April 27, 1999

Chair Sohmer called the session to order at 6:30 p.m. in the Graduate School and University Center Auditorium. Present were Senators from the following campuses:

Chair Sohmer called the session to order at 6:30 p.m. in the Graduate School and University Center Auditorium. Present were Senators from the following campuses: Baruch: Hill, McCall, Otte, Pollard. BMCC: Friedman, Price, Vozick, Young. Bronx: Cummins, Fuld, Read. Brooklyn: Bell, Hager, Jacobson, London, Shapiro, Tobey. City: Crain, Sank. CSI: Cooper, Foleno, L’Amoreaux, Levine, Petratos, Yousef. GSUC: Baumrin, Katz-Rothman. Hostos: Canate. Hunter: Sherrill, Steinberg, Wonsek. John Jay: Bohigian, Davenport, Kaplowitz, Rodriguez, Alternate Davenport. Kingsborough: Galvin, Goodkin, O’Malley, Richter. LaGuardia: Beaky, Gallagher, Mettler, Reitano. Lehman: Bullaro, Feinerman, Knobloch, Mineka. Medgar: Donohue, Harris-Hastick, Alternate Sigler. NYCTC: Cermele, Deraney, Norton, Walter, Alternates Hounion, Richardson. Queens: Diamond, Franco, Frisz, Kulkarni, Marshall, Savage, Hemmes. Queensborough: Barbanel, Dahbany-Miraglia, Gellman, Greenbaum, Alternate Specht. York: Cooper, Doss, Odenyo. Professor Grossman was excused. Governance Leaders present: A. Cooper (York), Davidson (LaGuardia), Fuld (Bronx CC), Kaplowitz (John Jay), Levine (CSI), Mettler (LaGuardia), O’Malley (Kingsborough CC), Perlstein (BMCC), Specht (Queensborough CC). Interim Chancellor Kimmich and Cynthia Pulliam attended. Dean Ribaudo, Steve Yoman, Colette Wagner, Marsha Ra, and Anil Khullar from Central Office were present. Also attending were Executive Director Phipps and Administrative Assistant Pasela.

I. Approval of the Agenda: The agenda was approved as proposed.

II. Approval of the Minutes of March 23, 1999: The Minutes were approved as
distributed.

III. Reports: [recorded in Reports & Deliberations]

a. Chair (oral and written).

b. Interim Chancellor Christoph Kimmich (oral).

c.      University Dean Michael Ribaudo on Status of Educational Technology (oral).

d. Faculty Members of Board of Trustees Committees (written).

e. Towards a Definition on General Education, Statement of the Academic Policy Committee (written) – Received.

IV. Nominations for Members-at-Large of the Executive Committee:

Seven senators were nominated for five vacancies. They were: Stefan Baumrin (Lehman), Lenore Beaky (LaGuardia), Martha Bell (Brooklyn), Lou Foleno (CSI), Anne Friedman (BMCC), Fred Greenbaum (Queensborough), and Kenneth Sherrill (Hunter).

V. New Business:

A. Resolution on the University Police Cadet Corps Program – The resolution from the Executive Committee was moved by Prof. Kaplowitz and approved unanimously by voice vote:

BE IT RESOLVED, that the University Faculty Senate endorse the resolution below.

***

RESOLUTION OF THE FACULTY SENATE OF JOHN JAY COLLEGE

OF CRIMINAL JUSTICE ON ESTABLISHING A UNIVERSITY-BASED

POLICE CADET CORPS PROGRAM

WHEREAS, The CUNY Cadet Corps was an innovative and visionary program designed and implemented jointly by The City University of New York and the New York Police Department to produce college—educated police officers reflective and representative of the people of the City of New York whom they serve, and

WHEREAS, The CUNY Cadet Corps class of 1992—93, as an example, was representative of the program in that the class comprised 127 students of whom 67% were people of color (47% Latino and 15% African American) and 37% women, all of whom were New York City residents, as mandated by the program, and

WHEREAS, The CUNY Cadets, having been recruited by CUNY and screened for police service by the NYPD, were all full-time students enrolled in degree programs at 10 CUNY Colleges in all five boroughs, and

WHEREAS, CUNY Cadets studied not only at their home college but also received intensive training, specialized study, and supervised practical work experience at John Jay College of Criminal Justice, for the specific purpose of preparing them for police service, and

        WHEREAS, The CUNY Cadet Corps was defunded and no longer exists, and

WHEREAS, The Faculty Senate is the voice of the faculty of John Jay College of Criminal Justice, a College whose mission is the education of current and future criminal justice practitioners, therefore be it

RESOLVED, That the Faculty Senate of John Jay College of Criminal Justice calls upon the CUNY Chancellor, the CUNY Board of Trustees, and elected officials to establish a University-based police cadet corps program, as a way to help serve the citizens of the City of New York and the students of the City University of New York. Approved by Unanimous Vote, March 24, 1999

B. Resolution Marking Anniversary of Open Admissions – The resolution was moved by Prof. A. Friedman, duly seconded, and adopted unanimously by voice vote:

Whereas, April 1999 marks the 30th anniversary of the Open Admissions policy at CUNY, and

Whereas, research has shown that hundreds of thousands of New Yorkers have benefited from this policy -- entering the university, graduating, moving on to earn advanced degrees, entering the workforce and contributing to the economy of New York City, New York State, and the nation,

Therefore, Be It Resolved, that the University Faculty Senate reaffirms its strong commitment to the universal access to higher education that Open Admissions has made possible, and to the educational and financial policies that are necessary to ensure its continued success.

There being no further business, the meeting was adjourned at 8:50 p.m.

Respectfully submitted,

William Phipps, Executive Director

a. Chair: I’ll try to relate the various activities of the chair in the recent past. There was a wonderful reception at the Bartos Forum honoring significant architectural renovations in New York City -- among others it honored the Hall of Fame renovation at Bronx Community College and the reading room at the New York Public Library at 42nd Street.

The committee to draw up a document on Intellectual Property has met twice,

The chairs of the discipline councils met to hear a fellow of the ACE (Dr. Schoenberg) make a plea for better articulation of General Education programs among the colleges.

Several of us (Sherrill, McCall, Greenbaum, Sohmer) spent a day in Albany visiting various legislators, functionaries and government officials on TAP and other aspects of the budget. We were well received though our visits were with both republicans and democrats.

There was a meeting of the American Association of Colleges and Universities on Governance, and there were present the not-yet-elected (but elected now) Chair of the SUNY Senate as well as the director of the Association of Governance Boards. It was agreed that our trustees did not live up to the principles that trustees should follow (at least with respect to independence). We produced a resolution to support the censure vote of the SUNY senate and of the SUNY union (the UUP) of their trustees. At the end of the BOT meeting last night I informed the board that the SUNY senate had censured their trustees, and that we had endorsed their action. There was a chilly response.

b. Interim Chancellor Christoph Kimmich: Good evening, everyone. I don’t think there is anyone not aware of the latest honor that came our way -- Pulitzer Prizes for two of our colleagues, one from Brooklyn, the other from John Jay. We should all congratulate them. I wanted to say this in part because it’s such good news and I enjoy sharing good news about our University. I say it in part also because, less well known, the two award winners stand in a not inconsiderable line of faculty members and alumni who have won Pulitzers in the past. We don’t have a complete listing but have been able to piece together a list of ten who have been so honored over the last twenty or thirty years. But I don’t think we have ever before had two current members of the faculty on staff, active in the classroom, teachers much in demand, engaged in a scholarly collaboration on a work of such magnitude. These national honors, whether they go to faculty or students or to programs confirm for me and for all of us the high quality of this institution. That’s what really matters here -- the ability to stand tall among our peers on the national scene and to be justly proud of ourselves. I find myself glowing at the thought that members of our faculty have won a Pulitzer Prize. I am deeply delighted and think we should all be.

Since we last met, there is some news about the budget, not so much on the State side as on the City side, and I want to give you some figures on that. I also want to give you the latest figures on applications and admissions for the Fall semester. Budget and enrollment -- two significant issues.

