process where by post-docs and those that are involved in soft money positions
can advance in positions that are long-term. What we are really trying to work
on is a strategy that brings in works through K-12 that focus on undergraduate
and graduate research and then a process that leads through the faculty
development, so it’s a systematic plan that pulls-in and involves students
earlier on in their research activities and develops them as faculty and
support members. We are developing an approach to evaluation of research
enterprises on an annual basis, and what this means is, we got lots of centers
and concepts across the campus and what we want to do is to try to provide
guidance and advice on how they might come together and focus and develop joint
activities. It is part of the ??? concept that is involved in clusters, but is
also involved in looking at the research directions that some of the soft money
units have and aligning them with the strategic directions that the university
now has. The chart in front of you shows-as reported by NSF–and those numbers
we are trying to use as we move forward. You will see that the top two elements
represent the satellite campuses and other programs. The core research elements
involve the elements that end with the dark blue line. You see the pattern of
research growth. Last year was a down year, but we are back on track with the
research growth we had before as we implement clusters. I would encourage you
to take a look at the research web page and look at the article that talks
about what is happening within the strategic directions of the university. You
see there that link between the work that
Regent Gallagher stated, “I think certainly that bar graph is moving in the right direction, and more and more, premier universities are graded on, obviously, research dollars. I think with the size of our university we should be very, very pleased with the amount of research dollars and with our continued commitment to increasing that. You are to be commended for that Don.”
Dr. Creider commented, “I do hope that when you are developing the non-tenure track faculty positions that you will consult with the Faculty Senate because we are going to have to address the issues of both them and college faculty and their representation.” Dr. Birx stated, “Most definitely, that is the first place we will go.”
10. REPORTS
(a)
Faculty Senate Chairperson’s Report
(Dr. Larry Creider)
Dr.
Creider stated, “The first meeting of the Faculty Senate was held on September
1, 2005. Our first proposition is to consider a bill requesting approval of a
doctoral program in nursing. With the approval of the Faculty Senate Committee
on Committees, I have appointed a couple of ad hoc committees to do work this
year. The first is an ad hoc committee on the Senate Constitution that will
work to make our language gender neutral and will also begin to address such
things as document transmittal. When we revised our process for approval by the
president of senate legislation, we began to realize that we need a more
formalized process by which he gets the information in a timely manner and a
response is clear. We are beginning to appoint a committee to revise the
university’s promotion and tenure policy. The committee will develop
legislation to implement recommendations from the provost’s Roles and Rewards
Task Force. It will incorporate a broader definition of scholarship, make the
responsibility of the various participants in the promotion and tenure process
clearer. The co-chairs of the committee are Donna Alden, former chair of the
Faculty Senate and Senator Tracy Sterling in the
(b) ASNMSU Report (Ms. Jennifer Burn)
Ms. Burn stated,
“ASNMSU has been doing a lot. Our executive staff is working very hard for the
year. Our first Senate meeting was September 1, 2005. We are collaborating with
students on campus and student organizations on campus to donate anything that
they have to victims of Hurricane Katrina, and we have a way to get all of that
immediately to the victims. If any of you have any students or anybody that you
know who wants to help, please send them in our direction. The only thing we
cannot accept are monetary donations. The intramural field lights have gone up
and they are going to be ready for the start of intramurals next week thanks to
Vice President Ben Woods. This year in
p.m.
and we are working on varying those hours. We are exploring the idea of the New
York Times pilot program where we will be receiving papers for up to six
weeks completely funded by the New York Times to see what everyone’s
thoughts are on that, and we have USA Today, which is funded through the
end of this semester. We have made an addition to our office, Ms. Kamali’s
office has been moved from the second floor of
(c)
Advisory Council on
Administrative Policy (ACAP) Report (Mr. Tim Nesbitt)
Mr.
