Faculty Senate minutes March 4 meeting

TO THE MEMBERS OF
THE ACADEMIC COUNCIL
THIRTY-SIXTH SENATE
Report No. 8

SUMMARY OF ACTIONS, MAR. 4

At its meeting on Thursday, March 4, 2004, the Thirty-sixth Senate of the Academic Council heard reports and took the following actions:

Upon recommendation of the Committee on Graduate Studies, the Thirty-sixth Senate by voice vote, unanimously passed the following:

1. The School of Medicine will be allowed to change the Fall quarter start date for first- and second-year students to September 2nd, 2004 and to analogous dates in future years, approximately three weeks prior to the beginning of classes for other students on campus.

EDWARD D. HARRIS, JR., M.D.

Academic Secretary to the University

MINUTES, MAR. 4

I. Call to Order

Chairman Wasow banged the gavel, and noted somewhat wistfully that "This is the last meeting of the winter term in 2004." He realized that each Senator wished that there could be a meeting of the Senate every fortnight throughout the full calendar year, but that the Academic Secretary's budgetary restrictions made this impossible.

II. Approval of Minutes

The minutes of the February 19, 2004 meeting were approved without additions, deletions, or changes, and can be found on-line at http://facultysenate.stanford.edu.

III. Action Calendar

This was empty.

IV. Standing Reports

Wasow noted that two memorial resolutions would be presented today. "I am pleased to welcome Professor J. Martin Brown, Professor of Radiation Oncology, to present a memorial resolution on behalf of Robert Kallman. The full Memorial Resolution will be included in Senate packets and published in next week's Stanford Senate Report."

Memorial Resolution

Professor Brown began. "Thank you very much. This is a Memorial Resolution on behalf of Professor Robert F. Kallman (1922-2003) former Director of the Division of Radiobiology in the Department of Radiation Oncology, and Director of the Interdepartmental Program in Cancer Biology. He was professor emeritus since his retirement in 1992, and he died on August 8th, 2003 at the age of 81.

Robert Kallman was a nationally and internationally renowned and respected researcher who focused upon the effects of radiation on tumors in normal tissues. He served as Director of the Division of Radiobiology from 1959 to the 1984. He is also the Founder and first Director of the Interdepartmental Graduate Program in Intensive Biology from 1978 to 1984. Under Kallman's leadership the Division of Radiobiology grew to its present world-renowned stature. The graduate program he founded in Cancer Biology has also become one of Stanford's major interdepartmental graduate programs, training several hundred scientists as well as providing needed graduate students for many of the needed laboratories at Stanford Medical Center, particularly those in clinical departments.

Mr. Chairman, it is an honor on behalf of the Committee, consisting of Professors Malcolm Bagshaw, Henry Jones, and Martin Brown to lay before the Senate of the Academic Council a Resolution in Memory of the late Robert F. Kallman, Ph.D. Professor of Radiation Oncology at Stanford University."

Chairman Wasow invited the Senate to stand for a moment of silence. He thanked Professor Brown and welcomed "Kenneth Arrow, the Joan Kenney Professor of Economics and Professor of Operations Research, emeritus. It is notable that Professor Arrow is a former Senate Chair. He will present a memorial statement in honor of Professor Tibor Scitovsky (1910 -- 2002). The full resolution was included in packets and will be published in next week's Stanford Report."

Professor Arrow said, "Members of the Senate....Tibor Scitovsky died June 1, 2002 at the age of 91. He was a Professor of Economics at Stanford from 1946 to 1958; and again, from 1970 to 1976. He was very influential in the early years of the department and received many honors for his scholarly accomplishments. Scitovsky worked in many fields of economics, including welfare economics, international trade, competition, and the analysis of happiness and its relationship to economic welfare. His excellence was recognized worldwide, and he had great influence on both scholarly research and economic policy.

Mr. Chairman, it is an honor on behalf of the Committee consisting of Michael Boskin, Melvin W. Reder, and myself, to lay before the Senate Academic Council a Resolution in Memory of the late Tibor Scitovsky."

The Senate stood for a moment of silence, and the Chair thanked Professor Arrow and his committee.

Steering Committee.

Tom Wasow noted that, "...the Senate meeting scheduled for April Fool's Day is cancelled. Our first Spring quarter meeting will be held on April 15th, when Dean Sullivan of the Law School will present a report during our short meeting prior to the annual meeting of the Academic Council to be held this year in the Cubberley auditorium. Please mark your calendars and note the change of venue from past years. On April 29, following our regular session, the Senate will meet in executive session.