There is not much to say about the State budget. I think all of you know that the three parties who have to come to the table to reach an agreement -- the Governor, the Senate, and the Assembly -- are still miles apart on revenue projections for the coming fiscal year. That is, on how much money can be spent. There is no resolution in sight; there is stalemate. We continue to maintain an active presence in Albany, with regular visits by representatives of the colleges and the Chancellery, and we work with SUNY colleagues on the community college side. But we really don’t expect anything to happen soon, and will likely discuss the subject pretty much along similar lines when next we meet.

It’s different on the City side. You will have seen in the paper that the Mayor has released his Budget. When you look at the numbers, you will notice that there is no change from what we saw in January. The budget recommends $79.4 million for the community colleges next year. This is exactly the same as last year. There is no money in there for College Now; there is no money in there for the Merit Scholarship Program that the City Council initiated last year. There is no provision for the mandatory costs, including the collective bargaining costs.

The numbers have not changed. There are however two stipulations the Mayor has set as conditions for the release of City funds to the University. The first condition is that CUNY use an objective test, based on high national standards, to determine when students in remediation are ready for college level work. The second condition is that the University offer students the option of obtaining remediation at another educational institution through a voucher system. You’ve read about the voucher system the Mayor is proposing for the schools; he is also proposing a voucher system for the University. While this is not spelled out, the assumption is that the funding comes out of University funds.

On the first condition, I think we can be reasonably confident that we are already pretty much there. When you think of some of the Board policies that were passed a year and a half ago, in September of 1997. When you think of the Board policy that was passed yesterday evening at the Board meeting, which stipulates that students with a 75 on the Regents Math, and a 75 on the Regents English exams, are considered ready for college level work, we are pretty much there. I do not think, were this condition to survive into the budget via the City Council, that we will have a hard time with it.

The other one – the vouchers – is very complex. I would say that, if it survives, and I do not think that it will survive the City Council, we clearly have to look at it in the context of what research tells us about how effective remedial programs can be. Remediation in the abstract tends not to be very effective. We have learned that remedial courses linked to substantive courses is the most effective way of dealing with remedial deficiencies.

The City Council for its part is much more generous as far as the University is concerned. They released a preliminary budget response to what the Mayor had released back in January. It provides for merit scholarships. It provides for an expanded College Now Program. In fact the City Council is proposing that the College Now Program be expanded to every high school in the City, and to every senior college of the University, beginning with those senior colleges that have both associate and baccalaureate programs. It responds to University needs on programmatic and collaborative programs very generously. It also, by the way, provides for a police cadet program for students enrolled in the City’s public colleges who have completed sixty credits. So there would be an opportunity here to have our students involved in what seems to be an enormously worthwhile project.

The adoption of the City Budget is scheduled for the 5th of June. Whether there is a State Budget or not, the City is always pretty much on time and they have set a firm date. Between now and then, we are going to be testifying at various City Council hearings that have been scheduled for the budget. I’m sure that we will have representatives, not only clearly from the Chancellory, but also from the colleges, to make our case. We will continue to be in touch with both the City Council and with the Mayor’s Office, not only on the numbers, but also on conditions that have been set. That is it for the budget.

I reported to you the last time on enrollments for the Spring and made some comparisons. I understand that the figures have been distributed to the body in the meantime. Today I want to talk about where we stand with admissions for the Fall semester. Let me stress that these are very preliminary figures. They could change, and probably will change, by next month. They reflect the stand of our applications and admissions data as of mid-April. We are at this point at the end of the fifth phase of a process that is going to run all the way though August. As of mid-April, the University admitted 32,751 students overall. This represents a slight increase from last year. In percentage terms, what we see is an increase in admission of 0.8% at the senior colleges. And an increase of 3.3% at the community colleges.

It’s harder to talk about transfer students because the allocation came at a slightly different time.

We are comparing a status that is about 2 to 2 ½ weeks apart. What we see at this point, mid-April, is an increase in transfer students of 18.8%, not a small number, fairly evenly distributed across the colleges. But bearing in mind a difference in calendar, we are probably about even with last year. So that the 18.8 %, as nice as it sounds, is roughly the same as we had last year at this time. As soon as we have better dates to compare, I will come back to you and give you an update.

Let me make three points about these figures. First of all, the figures reflect the impact of higher admissions criteria at the senior colleges. Demand has not dropped. In fact, applications to the senior colleges with baccalaureate programs only, first choice applications, are up. What’s down is the students who are admitted to those colleges, because many of the applicants cannot meet the admission standards set by these colleges. So that while we have a continued demand for application, students do not meet the admissions criteria for those institutions. My second point is that the applicant pool from students with 85 GPA’s and up is on the increase. Compared with this time last year, we had close to 5% more in the pool of students with a high school GPA of 85 or better. The challenge here, and I’ve said this to you before, is to get them to enroll. These are students who have options. I think we should do everything we possibly can to make sure that the University remains one of those options, and in fact remains on top of the list.

The third point I refer to an interesting phenomena. Our applications from the suburbs are up by 30%. This cohort is also going to be very difficult to enroll and for the same reason I just mentioned. But clearly, the University is attractive to college-bound students beyond the five boroughs. That’s not the norm. Having said all that, let me just say once more that what this relates to is applications and admissions. It does not relate to enrollments. We are going to continue to get applications, and to admit students through August. We won’t know about actual enrollments until the Fall semester is under way.

Let me cover two other issues -- teacher education and the pending master plan update mentioned before. About two weeks ago the Times did an article on teacher education, more specifically on the performance of CUNY students who took the teacher certification test in 1997-1998. The data for that article came from the State Education Department. It is broken down by colleges and consists of two sets. One set shows the scores of all those students who took the exam in 1997-1998 and said they were affiliated with or had graduated from a particular CUNY college. The other set shows the scores of all those whom the colleges recommended for certification, to take the test, meaning that they had completed all the requirements of the teacher education program in that particular college. The first number, the first set of figures is quite large. The second set of figures is a lot smaller. There is a significant difference between the two. It’s the second number that counts, the State Education Department regulations, which came into effect this year, indicate that they will look to those students who were recommended by the colleges, in judging the validity and the continuing registration of a teacher education program.

Worth saying here, is that the reforms put in place at the campuses, by the faculty, are beginning to show some results. That doesn’t mean that we are done, that we can relax. There is still a lot of work to be done. In fact, as some of you know, over the next three years, the State Education Department is going to tighten up the tests and make them more rigorous. So continued work, continued effort, is going to be necessary. But the initial results, and these are 1997-1998 results, are really quite encouraging, and that is good news. None of our colleges fell below the 80% level the SED sets for non re-registration. The other thing you can say about those figures is that the discrepancy between the large numbers of self-identified students and the smaller numbers of the recommended students are also a measure of how well the institutions are performing. That gap has begun and should continue to close, the gap between those two figures. Every institution has enhanced its admissions standards and strengthened student performance requirements.

The other topic I wanted to talk to you about briefly is the Master Plan update that the University is going to submit to the Regents this summer. I think you heard from me the last time that under the terms of the State Education Law, the University’s obliged to submit what is called a Master Plan Update every four years. This is an opportunity to report on developments of the previous four years, to indicate what is already the case, what is contemplated in light of existing Board policies and plans. The due date for this report is the year 2000. We have consulted with the State Education Department and have begun the process of preparing an update for submission this summer because under Board regulations, we are required to meet the time table of the January resolution on remediation.

The Master Plan Update is being moved to this summer, rather than next year. In order to provide the Regents with an opportunity to review the implementation plans that are being prepared by the colleges. The draft that we’re working on is going to cover the remedial issues in some great detail, but also issues relating to enrollment, to the operating budget, to the capital budget, to faculty, to faculty research, the University’s role in the City in economic development, and the like. We will be in touch over the next two months, with presidents and with trustees. The draft itself will go for review and for approval ultimately to the Board. There will be an opportunity for a public hearing which is mandated for all Master Plan Updates, so that the entire University community will have a chance to see it and talk about it. It is due on the 1st of July. We are operating under a very tight time frame.