Nesbitt stated, “I would like to let you know that since the last meeting we
have discussed and posted President Martin’s letters to the American Federation
of State County and Municipal Employees. We have discussed and encouraged and
moderated an open forum held in
(a) NMSU President’s Report (President Michael
Martin)
President Martin stated, “First, let me thank our colleagues here at Grants for their warm reception. Felicia, thanks a lot; it’s a great campus, a wonderful community, and we are proud to be a part of it. I regret missing dinner last night, but I did spend the evening with Senator Altamirano who invited a group of presidents to come and meet with the commission he is on, and we had very good meeting with Senator Altamirano. I think he was quite pleased with the performance of the presidents that he brought in, so I was proud to be a part of that group. We had a meeting this last week with ACAP, the director for Human Resources, and some local citizens, led by Bishop Ramirez, who is concerned about the way we are interacting with the union people. Out of that meeting came an agreement that we would bring an expert who could help answer many of our staff’s questions and that once those questions were answered by that expert, the whole group that had met would endorse that as a message to the staff as to what the true union implications are. The Bishop and I and Representative Tony Lujan agreed to help assemble that group very quickly and our hope is simply to give the people out there who have to make an informed decision, the maximum amount of information they can have. It was a very good meeting and I appreciate him and Diana participating in it. Let me turn to a more serious issue. Usually, I come with good news; this is a little less good news. It relates back to what Garrey Carruthers talked about and it relates, at least tangentially, to the great Pistol Pete debate. What I shared with you is a couple of documents one of which is an article from the Albuquerque Journal, which pointed out that about 26 percent of the graduating students from New Mexico tend to leave the state to pursue their degrees and asked the question ‘Why?’ One of the answers embedded in that article is that New Mexico has no institution in the state rated above the third tier in U.S. News and World Report and has never had an institution rated above the third tier. The three big universities: NMSU, UNM, and Tech, are all rated third tier, the other three universities, are rated forth tier. The perception out there among parents and students is that if you want high quality education, you leave the state. The unfortunate reality is that NMSU is much better than them. I can say that for a fact. We ought to do more significantly greater and yet, we have failed in arriving at that outcome. Now, one could ask two things: ‘Do these ratings really reflect reality?’ There are many of us in the academic community who question–to some extent–the methodology of U.S. News and World Report. The reality is that students and parents use it heavily. So, it is meaningful in that it is applied. The second question is, ‘Does it really make a difference where you’re rating?’ I would argue that it makes a difference for at least six reasons. One, is as the Albuquerque Journal pointed out, students do tend to leave the state to seek educations at higher rated institutions; secondly, it significantly weakens our ability to compete for strong out-of-state students; third, it makes it much harder to attract and retain strong faculty if they don’t believe they are in the upper tiers; fourth, it really reduces our capacity to approach donors, because donors want to bet on a winner; fifth, it makes it much harder to place our graduates, particularly, at professional schools and graduate schools–I think their job market is different; and finally, it is simply a matter of pride. This State deserves–in my judgement–a top tier institution and we could be it, but we have not done what is necessary. I want you to turn to page two and look at what the criteria is for ranking institutions and the percentages. The highest percentage is in peer assessment. That is, how do we appear to our peers across the country? Over the last ten years, before coming to New Mexico State, every year, I filled out their assessment. We all have done it and I will tell you candidly, what I thought about New Mexico State at the time. I thought, (a) it was a nice place in the desert, (b) it is not in Albuquerque,(c) it has a good PGM program, and (d) it has Lowell Catlett. That was the image for many of us of New Mexico State University across the country. It has a very low profile. Now, if you will turn to page three, you will see our most recent scores. Here is what is distressing to me. If you look under ‘Peer Assessment,’ not only are we ranked at the bottom of all of those peers, but we are declining. This, I think, ought to be a serious concern of ours. Before I came here, the institution wisely, I believe, contracted with LANDOR to look at our branding, and LANDOR was asked to assess how we are positioned nationally in terms of image, in terms of our symbols, our logo, our messages, and our profile, and they confirmed what these numbers confirm. NMSU has no identifiable characteristics that give us distinction on a national level and we have got to turn that around. In doing so, we will make some mistakes. We will do some things that people do not like. We will make some changes that offend the tradition of the university, but we are going to have to offend that tradition if we are going to put ourselves on the landscape. I will tell you, last Saturday we hit a home run. Not because we had the biggest crowd in the history of NMSU football, not because we had the first sellout before game day, but because we were on ESPN nationally and our Agricultural Communications department produced some absolutely outstanding public service announcements, one of which was Reggie Theus. I have gotten calls from around the country that people saw Reggie Theus talking about NMSU on national television. Those are the things we have to do. Now, in the process of LANDOR looking at our image, they did point out to us that two of our biggest identifiers are actually identified with other universities. If you ask 100 people outside of New Mexico who the Aggies are, they will tell you Texas A&M. If you ask 100 people outside of New Mexico who Pistol Pete belongs to, 99 will tell you Oklahoma State, because it legally does. So, we have an image, but when we do good things under that banner, it actually accrues benefits to other institutions. We can debate whether or not we ought to change those and how, but if we do not change we will continue to slide, and we have slid the last year. Now, the ‘Living the Vision Document’ gives us some benchmarks in the other categories and we are going to work on them, but if you do not address 25 percent of peer evaluation, we will never be able to move up the ranks. And of the institutions in this state, I am absolutely convinced NMSU is the one that can do it: (a) because we are already better than we are ranked, and (b) because we have the capacity to move up. Now, people may not like what happens and we are going to go back and reflect on that, but the truth of the matter is the numbers are clear. Our ranking is what it is, that if we don’t come up with a better branded identifiable vision and image of NMSU we will be lodged at this level and I take it from all the conversations we’ve had that that is not what this Board wants. I know that’s not what this faculty and what our community wants and I know that is not what this state deserves. So, this is a concern of mine and I have spent a year thinking about it, trying to wade in to how we are and what we are. I think it is now time that we take some risks and that means from time to time, stepping out and redefining ourselves. It is important that the people of New Mexico love us and it is equally important that the people of this country respect us. That starts by knowing who we are, so this is the bad news of the day. I think we are on the right track and I think we really are making some headway and I think we are putting people out there and messages out there that will change our image. It is time that New Mexico State has a faculty member elected to a national academy. There are very few institutions of our size that can say that. It is time we do that. That comes down to peer assessment. It comes down to the respect we have for the institution. The good news for today is I think we have people really working hard to fix it. Now, let’s return quickly to Pistol Pete. I find it interesting that there’s been so much angst about Pistol Pete, particularly, in lieu of the fact that he hasn’t had a pistol since 1993. In 1993, his pistol was removed following the bowling alley shootings in Las Cruces. So, he has been ‘empty holster Pete’ for the last 12 years. Maybe we need a different one than we have now, but we don’t need Oklahoma State’s. We need something that reflects the fact that NMSU is unique, stands alone, and is clever enough to come up with it. That is what LANDOR told us and I happen to have believed it. This started before I got here. The Pistol Pete consideration was well underway long before I came on board, but I believe what they say. That is only one of many, many other symbols we are trying to change, so if that is one we have to revisit and revise, that is fine. At some point, we’ve got to come up with messages that tell the rest of the country we are distinct, we are here, and we are excellent. If we don’t, we will penalize those students who come through here and their productivity. That is my message for today. I haven’t typically done this at these meetings, but this is why I have been working on it for a while and I’ve been wading through all–and all my colleague’s know–I have gone through all the National Research Council measures, I’ve gone through NSSE measures, the Florida Policy Centers measures, and the Gorman Report to figure out where we are and how we start changing that. I think ‘Living the Vision’ is an enormous first step. I think we now stated that we are going to be among those better peers and we have a measure for it, but now the question is ‘how do you follow through.’ That is my report. I am pretty much committed to at least battling out the notion that we are going to be on a national and international stage and we are going to do it the best possible way.”
Regent Anaya asked, “Where are we on enrollment?” President Martin responded, “We are about flat. The overall system is about flat, the main campus is down slightly. Almost all of the other institutions in the state with the exception of Tech are also down. Tech is up slightly, but at Tech three people show up and you have a one percent increase. There is still a little uncertainty about final numbers, because we dis-enrolled 1,400 and now have re-enrolled 1,200. We will get a few students from the gulf area. Among others we will be getting the University of New Orleans baseball team. Twenty-eight players and five coaches are going to enroll in classes and workout on our campus on Monday, but it has been pretty flat and that hurts us. This is the third year in a row and that means we get no enrollment growth money and President Gallagher talked about that last time. We have got to start turning that around and it starts with keeping the best students here that we already have and then it follows by attracting strong students from out-of-state. We are not doing that as the Albuquerque Journal pointed out.”
Regent Anaya asked, ”On the mascot, the logo, the triangle, I guess I have a couple of questions. The first one is, you had said we were not changing the logo yet. Some of the logos changed, some on the mascot, and some on the triangle. What determines what? You said the mascot was for athletics, the New Mexico State signal sign within the state is one thing and then the triangle. Would you explain that?” President Martin responded, “What we are doing is adding more than anything else to the range of ways in which we can represent ourselves. We will continue to use the triangles for official events and we will use those in-state for people to recognize us. But out-of state, quite candidly, no one knows what they mean. Not even on campus is there a consensus of what the triangles mean. So, one of the reasons for changing or adding a logo is that when we decided we were going to join the Western Athletic Conference (WAC) and decided that they are going to start web casting all football and basketball games, we were told that our interlocking N and M did not translate well over the web, so they wanted to separate those. The other thing we tried to do, was strengthen the symbol of the state around our logo to send the message that we are the only university for which the entire State is our campus. So, basically what we have done is add some other ways, depending on the audience we are trying to reach, to symbolize who we are. The Pistol Pete decision was made a couple of years ago to revise Pistol Pete because the costume that Pistol Pete wore had to be replaced anyway. That was done by the marketing department in the Athletics department and they went to an artist in Artesia who has been working on it for a while. I think they are going to meet with Jen and the students to yet consider whether there is another way to have a mascot a little more like Florida State has, which is a live person. In their case they have Chief Osceola who rides in on a horse and throws a