Thanks to the efforts of our new Faculty Correspondent, Aaron Ramcharan, the Quest will bring you coverage of the faculty’s monthly meetings this semester.
CAC Work on Campus Smoking Policy
Professor of English and Humanities Laura Leibman spoke as chair of the Community Affairs Community (CAC) about the current policy being worked on with regards to smoking on campus. She outlined four main steps that the CAC planned to follow (these were also outlined at the Tuesday, February 4 forum on smoking). First, the CAC intends to get feedback from the community, which they have begun to do by starting a smoking discussion blog and hosting the Tuesday forum. Second, the CAC plans to work closely with Senate. Leibman noted that two student senators are members of the writing group, and that the writing group meets weekly to keep the process moving. Third, Leibman said that the CAC aims to continue to be as transparent as possible by providing consistent updates to faculty, staff, and students. Lastly, Leibman emphasized that an aggressive timeline is necessary. Leibman said the CAC plans to submit a policy to Senate by Friday, February 14, so that Senate can vote on the policy the following week. She mentioned that the CAC and writing group are attempting to treat both the right to smoke and the right to avoid secondhand smoke as equal rights.
Title IX Update
Vice President and Treasurer Ed McFarlane spoke on the topic of potential review to the Discriminatory Harassment and Sexual Misconduct policy and a new Title IX complaint. He mentioned that some new legislation has been passed that may require some edits to the newly implemented DHSM policy. He was unsure of the extent of the changes that may be required, but mentioned that some definitions may need to be changed or added.
McFarlane also told the faculty about a second, recent Title IX incident, but that both this new incident and the Humanities lecture claim from the beginning of the year have been resolved through informal mediation to the satisfaction of the involved parties. McFarlane reminded the faculty that they are all mandatory reporters of incidents that fall under the jurisdiction of the DHSM.
President’s Report on Admissions
President John Kroger gave an update on admissions information for the coming 2014-2015 year. This year, Reed had 3943 applications, up from 2890 last year, which is roughly 500 more applicants than Reed’s best year ever. The average SAT score is 1345, up from 1339 last year. Diversity is also increasing, with African American applicants up 43 percent, Asian applicants up 49 percent, Hispanic applicants up 54 percent, Native American applicants up 52 percent. The number of students not applying for financial aid, as a rough percentage, is 22 percent, consistent with previous years. Kroger noted that yield may be more difficult this year, as Admissions has to figure out how to best draw their best applicants without going over or under the target class of 355 freshman students.
Keith Todd, Dean of Admissions, spoke to the faculty about sending emails and phone calls to desirable applicants in order to tip their interest in Reed. Todd solicited volunteers from the faculty to be given a few students that have expressed demonstrated aptitude in the major-field of the faculty member.
Dean’s Report
Nigel Nicholson, Dean of the Faculty, spoke on a few topics. He said that the preliminary reports for the Strategic Planning committees have been compiled. Nicholson also mentioned that Kathryn Olson, Professor of Psychology, has been chosen as the new director for the teaching center, a place for faculty to work on their teaching skills and materials, and that Greywood is being renovated to better suit the needs of the teaching center. Nicholson noted that our faculty student ratio is now nine-to-one, because Reed has changed how it calculates the ratio. Before the change, Reed, unlike other institutions, counted students abroad and did not count faculty on sabbatical, and this previous method of calculation was responsible for the old ten-to-one-ratio.
Changes to the Faculty Code
The faculty approved three changes to the Faculty Code. The first change moves the due date for incomplete work from the first day of the next semester to ten days before the start of the next semester. The change also requires that professors grade the work by the first day of the next semester. The second change alters the language in the Faculty Code so that the Code no longer attempts to define exactly what a thesis is. The language was from 1913 and made it difficult for seniors petitioning for an irregular senior year. The last change makes any two economics courses count for the Group B distribution requirement, though the Registrar’s Office has been advertising this as a possibility at least since August, 2013.