I suppose that I might just say another brief word about the CUNY Task Force. We are told the report will be released mid-May. What we hear is that drafts are being discussed and negotiated, more evidence that this deadline may be serious. Those of you who heard Mr. Schmidt talk at Baruch a couple of weeks ago will probably have gotten a fairly good sense of what’s likely to be in this report. He did acknowledge the mission of the institution as being very important, but said that we are not meeting our mission. He addressed four issues. One is a new term--system architecture. This has to do with the nature of the system, how it is governed by both the administrative staff and trustees, and how it functions as a system. This has been one of Mr. Schmidt’s themes for some time now.

The second one is remediation. Here, the focus, at least in the Baruch talk, was on the nature of the remediation process as it effects the outcome. We need to reappraise how effective we are. He drew a distinction between our being enormously competent in identifying in people who needed remediation, but not very good at saying what it was that students had when they exited from remediation. He pointed to the fact that different colleges in fact have different exit requirements. And that in a system as large as ours, there ought to be, but was not, a general standard by which one could tell whether someone had left remediation and was ready for college work.

The third point he made was that we were not doing enough in collaborating with the school system, which he blames for much of our ills. While he recognized we had such things as College Now and the College Preparatory Initiative, he called them sporadic. He was looking for something more systematic and sustained. Clearly that kind of charge would take us far afield from what we are doing now. While necessary, it is not something that at this point is in our purview or in our budget. At this point, let me take time for questions.

Professor Greenbaum (History, Queensborough Community College) - "When we were up in Albany lobbying, one of the things that came up from one of the Republican senators was that the longer it takes them to agree on how large a surplus there is, the larger the surplus they agree upon is going to be. Can you comment on that?" / Interim Chancellor Kimmich - Certainly the statements from the Governor and the statements so far from the Senate indicate that they are much more modest in that calculation than the Assembly. The Assembly says $4 billion and the Senate talks about $1.5 billion. That is not something where you just split the difference. While it is possible that there might be some movement on this, we have not seen any evidence that suggests that they are even talking at this point.

Professor Savage (Sociology, Queens College) - "We’re going to have a problem always with these claims about what kinds of evidence we have that our students are doing well or not doing well. I heard Benno Schmidt at Baruch saying CUNY did not have information on what happens to students after they go through remediation. Could you arrange to convey to the Executive Committee what sorts of data have been provided to the Schmidt Commission on how well our students, who have gone through remediation, do in comparison with ordinary students who didn’t have to go through remediation. If we knew, we could be ready to go ahead and respond to the Schmidt Commission Report when it comes out." / Interim Chancellor Kimmich - Let me say three things in response to that. One is that we responded to every request they have made and continue to make for data. All the data that we provided and all the past documents and planning materials we provided are put together in a library. I’d be delighted to have you come and look. Number two, we have just about come to an agreement with them that they will share with us the data that will be used in their report. The argument we made is that seem to be differences on the data, as for example on the cost of remediation. It would make sense for us to at least be on the same wave length on the figures. We could argue about findings, we could argue about conclusions and inferences, but we didn’t want to argue about data. I think we owe it to ourselves to say to them: let us be straight about the data. Number three, we have established at the Central Office a facts and figures committee. We have picked up every scrap of information, every reference in every speech that Mr. Schmidt has given on various occasions. We are preparing ourselves very thoroughly to be prepared to counter their data, correct them, or whatever the case may be. We have not been sitting still. I shall be pleased to share the library as well as the whole listing of these documents with anybody who asks. / Professor Savage - "That’s wonderful and I appreciate the offer to share the list."

Professor Bell (Educational Services, Brooklyn College) - "Chancellor Kimmich, I am still very puzzled about this notion of vouchers for college, unlike vouchers for public schools where people are forced to go because we have an educational law that requires people under the age of 16 to attend school. But nobody is forced to come to the University. There is tuition, which is a form of a voucher. There is TAP, which one can take any place one wants to do it. The University doesn’t force anyone who comes in prepared to enter remedial courses. I don’t understand how they envision vouchers. Because anyone who wanted to take their TAP or tuition elsewhere, could in fact do so." / Interim Chancellor Kimmich - And you’re asking me? / Professor Bell - "I’m asking you what you think he means. I can’t figure it out. What does he mean to do, different from TAP and different from tuition?" / Interim Chancellor Kimmich - I think you put all the arguments on the table that we would put on the table. In fact we have something broadly called a voucher system. Which means we are not forcing students to come to the University; you can take your pick and your choice. Let me just say one thing that shades back into some comments by Benno Schmidt. He sees vouchers, which he casts in the frame of choices, as a method of challenging us to improve what we do now. If there is competition, the theory goes, we will do even better than we are doing now. The way to do that is to give students choices; they will march away from us and go somewhere else. That is one, maybe even the main, motivation that fuels this kind of voucher discussion. / Professor Bell - "I think there are numerous choices in New York City. Whether they are aware of them is another question. I just have an aside question. When you reported Mr. Schmidt had four points, you reported three. System architecture, remediation, and collaboration with the schools. If you could remember what the fourth was." / Interim Chancellor Kimmich - The fourth was trying to establish mainstream credentials. He talked about the SAT’s, about setting up a kind of national standard-oriented admissions process.

Professor Sherrill (Political Science, Hunter College) - "Chancellor, at last month’s meeting I asked you about legislation that Ed Sullivan had introduced that mandated that the city no longer be exempted from contributing the same amount proportionally to the City University’s community colleges, as towns, counties, and cities upstate are mandated. I believe that is making some progress. That issue leads to this question however. My understanding is that the City’s contribution to the University is almost entirely mandated by State law. What is the University going to do to get the Mayor to obey the law?" / Interim Chancellor Kimmich - I think the recourse is two fold. One is support from the State Legislature, the second is going to law. Whether the Trustees will buy into either one of those is an open question. / Professor Sherrill - "Individuals can do it if the Trustees don’t." / Interim Chancellor Kimmich – This is what happened the last time the Mayor was sued.

Professor Sank (Anthropology, City College of New York) - "I wondered, Chancellor, are there any CUNY or Board of Trustee rules or guidelines regarding commencement speakers? In other words, specifically regarding a college inviting a particular person who might be a candidate for a high political office like the U.S. Senate. To be a commencement speaker and get the presidential medal or receive an honorary degree. My question stems from the fact that a few days ago, the president of our college, Yolanda Moses, announced that she had decided to invite Mrs. Hillary Rodham Clinton to be our commencement speaker. Since she is and almost declared candidacy for the Senate. And since also the Mayor of our City is an almost declared candidate for Senate. I just wondered if you thought it was appropriate, especially for a public institution, to invite a political candidate to speak at a commencement?" / Interim Chancellor Kimmich - The answer to your first question is, I am not aware of any Board policy or CUNY policy on commencement speakers. That’s a decision in the discretion of the colleges, the president, in most cases working with a faculty committee. As to the choice itself, we have had a wonderful array of choices, and I would leave that to the discretion of the individual institution and the wisdom to the administration and faculty.

Chair Sohmer - There is in the policy handbook of the Board of Trustees a statement that an avowed candidate for office may not be chosen for speaker. We don’t seem to have that. I think that she would be illegally using federal funds for her traipsing around the country if she were an avowed candidate.

Professor Sank - " This is the point. Time Magazine had her listed as Senator. Our own Senator from New Jersey, Torricelli, admitted in an article in this week’s New York Times, that he was the one who leaked out the fact that she will be running for Senate. People sometimes don’t like to declare themselves too early because they like to get a sense of what’s happening. Doesn’t it imply that we are endorsing this person?"