spear in middle of the field. We may go to a contest of students to actually be Pistol Pete or whatever we want to call him. That is a conversation I think that will carry on, but the recommendation was that you have to move away from a symbol that was clearly owned by and identified by another university and that is why we are not the Fighting Irish or the Buckeyes. There is a reason why you try to be distinct and so what we are trying to do is to retain as much as we can of the identity we have, but cast it in a way that it can be distinct from all others, which is the point of marketing.” Regent Anaya stated, “I don’t disagree on what you have talked about regarding the branding and I agree we have to have branding. I guess I was a little more concerned as to the process of how things get done and if this one guy in the Athletics department had the full authority to change that, I’m not going to beat this dead horse to death because it is done. Frankly, I did not agree with it. I...” President Martin said, “Well, that was not the case, Regent Anaya. The following groups were involved in the conversation: ASNMSU was at all of the meetings that we had about image changing, including Pistol Pete. The Board of the Alumni Association was involved, and the Board of ASA was involved. So this was a conversation that was going on for the last year and a half to two years, Rebecca? The last two years this conversation has been going on on campus. Now, maybe it didn’t get as much play state-wide and elsewhere as it ought to have, and maybe we should revisit that, but it was not an arbitrary and unilateral decision. As a matter of fact, I think I can say honestly that Sean Johnson wanted to go with the students’ proposal, but the Board of ASA was adamantly opposed to it. They wanted a head and so I think they are going to go back and revisit that issue and decide if there is another way to do it. Is that right, Jen? Is there a meeting coming up?” Ms. Burn responded, “Yes, they have approached us and they want to revisit this and try to come up with a consensus with the students and I was going to ask Larry Creider if we wanted to have faculty representatives on that as well, so that we can see what everyone can agree on and have more representation on a board together like a committee, so that everyone is represented.” President Martin stated, “I would note that, having been at some other universities, that this happens all the time. Benny Beaver at Oregon State changed five times while I was there. Goldie Gofer at Minnesota has changed many times. I think Stanford went from an Indian to a tree as their mascot.” Provost Flores said, “Actually, it is a cardinal, but yes, there is also a tree.” President Martin continued, “But, I do think and I think you are absolutely right, Regent Anaya. We have to have some broader conversation about this, but I will also tell you that I have been a little disheartened by the–not a large number–vitriolic response of people to this. It has actually been incredibly mean spirited and I don’t think that speaks well for a great university and a great state. I think we can have respectful conversations about these things, but when a mascot, which we have only had since the mid seventies–officially since 1986–engenders the kind of mean conversations that people have–and I’ve got some e-mail I will share with you, and Sean has some worse–it really bothers me about the state of our civilization. If this is where we go, if this is what makes people as angry as they are, in light of the fact that we have much more challenging issues like retention rates, national visibility, and graduation rates, it really disheartened me a little bit. Fortunately, there weren’t so many that I couldn’t get over it, but there were enough, and mean enough that I thought ‘my gosh, get a life.’ People are drowning and dying in the gulf and we have disaster in the country, and people will write four pages of mean spirited stuff about a decision that can be changed in a minute and will not in any way affect western civilization, and that has bothered me, I will tell you. I think we can re-open this and if the students are going to be engaged, we will try to make sure everyone’s engaged. We can have the great Pistol Pete debate, but let’s remember what it is. Let’s remember that a great university has the nerve to stand up and change itself and when it changes inappropriately, admit it was wrong and try again. In the process, the university is telling the country that we are a great university at the core, not at the sidelines.”
Regent Gallagher commented, “On that subject, I want to make two comments. One is, I am extremely disappointed that the overwhelming majority of the negative comments have been directed at President Martin. This process started before the search for a new president much less the selection and to suggest that the president unilaterally did this, sat in his office late one night when the students were gone and the alumni didn’t know anything about it, and changed it, is an absolute lie and for alumni to write in and suggest because Pistol Pete has been changed they are not giving to the university, well I would suggest, nothing plus nothing equals nothing. Those alumni that truly care about this university, care about what makes this university great, and I would suggest a mascot for the Athletic department does not make a university great. I am personally offended by the fact that President Martin has had to take the brunt of this abuse and I would like to personally put it to bed. I am disappointed at the comments that were made by several people that are associated with the university in the past and I am with President Martin. I think people need to get a life and understand that it is a mascot for the Athletic department and we need to move on, and espouse the Living the Vision goals and make this university great and forget about Pistol Pete, or whatever we want to call him, and get about the business of educating kids. With that I hope we do not have to discuss Pistol Pete again.”
Regent Lewis stated, “I would like to say I understand where we are going, but maybe it has been a public relations problem where we, as a university, have not reached out to the alumni and told them this is why we are doing it. We are branding an image and we are taking our university to the next level. What we need to do now–the damage is already done–is somehow come back and send something out to the alumni everywhere and tell them what we are doing and the reason we are doing it and I think everyone will understand then.” President Martin stated, “I agree with both of you, Regent Anaya and Regent Lewis. I think we have to do a much better job of explaining what is up. I do think we need let people know what the underlying point is. Th