Professor Crain (Psychology, City College) - "I understand that data exists by ethnicity, and passage of skills tests for the Fall 1998. I wondered if that could be made available. I know that the Lavin Report on that gave us some of the information. I’d like to see the full data on that." / Interim Chancellor Kimmich - If it exists, there is no reason why you shouldn’t. I do not recall seeing it. / Professor Crain - "I’m a little surprised by moving the Master Plan forward. On January 25th, the Board of Trustees voted that they did not need approval of the Regents. Did they vote to move the Master Plan forward? That’s like doing the same thing. They voted that they did not have to get approval from the Regents. I thought when they did that, I thought that was great -- their arrogance is going to do them in. Now are they giving you directions, why..." / Interim Chancellor Kimmich - My memory is not what it was, but I don’t remember them voting affirmatively on not going to the Regents. / Professor Crain - Yes, they did. It was a resolution that came up late in the night at the very end of the meeting. They voted "no". They declined Trustee Everett’s Resolution. Why help them out of this by, in effect, meeting the requirement of the law without their approval. I don’t understand; let them hang themselves with this resolution, with their arrogance." / Interim Chancellor Kimmich - I’m not quite sure what you expect me to say. / Professor Crain - "I don’t know. You got my opinion."

Professor Kulkarni (Mathematics, Queens College) - "I think that we should be prepared for some critical self analysis before someone outside like Benno Schmidt does this. When I spoke to you last month about the Graduate Center, very logically you pointed out good scenarios. The first possibility, there is a free standing Graduate Center, consisting solely of who the Graduate Center appoints and their students. We have repeatedly said that we don’t want such a free standing Graduate Center. The second is, the consortial arrangement which the Graduate Center says it has and wants to preserve. I really love the Graduate Center, but I am disturbed by some of the situations. The Graduate Council, which is the main legislative body of the Graduate Center, begins and conducts its meetings often without a quorum being present. In fact, the structure committee of the Graduate Center, of which I am member -- we simply try to legitimize these meetings by reducing the quorum to one-third. I understand that your office has denied that request. Secondly, the same is true for some of the Ph.D. programs located at the Graduate Center. Not just for a month, a semester, a year, but for ten, twenty, thirty years, some of them begin and conduct their meetings without a quorum being present. The situation indicates deep rooted ethical and legal problems in the structure of the Graduate Center. The Graduate Center is going to have its Middle States accreditation review next year. For that purpose, the administration asked each program to prepare a self study report. In one of the programs, the Executive Officer sent its report without any consultation with the faculty or students. Not only that, he refused to show the final report to a faculty member who asked for it. The particular incident that I have described is not an isolated case. It is a fairly common pattern. I think you will agree, the underlying problem is certainly not solved by the Provost of the Graduate Center himself providing that particular report to that particular faculty member, leaving the Executive Officer to harass the faculty member academically in many other ways. The point I’m trying to make in this short time is, if we are serious about making the consortium at the Graduate Center functional, these excesses need to be checked. That check has to come from outside the Graduate Center. The internal structure of the Graduate Center has repeatedly shown itself incapable of handling its own excesses in the last thirty years. Can you conclude on how the Graduate Center’s dysfunctionality and arrogance can be checked in the future?" / Interim Chancellor Kimmich - I’m a little puzzled that the absence of quorum should suggest structural dysfunctionality. If you were to apply that criterion to governance or other bodies that we’re familiar with, we would find ourselves at a total stalemate. I presume that the absence of a quorum is a familiar matter to the provost and to the president. Presumably they have tried to bring faculty into meetings for which a quorum is required. Why that hasn’t worked, I am at somewhat of a loss to explain . But I’m not quite sure that I can take the next step you suggest, which turns that into a structural dysfunctionality. Certainly a quorum is desirable. Certainly governance requires quorum. Whether however we should therefore either dismantle or deeply reassess the Graduate Center does not follow. One thing one might look at are the standards of an established quorum at the Graduate Center. Another is to look at the substance of what it does, which I think is not inconsiderable.

Professor Levine (Engineering Science & Physics) - "On the proposed budget of the Mayor and the City Council. You mentioned that the budget incorporates the $79.4 million that was adopted in 1998-1999. But indeed the full adopted budget for the City’s support is $111.7 million. And there was even another, perhaps $4.3 million, bringing it to $116 million. In addition, your budget request asks for an additional $13.5 million, in mandatory and collective bargaining changes; an additional $7.2 million in program changes. Are any of these amounts in either the Mayor’s Budget or the City Council Budget? And if not, should we be campaigning to get it in?" / Interim Chancellor Kimmich - Let me separate the first three figures that you gave. The $79.4 million, that’s the community college budget. To which another $30 million is added in order to deal with associate programs and with the City’s share of management. The $4.3 million that we referred to last Spring, that was already included in that $79.4 million. / Professor Levine - "So that is not any new money." / Interim Chancellor Kimmich – No, that was not any new money, that was old money. The larger question that you asked related to our budget request. The sums requested are met by City Council but not by the Mayor. / Professor Levine - "So the City Council has incorporated the mandatory changes. What about the program changes?" / Interim Chancellor Kimmich - Both.

Professor O’Malley (English, Kingsborough Community College) - " My question is, what if any plans exist at this moment, to propose a CUNY Core?" / Interim Chancellor Kimmich - There has been some discussion obviously in previous committee meetings. It is not on the agenda of the next Board Committee meeting. There has been extensive discussion with the academic affairs committee of the Council of Presidents and with members of the Faculty Senate Executive Committee about the low desirability of establishing a CUNY wide core. Not least because we believe we already have very good core curricula at the various colleges. We need not try to improve upon or emulate others that are not as good as we are. / Professor O’Malley - "The Faculty Senate Academic Policy Committee just put out an excellent statement that I think you’ll be getting about its feelings about a core."

Professor Beaky (English, LaGuardia Community College) - "I’m not sure if I caught all of what you said about the Mayor’s restriction of funds contingent upon our developing an appropriate test for remediation. Does 80th Street see that as an invasion of its prerogatives in terms of developing policy and deciding policy? And of course on the part of faculty as well. Do you have an opinion on whether this is legal, even?" / Interim Chancellor Kimmich - As to your first question, we object to all outside intervention telling us what we should do in curriculum and programs. That is our business. Is it legal? Let me remind you that last year the Mayor withheld funds. He refused to allow agencies to spend because he didn’t agree with the way they were operating. Was it legal? Nobody challenged him on the subject. But he was able to withhold it until negotiations brought about a meeting of the minds so that funds ultimately were released. He does have, and I think the Executive in many cases does have, the power not to spend money even though it is allocated.

Professor Baumrin (Philosophy, The Graduate Center) - "Two short questions. It seems to me that the appropriate person to bring a lawsuit about the sequestration of funds would be the Attorney General of the State of New York. I’m a little troubled by your suggesting that it would really be up to the Board to decide whether or not to pursue this legally. That’s my first question. My second one is a nicer question. How does it feel to be the Senior Academic Officer of the University and not have a burden of enmity from the faculty?" / Interim Chancellor Kimmich - I was going to bring in a doctor’s note today. On the first question, clearly any outside agency can sue without our permission. I think it’s a reality, political and otherwise, that the Board would have much to say if the University decided to sue one of its political sponsors. I don’t think that we can talk realistically about taking such a step. That the Attorney General might take such a step is clearly up to him. I don’t know whether he has that close an interest in it or whether anybody has brought it to him or whether he would be willing to engage himself in this particular issue. Nothing surely would stand in his way. As to your second question, I’ve always thought of myself as part of the faculty.

Professor Canate (Mathematics, Hostos Community College) - "As you know, drastic cuts to CUNY budgets, student access, and aid, are likely to provoke greater demonstrations. I was very disturbed by a recent Freedom of Information Law Disclosure. It revealed that CUNY Security recently purchased 80,000 rounds of ammunition, including hollow point bullets, automatic pistols, and twelve gauge buck shots and slugs. I would like to know what your opinion is." / Interim Chancellor Kimmich - A little history. Back in 1992, the Board decided to employ a security force that was strictly CUNY, to replace security guards who were brought in from the outside and be fully trained peace officers. In subsequent years, a decision was made at the Central Office, by my predecessor, that some of these peace officers should receive weapons training. That entailed a certification for firearms training. That firearms training is carried out on police ranges. The ammunition that is bought is for those training exercises. Peace officers have to be recertified twice a year. They have to go through a series of training exercises, for which we have to contribute the ammunition. Shot guns are not part of our arsenal; they are part of the training. Three years ago I believe, or maybe two years, when the re-certification training was resumed for a certain group with earlier training, the University apparently asked the FBI to provide such training. The FBI training included shot guns and hollow point bullets. Again, we had to supply that ammunition. The ammunition used in the training by the FBI is used up. The only acquisition of ammunition was in fact for the purpose of the required certification of firearms training by the peace officers of the security force. Whether or not that was a good decision back in 1992, whether or not that was a good decision back in 1995, these are clearly questions we are asking ourselves. Not only is there a committee -- of which I believe Bernie, you are a member -- the Deputy Chancellor has also engaged an outside consultant to give us an objective, neutral view of whether our security arrangements are appropriate for the University or not.

Professor Sank (Anthropology, City College of New York) - "We at City, and I think throughout CUNY, are terribly worried that the end of remediation may have a very harmful and disastrous effect on the enrollment of students, most particularly minority students. Also, we fear that it will have a disastrous effect on our budget which could affect hiring teachers and so forth. I just wondered if you think it is a valid concern? If so, is there anything that you could suggest to counteract this potential, imminent cut in student enrollment, and imminent cut in student enrollment, and potential cut in the budget." / Interim Chancellor Kimmich - I was never in any doubt that these resolutions would have an impact. I said so when the resolution first surfaced in May last year, and I said it again this year. The extent of the impact is not clear. One of the questions that I posed to the colleges who are responding to the resolution with implementation plans is, specifically, what do you expect the impact to be on enrollment? On your student profile? And what plans, if any, do you have for dealing with that on your local campus? I will probably better be equipped to answer your question the next time around rather than this time. I’m waiting to see what the colleges are telling me specifically about their own assessment of the impact of the resolution, both budgetarily and on enrollment. My own sense from the beginning has been that there would be some impact on these institutions. Though I’ve said from the beginning, that I hope, with our system, and the collaboration that exists among the campuses, that we don’t lose a single student.

Professor Mineka (Math & Computer Science, Lehman College ) - "Coming back to the question about ammunition. It’s my understanding on my campus, that we do have peace officers who carry loaded weapons. So some of the ammunition is not merely for training exercises. Was this new supply of ammunition to replenish what our officers carry? Or was it strictly for training purposes? In other words, are they just relying on old stocks of ammunition or is this a resupply in any sense?" / Interim Chancellor Kimmich - Let me start off in two ways. One is that I think, as all of you know, Lehman is the only institution where the security is authorized to carry weapons. The stock of ammunition that exists was acquired and used primarily for the recertification and training. Some of that ammunition would probably be available to the peace officers, when, if ever, they are called upon to carry guns. The acquisition of ammunition for the training probably also serves that purpose. / Professor Mineka - "I have just a quick related question. We also have a group of attack dogs kept on campus. Could you tell me if there is any other campus which is supplied with attack dogs?" / Interim Chancellor Kimmich - Not to my knowledge, Professor Mineka.

Professor Frisz (Student Personnel, Queens College) - "This might be totally on a different topic, but something that really concerns me. The media over the last week over the terrible massacre in Colorado has led me to start thinking about the fact that this kind of situation could happen anywhere, not just at a secondary school. Maybe the City University should think about being a leader in getting together some kind of task force, where we can talk about what kinds of positive educational programs we can do at individual campuses in terms of dealing with the kinds of issues, violence, and reaction. Just courteousness to students and others in terms of feelings. Coming up with programs that might work. I don’t think it is unique in terms of what we saw this last week. Even on individual campuses. I know that at Queens we have seen over the past couple of years, several instances of racist kinds of reactions. Of people’s anger coming through in very inappropriate ways. We have spent a couple of years reacting to the terrible crises we are having in CUNY about remediation and testing, and so on. But I really think we need to talk about doing something on the human level. In terms of helping faculty, staff, and students cope with this kind of national disaster and work towards some education. I don’t know if you have any thoughts on it. It has been on my mind, maybe because I have a daughter in high school and she is going to college next year. Also because I work with students on the campus. There has been a lot of talk about what has happened in Colorado. A lot of fright and feeling, and so on." / Interim Chancellor Kimmich - It’s not a subject that we have not addressed. I’m thinking in particular of people at John Jay College who have thought very hard about conflict resolution and anticipating problems before they arise. On our faculty we have people with considerable expertise and training in that. The question that you’re raising is, can we make that more available and accessible to colleges other than John Jay. I will be happy to look into it.

Professor Perlstein (Governance Leader, Borough of Manhattan Community College) - "We’ve been informed by sources that we think are reliable, that when our security forces have been certified as peace officers, that renders them no longer totally under the control of the college or the college president. That they have under certain respects, which are not completely clear, autonomous authority. I wonder if that is your understanding, and what the University feels about that." / Interim Chancellor Kimmich - It is not my understanding, no. The president has the formal power over the campus on security. But in the event of a security incident, the president will probably not be directing a particular situation. But barring that, I see no... / Professor Perlstein - "With all due respect, that doesn’t seem like a clear response to me. I don’t understand the distinction. If in fact when they are in the process of providing peace and security, they do what they want, then that is not presidential or campus control as I understand it." / Interim Chancellor Kimmich - I was thinking really of an incident in which the president decides to call on security to resolve a difficult or problematic situation. I would suspect in such cases, the word of the commanding officers governs.

Chancellor Kimmich - I know that you are about to see and hear a wonderful presentation on technology and you are in for a treat. Thank you very much.

c. University Dean Michael Ribaudo on Status of Education Technology

Chair Sohmer - As you notice from the agenda, Dean Ribaudo, who is the Dean of all technical things in the University, has come with a chorus and will make a presentation on both our facilities and our pending facilities.

Dean Ribaudo – [Overhead slides referred to throughout this presentation are attached to these minutes.] Thanks for bearing with us. We are going to make a presentation tonight that was made before the Council of Presidents and before the Board Committee on Fiscal Affairs. Dr. Sohmer invited us to make the presentation tonight to you because he thought it would be informative. I think it’s informative, and I think it is a change from what you’ve heard. I think this is really exciting stuff, and we’d like to get your reaction. This is not something I’ve done myself. I work with a team, and the team is here. Networking and telecommunications, we have Steve Yoman and Anil Khullar. Our Director of Library Services, Marsha Ra, and our Director of Education and Training, Colette Wagner. They’ve been responsible for what I have to say and show you. Afterwards we will have a chance to discuss it.

We are going to discuss three topics tonight. They are really cut from the same cloth. They are built upon one another and taken together represent the most important technology activities we are currently engaged in. There are other aspects we can talk about. We can talk about administrative system, things that bind us together in terms of personnel systems and the like. The delivery of digital information, the kinds of resources that information represents, and the systems we deploy to accomplish that delivery still undoubtedly have the most impact on the constituencies we serve as we move into the next millennium.

We have a wide area network that we are responsible for. It took us about seven years to build. Separate networks for data and video. Based on T1 lease lines, T3 to the Internet. The Chancellor urged me not to get too technical. But this is the only technical part that we are going to get into. Campus LANs, built incrementally, had lacked cohesion. And the bandwidth-intensive applications that we are really starting to deal with, we are not ready to deal with. The basic decision drivers -- the web is just exploding, everywhere we look. As of March 1999, 4.3 million web sites in the world. Forty-three million Internet hosts, machines connected to the Internet. About 60% of those in the United States. Faster and cheaper desktop computers, and a greater demand for access. There is about a 43% annual growth rate in both the numbers of hosts connected and people connected to the web. The changing pace of information technology everywhere is overwhelming.

The wide area network overview -- we have the Internet that comes to us through 57th Street via a leased T3 connection. Going into 57th Street, then being passed through leased T1 lines through the colleges, to campus backbones, to the buildings, to the classrooms, to faculty desktops, etc. Where do we see ourselves going? We want to connect each classroom, every lab, every office in CUNY. We want to upgrade wiring infrastructure for newer technologies. We want to increase the capacity of the campus based backbones. We want to be future proof in that work. That means, whatever comes next, whether it be wireless, or whatever, we’re ready. We want to upgrade CUNY-Net, which is essentially the wide area network that we’ve got so much investment in already.

Our goals here allow student and faculty access to multi-media applications, providing LAN services to digital media libraries. Internet access from anywhere on campus, fast and easy access to data bases. We want to use advanced repositories for what will become video on demand and video to the desktop. We’ve been rather fortunate. The Governor’s five year multi-million dollar capital budget includes $7.2 million per year over the next five years for a commitment to upgrading the network infrastructure at each of the campuses. We’ve got certain realities to deal with, such as reduced debt ceilings and caps on bonding, but we’re working around that. Scaled and phased upgrade and development on campuses. We’ve begun this year, we intend to move forward, especially the upgrading of the backbone which is essential to providing high speed network access to the Internet and what that entails.

This is what we are looking for in the future. We are looking toward these options, SONET networks, synchronous, optical network, leased dark fiber… Public ATM, asynchronous transfer mode. In terms of what those entail, and what the downsides are, SONET is very expensive. It is about twelve times what our current cost is for T1 communications are. Leased dark fibers aren’t available in all the boroughs yet, that’s a limitation. The DS3 is very expensive, it’s overkill. And the ATM is available in 5 megabit increments and that’s where we are looking toward moving. The wide area technologies, the current CUNY-Net Infrastructure consists of multiple T1 lines, each capacity 1.5 megabits per second. We’re looking at existing copper wires. The next generation, the ATM is what we are leaning towards, fiber optic based, high bandwidth. That’s very high quality data transmission. We’re looking at integrating data, voice, and video over the same network. The rewards on campus for the desk top, where we are currently 10 megabits per second, moving to 100 megabits per second on the backbone. Currently 100 megabits per second to gigabite speed. It’s an order of magnitude difference, ten times difference in each regard.

It is interesting, when we look at what exists now, each of the campuses connects to the 57^th Street facility from 1-4 T1 lease lines, an average about $600 - $700 per month. You look at the current cost there and what we look to move to, if we moved to the ATM technology, is a significant increment in the available bandwidth, at approximately the same cost. We are trying to accommodate the demand for multi-media learning tools, for the digital media library collection, for video on demand, and for multi-point video conferences. We are looking to implement a wide area network strategy that can accommodate all these needs.

Moving on to what we are looking towards in terms of the digital library. We want to upgrade the CUNY Library Networking Infrastructure. Currently it exists to accommodate what we had put in place in the 1980's. We want to move to a digital media collection. We want to move to a new generation of integrated library system. We are looking for a multi million dollar capital commitment that the Governor promised over the next four years. Currently, all CUNY Libraries provide some access to the web via Internet connections. In 1996 we engaged in a major networking and work station library initiative.

Rank and file librarians want more robust infrastructures to support significant moves toward digital media collections. We need better wiring, workstations, and better peripheral equipment to access services. The collection now, to the extent to which it exists, remains the predominant medium for monographs. Digital media collections provide access to new indices and abstracts as well as reference works. The Encyclopedia Britannica is now something that we licensed for University use. It is a web based product sitting on a server out in California, accessible to any workstation within the CUNY system. The digital replication of the Britannica. More scholarly journals now are becoming available on-line. We’ve recently engaged an arrangement with the American Chemical Society whereby we’ve accessed on-line the 26 journals that they produce. They are available to any workstation within CUNY, on-line via the web interface, with all of the graphics associated with it. That is the first of many we hope to follow. Classics are available. Major authors on-line, the complete published works of authors such as Walt Whitman, the Brontes, Virginia Wolfe, Johnson, Boswell, Cervantes, many more than that. Facsimile images of first editions, notebooks, diaries, manuscripts, photographs, and paintings. That’s the home page, that’s there for you to access. That’s the first of many we hope to follow.

The cost of digital media services. They are more expensive than print. The pricing models favor consortium purchases. We’ve got a couple of examples. Lexus-Nexus, a company that gives financial profiles of business, legal, and market news. If we purchased each campus separately it would cost about $3.20 per FTE. As part of a state-wide consortium that we’ve entered into with other institutions within NY State, we’ve got that cost down to $1.23 per FTE. The Britannica that we referenced earlier, if we purchased ourselves, each campus separately, would cost $1 per FTE. As part of a CUNY-SUNY consortium negotiated, $0.40 per FTE. So all that translates into the ability to access all these indices, abstracts, and data bases efficiently and cost economically, on-line.

What we’ve got to date, the 18 indices and abstracts that are part of the CUNY+ data base, ERIC, Dissertation Abstracts, Meddling, Reader’s Guide to Periodical Literature, InfoTrack, Expanded Academic, Combined Indices and Abstracts, as well as full text articles for over a thousand journals in the fields of Astronomy, Religion, Law, History, Psychology, Humanities, Sociology, and General Sciences. InfoTrack Business and Company data, directory listing for over 150,000 companies with associated information on finance, trade, new technology, industry trends, books in print with reviews. Over 1.9 million titles, retrievable by title, author, subject, publisher, publication date, and ISBN number. As well as thousands of full text reviews and current contents. Table of Contents and Article Abstracts for over 7,000 journals in seven disciplines with every representation among the sciences and as I said, the 27 American Chemical Society Journals. Again, all products acquired as a system at great savings.

The current state we have is a single share integrated library system called CUNY+. It gives access to the entire contents of the CUNY libraries, about 5 million titles. It supports all basic library functions from acquisitions to serials control throughout. There are limitations, legacy hardware and software. We run it on the old mainframe at 57th Street. There is no integration of full text, graphics and multi media. There are no patron empowerment features, such as the ability to walk up to a workstation to see what your fines are, what your ability to check out books is. It’s weak on its ability to produce management reports. What we are looking to migrate to is a new generation system, client server, probably UNIX based with new capabilities. Integration with digital media and multimedia, more on-line resources for patrons. Again, the reference to inter-library loan, the access to patron account information, self-service book check out, and more sufficient support for staff workers. The Windows Applications interface with publishers for orders, claiming and invoicing. One stop shopping, if you will, for interaction with major vendors.

There is a Home Page from the California State Monterey campus. It is their window on the world on their integrated library system, what they can access via one click of the mouse, via a web based application, integrated library system, integrated resources. What we are moving to (reference to slide), College of Staten Island is starting to emulate it. We are building the backbone to enable them to fully integrate the kinds of things we are seeing in the Cal State system. The graphical user interface is the kind we hope to implement when we move onto the new client server based system.

Finally, moving into a discussion of distance learning. What do we see when we look at the national scene? We see some very visible players, Western Governors’ University which has received a lot of press. It started a couple of years ago, most notably by the Governor of Colorado at the time, and the Governor of Utah. They don’t want to build any more buildings in the West. They want to do everything virtually. They want to train knowledge workers. We see the same thing happening at the California State University with their Virtual University. In Virginia, Stanford, Hawaii, Illinois. All of these places have a history of this going back a number of years. When we look at what is happening locally, the SUNY Network which has through Sloan funding been active for a number of years. They have about 250 courses on-line, asynchronously available, collaborative effort by a number of the SUNY institutions. We’ve got the proprietary schools and institutions, you’ve got Berkeley, Columbia. Some of the smaller schools like Mercy. The big schools in the private sector like The New School, NYU, Pace. WNET is interesting. They’ve become involved with in-service training of teachers. They have put together an on-line course. The NY Institute of Technology is very interested in this, very actively involved.

What are we doing here at CUNY? At Hunter College, in the Administration and Supervision program, we’ve got a master’s program in education, twice funded by Sloan. In fact, two 1999 graduates will have completed 60% of their course work on-line. Students from the School of Education from the University of Linz in Austria regularly participate in exchange units of these courses. Offering an international perspective on issues of educational administration and supervision. City College is now very actively involved through their Continuing Education area. That’s their on-line course catalog offering. They are using it to teach writing and other courses asynchronously. That’s their catalog. Back at Hunter College they are offering synchronous instruction at the two video conference facilities that they operate. One on its main campus and another located at their School of Social Work, that’s 79th Street. And they are offering some courses with the City of New York in terms of an interaction with the Social Services Agency.

At Queens College, the Graduate School of Library and Information Sciences is committed to convert their entire master’s degree program to a synchronous delivery mode. They are well on their way to at least begin that. At Lehman College, John Jay, BMCC, and Hostos, they are involved in The Hispanic Educational Telecommunications System. That is a satellite based coalition of colleges from the Southwest, New York area, and the Caribbean. Sharing educational programming among its participating members in real time using satellite technology. At Brooklyn College, they have recently opened a library cafe. It is an Internet based study center, open late nights and on weekends. It provides students with extended access to the distributive learning opportunities offered by the college, in its many web based curriculum initiatives.

Where are we now in terms of distance learning readiness in terms of CUNY? We’ve got a number of networking infrastructure and digital library initiatives in progress. We’re looking at distributive learning resources under construction. We’ve got a CUNY media distribution system which is now in its final installation to include all of the CUNY schools. We’ve got a new Sloan funded initiative which is called CUNY On-Line which is beginning this Spring semester. CUNY Math, and the CUNY Write Site, two examples of the kinds of network based resources that can serve our students as they progress through discipline based study at the University. Math and writing, two highly organized discipline communities within the University, are really pioneers in this kind of on-line instructional materials development. Faculty have been involved in these efforts for the past two years. The Write Site in particular -- workbook, textbook materials, software programs -- to which our nationally renowned writing faculty hold copyright, are being put up on the site. The site will also become the electronic repository of the University’s Journal of Basic Writing, in continuous publication since the early 1970's. I see George Otte in the audience. He is the faculty member primarily in charge of this development.

A number of the students enrolled in the University’s Ph.D. program in English are heavily involved in the design of exercises and documents. Also in the design, delivery, and the electronic tutoring program. That is really a critical part of this Write Site. Writing across curriculum area, plus a new edition to the already existing ESL corner, will be introduced this year. This is an example of one of the exercises incorporated (reference to slide). It is called, "Watch Your S." Obviously an interesting part of this. This has achieved some very interesting acclaim. Bob Maurer, who is the head of the Higher Education Services Commission for the State of New York, asked the Deputy Chancellor when she was up last week with Les Jacobs when can we begin to incorporate the Write Site in what the Higher Education Services Commission is looking towards as the primary web site for New York State.

The media distribution system is a platform for synchronous teaching, research, and staff training, real time event resource sharing. It was and continues to be funded by a State Capital Budget for the Educational Technology Initiative. It started at fourteen CUNY schools, and has been in place since Spring of 1999. Beginning this Spring we are installingg the final tier. It has been used in undergraduate courses in German between Hunter and Brooklyn College. We’ve got a slide of that I think. It’s been used in courses in biochemistry and psychology, undergraduate courses in engineering and nursing, as well as the delivery of faculty training and development. It’s also been used as a vehicle for delivery of scholarly conferences such as the April 1998 Renaissance Shakespeare Conference between the Graduate Center, 57th Street, Brooklyn College, and the University of Pennsylvania. It’s also been used at a Literature Conference held between CUNY and the University of London. On the second slide down at the bottom is a caption for one of our series of conferences held at 57th Street, between the New York City Board of Education High School Superintendents and their colleagues from the Ministry of Education in Vienna, Austria. It was held during the Spring 1997 semester using high speed international ISDN lines.

Finally, the CUNY On-line Learning Network, recently funded by the Sloan Foundation to the tune of $300,000 in its first year. It was designed in its first year to field 25 courses through a variety of disciplines which represent the offerings of the University. It involves eight CUNY colleges, expanded to ten with a buy in of the additional two colleges which wanted to become involved. They are funding their involvement on their own.

So we are beginning. We are looking to form a focus. This is a very interesting area. As you know, there is a new committee that was set up by virtue of the last contract negotiation between the union and the University. The first thing that committee was able to do was to get the Delegate Assembly of the Professional Staff Congress to lift their December 1997 ban on distance learning and to declare a two-year experimental period, during which the colleges are encouraged to let experimentation occur, to document what the best is of what is occurring. And to profit from that as a University. And to have us to become informed as to where we want to go in that regard.

It’s a very interesting time, as you are well aware. You have become leaders in telling us how far behind we were. It’s been encouraging to work with you in trying to respond to that in moving us further ahead. I represent someone who has been around for a long time. When the Chancellor first came on board he asked me what happened in 1994 when the Faculty Senate held a conference in December to talk about technology, was there anything worthwhile that came about as a result of that? And I said, there is something that came about as a result of something that we live with on an everyday basis, called CUNY-TALK. I still believe in the virtue of that, the virtue of discussion. I think that this is a very worthwhile venture. I thank you for your support.

We were recognized by PC Week. They claim, that of the educational institutions in the country, we were number four in terms of our innovative use of technology. When they looked at the 100 public sector, not only education, but government, we were number six. We ranked ahead of a number of institutions. It was interesting. Marsha got a press release SUNY, saying that they were number seven, and weren’t they great. We pointed out, when you looked at the 100, they were number 36, while we were still number 6. It’s nice to know that somebody cares. We know you care and thank you for it. Bernie assured me that I would be set up for questions.

Professor Savage (Sociology, Queens College) - "Actually, in the document that has been handed around, talking about shifting away from CUNY+ to a new kind of system. You say you have heard talks by vendors of 7-12 systems and you narrowed it down to 5-6. What is the status of that? And maybe this is a question for Marsha. Marsha, where can we go on-line to look at some university that is using one of these systems that you are considering, so that we can see or get an idea of what it might be able to do. I am looking forward to it with great enthusiasm." / Dean Ribaudo - That’s a great question. What I’ve asked the librarians to do is to lay back a little bit and to go out and look. You are welcome to look with them. What’s happening, of course, they are looking on-line on the web. The performance that they are seeing based on the Internet interaction is not what they would see if they were actually at that campus. We’ve cautioned them, because it is such a big decision to form teams and go out and actually visit these places where the implementations have actually occurred. What we are also trying to do based on the sort of ambiguity, is where the money is at the moment. We are trying to commit to the network infrastructure upgrades first. It doesn’t hurt, if we replace the SNA with TCP/IP, replace the 3270 view of the world with a more structured web view of the world. You can look at the existing Notice catalog from the web pack implementation that we are now currently providing. You can access the existing data bases that we’ve either licensed or are trialing that require that kind of conductivity. Marsha would be happy to include the faculty as she always is, in going out to visit these implementations where these systems are already installed. We think we will scale to a system of our size.

Professor Alan Cooper (English, York College) - "Of course you spoke too fast for anybody to take notes. That was a wonderful presentation. Do you have some hard copy of your presentation that I can study?" / Dean Ribaudo - Absolutely. We only went so fast because the Chancellor went so long. / Professor Cooper - "How can I get it?" / Dean Ribaudo - We’ll send it to you. / Chair Sohmer - We’ll distribute it with the Minutes. / Dean Ribaudo - We could put it on-line. The slides are not that informative without the background. But if you want them. The interesting thing is that, since we control the CUNY web site, we can put anything on it. / Professor Cooper - "We can find it on the web site shortly?" / Dean Ribaudo - Yes, we’ll put it on the web site, Alan.

Professor Crain (Psychology, City College of New York) - "Just a statement. I have the deepest reservations about a lot of the sources that are pouring the money into this. Particularly interactive TV distance learning. I’ve experienced it, I’ve watched, I’ve looked at it. I find it a terribly impersonal kind of learning. I’m afraid it will start replacing the face to face interaction of the classroom, the more human interaction that is so valuable to us and our students. I know it’s going to. The question is, if we can stop it. I say, this is a runaway freight train and huge financial corporate interests are behind it. They are going to pour money into it; they are going to give us grants and all kinds of money to implement things we aren’t going to be able to resist. The question is, will we ever be able to draw a line? That’s the question. I’m not posing it to you, I’m just posing it. That’s going to be the question as I see it." / Dean Ribaudo - I have the ultimate respect for the CUNY faculty. As you know, when I was an undergraduate at City College as a psychology major, I took most of my courses with you. That was a long time ago. I don’t see this at all as replacing faculty. I see this as an option that faculty can choose to employ if they wish to. To augment what they otherwise would like to do. I will tell you from the start, if we ever face an administration where the options are not that, I will leave.

Professor Reid (Math, BMCC) - "Do you have available for distribution a report that gives the relative status of the different campuses along with a projected completion date of when they will be brought up to what you consider speed?" / Dean Ribaudo - There are a lot of variables that constitute speed. / Professor Reid - "I would just be interested in seeing how that works out at different campuses. What the plans are for the individual campuses." / Dean Ribaudo - The campuses are at very different positions on a number of different indices. In fact, when we got the money to do the network infrastructure initiative from the State, the first thing we did was to contract with an outside consulting firm to go out and do a recognizance of where the colleges fit. That was with networking infrastructure. Based on that, and based on an assessment of the colleges’ readiness to move forward, that’s how we decided to allocate the first year’s money. We continue to work with the presidents, the vice presidents, and the people involved in the technological areas to further that end. You’re asking a very difficult question. Because it is not only a question of technology infrastructure, it is a question of faculty orientation and their willingness to engage themselves in this kind of effort. It is a question of the administrations’ degree of embracing this as an effort that they want to get behind. I can give you a subjective estimate as to where I would think each college ranked in their technology readiness, but that would be misleading and subject to anybody else’s disagreement.

Professor McCall (English, Baruch College) - "I like technology and I think it’s wonderful, and I think it is going to take us to new worlds that we haven’t been able to dream of. But, at times like this, I’m happy that I’m closer to retirement than coming into the profession. Because I really think this has profound ramifications for our younger colleagues. I’m just wondering if you have a committee, or somebody at 80th Street, someone somewhere, perhaps it’s the Faculty Senate that needs to do this, which is thinking of what the ramifications are going to be for new scholars. And what some of the other problems are going to be for faculty when they are confronted with this technology. I do believe they are going to have to use the technology in their teaching." / Dean Ribaudo - It’s a very good question and one that you’ve raised before. I think that there are a number of things that are going on that address your concerns, but I don’t think adequately. Two or three years ago, if I was asked to assess where we would be in this regard two or three years hence, I would have thought that we would have been a lot further along. And we are not. We haven’t begun to address the major issues that these technologies entail. We haven’t addressed things like work load, ownership, what our audience is. Do we want to augment traditional classroom instruction. Do we want to go about recruiting totally different populations that we can serve? We’ve not done that, and I think that is a failing on part of the University. Whether or not it is the function of the individual colleges to define their own roles in that respect. Whether the University should take an overarching role in getting involved in those discussions. I’ve been disappointed in that there hasn’t been very much movement. Your questions become more legitimate as we move further on. I have no answer.

Professor Marshall (English, Queens College) - "I’d like to pass on a question to you actually that was posed to me by my students in a cyber composition class, especially seeing CUNY as number four in the country. When will students have access to web space to be able to design their own web pages with enough capacity to design non-linear, hyper textual assignments on those web pages, for our courses, as an alternative to standard research paper format?" / Dean Ribaudo - That’s a very interesting question. I think we are really at a crux in terms of where we’ve defined the responsibility through Central Computing responsibilities. What we are doing now is taking responsibility for providing the colleges with the ability to get out of providing administrative functions. We’ve migrated most of the colleges away from their own local base main frames in favor of processing centrally. We provided them with integrated voice response technology for voice registration. We intend to move that to web based registration. Where the college then takes responsibility and where the college presidents and vice presidents have to step up to the plate, is the responsibilities for the kinds of things you are suggesting. I know your college in the last few years was the hallmark of that. Unfortunately some personnel changes mitigated that continuing in the direction I thought would become really the halcyon for that. In terms of providing local based web resources for students in terms of universal ubiquitous e-mail. In terms of faculty for the ability to mount web based resources for all their courses and to integrate that. I think that’s the direction in which we’d like to see people move. What’s interesting is, people ask, how can we be proponents of this sort of distance education, distributed learning, when we deal with a population that is so underprivileged. Our Institutional Research for a number of years has sent out questionnaires to representative samples of the student population. In the early 1990's, they began to ask the question, how many students have access to computers at home, with modems that would enable them to access remote resources. That was before the Internet became a buzz word. In the early 1990's, about 25% of our senior college students responded in the affirmative to those kinds of questions. In the mid 1990's when that was repeated, about 45% responded in the affirmative. They are about to issue a similar questionnaire this Spring. I would submit that the number will jump to 65-70%. Which I think is astounding, given what the conventional folk wisdom is about our students and what they have access to. A vendor we met with today asked me, how is that the case? I said, everybody is doing everything they can do to get access to these services. Whether it’s cannibalizing old machines. Taking advantage of the ubiquitous nature of resources like America On-Line. It’s just unbelievable. We try and make available opportunities that we can pitch centrally that will benefit the colleges. For a number of years, we put in our budget requests this proposal that the Governor and the Legislature underwrite a program whereby we provide access to computers to students at home. It has never fared very well. We’ve been successful in the last couple of years in convincing the Governor and to some extent the Mayor, in the fact that the capital budget represents a viable place for funding technology. The extent to which we can do that and build up the infrastructure on campus, we provide an opportunity that doesn’t exist, and we will continue with that.

Professor Young (English, Borough of Manhattan Community College) - "I’ve seen articles in the Chronicle of Higher Education concerning controversies that are springing up at major private universities, about the very point you mentioned about ownership of courses that are taught on-line. Universities are claiming all rights to those courses as in fact major journalistic outlets are claiming electronic rights to articles that people write for magazines and newspapers and so on. Can you comment about the whole issue of remuneration of how professors will own the work they do on line. Or whether the University will claim ownership of these things." / Dean Ribaudo - This is a very thorny issue. There are a couple of things going on. There is a joint PSC/University Committee looking at that. There is a new committee that’s been formed by the Interim Vice Chancellor for Legal Affairs, to look at the copyright and patents. There is work by Dr. Halpern and Dr. Jacobson at the Research Foundation, also focused on this effort. There is work by notable people at the colleges who are trying to look at the existing copyright law to try and interpret what it actually means. There are different provisions that people cite. They work for higher provision, which is different from what governs the traditional text book. I remember back in the early 1980's, there was an effort at UCLA among the English Department which led to something really very exciting and creative. It was the English Department’s own attempt to write their own word processing programs, sensitive to the nature of students. Sensitive to the nature of writing professionals. They came out with something called WANDA. It was a wonderful thing. Everybody in the writing profession embraced it. They said, this is really where we are going to go. About three months after that, people were called and said that the University of California’s patent attorneys called the English Department at UCLA, and they locked the file cabinet that contained the source code for WANDA. They said, this is not yours, it is ours, this is work for hire. They later took that and they sold it to Harcourt as a JBJ Writer or something. / Professor Young - "I think this is a pretty essential question, and it is a very difficult one." / Dean Ribaudo - It’s a question that has been around for the past 25 years and really hasn’t been resolved. / Professor Young - "I can see why the union rejected distance learning." / Dean Ribaudo - The union is embracing distance learning. / Professor Young - "Now."