"All faculty members are now receiving ballots for Senate elections. In addition, faculty in three groups, the Humanities, Social Sciences, and a third group combining Earth Sciences, SLAC, Special Administration, and Basic Sciences in Medicine are also nominating candidates for the Advisory Board. This is the beginning of the Spring elections process for terms beginning in the fall of this year. As you know, these first-round elections will be followed by an Advisory Board election in which all faculty in the University may vote. Subsequently the Steering Committee for Senate thirty-seven will be elected by the new Senate, and this small group will name the new senate chair." Wasow strongly urged "...all members of the senate and all members of the faculty to exercise their right to vote! Our participation strengthens the Stanford faculty governance system."

Committee on Committees.

Professor Arnetha Ball, chair of CoC announced that "...the CoC met last week and finalized the task of identifying faculty members to fill the vacancies on the various Academic Council committees, and we have submitted that list to the Academic Secretary, who will contact those individuals to fill the committee rosters for the 2004/2005 academic school year. At our next meeting we'll be moving on to selecting candidates for University committees."

Reports from the President and the Provost.

President Hennessy appeared to be in a fugue state. He had no report but was heard to mutter the mantra, "Easy victory, perfect season...easy victory, perfect season." Everyone appreciated this extra boost for the Cardinal men's basketball team, and applauded the Pac-10 championship for the women's team and the #1 baseball team as well. [As we know...we lost to Washington ... but it was a great year for the men, and perhaps (the view that I share) the loss will slingshot them into the NCAA tournament!]

Provost Etchemendy began with Winter Close. "Tomorrow we are going to make an official announcement that the two-week Winter Close, that is the closing down of buildings and programs as much as possible during both the week that begins on Christmas and the week that begins on New Year's day, will be made permanent features of the winter calendar. There are a number of reasons for this. One is the savings in energy that we accrue, over $300,000 last year. Another is related to the tremendous amount of positive feedback sent to us about the Close. Many faculty and staff said that it was pleasantly unlike a normal two-week vacation because activities actually stopped while one was away instead of just accumulating on the desk and computer and 'In-box.' This was an unexpected positive benefit for staff in particular, but also for faculty, and, we believe, worth continuing. We realize that there are offices and programs that cannot close down during that period or part of it. Thus, the final decisions, as this year will be left to the relevant Dean, Vice President, or Vice Provost.

"In 2004, as in 2003, we will add two 'additional days off' into the mix, one in each week. That will permit staff to take only five days of vacation in order to have the two weeks free, given that there are already a number of holidays during those two weeks. In 2005, one of those two days will become a permanent part of the holiday period, making it necessary to have only one 'additional day off' during that period after the end of this year.

"The second announcement is a related announcement about energy savings. During the last year, schools and administrative units have all been receiving reports tracking their energy use building by building. We've been keeping track of the baseline energy use, and beginning next month charges will appear on expenditure statements for that energy use. During the next six months, if you save energy from this baseline, we will provide you with money representing that energy saved. During the same six months, if you use more energy than the baseline, you will not be penalized. However, beginning in September the system decrees that if you save energy you will collect extra general funds representing energy saved, but if you if you use more energy than baseline, you will be charged for it. So...turn off those lights!"

There were no questions for the Provost, and he then asked Professor Debra Satz to make an announcement. Professor Satz said, "I want with enormous sadness to share with the Senate the death yesterday of Susan Okin, the Weeks Professor of Ethics in Society. She was Professor of Political Science and, by courtesy, Professor in the Interdisciplinary Program of Ethics in Society. On a day when we are discussing the report on the Status of Women it is important to acknowledge that she had in the forefront of her life and work a strong concern for the standing of women, both at Stanford and in the field of political philosophy which she single-handedly transformed into a field that can no longer ignore issues of gender. We will find a way in the near future to commemorate and celebrate her life and her work. Today I simply want to share her loss to all of us. Thank you." The Senate was shocked, and silent.

Open Forum.

No hand was raised.

V. Other Reports

1. Committee on Graduate Studies: Recommendation for change in the School of Medicine's Academic Calendar year (SenD#5554).

Professor Wasow introduced the recurrent visitor to the Senate, Professor James Baron (chair of C-GS) as "our youthful friend," as well as noting that Senior Associate Dean Julie Parsonnet and Associate Dean Neil Gesundheit, both from the Medical School, were in attendance. Dean Pizzo was away from the campus.

After receiving clarification that seeming youthful did not connote being immature, Professor Baron began, amidst laughter. "The Medical School came to C-GS asking, among other things, for the change to their calendar that is summarized in the memo that you have. The rationale is that the Medical School is hard pressed to cover the curriculum, and with recent additions to the curriculum, and the fact that the school has a shorter academic calendar than its peer institutions, the argument for starting early seemed quite compelling.

"The proposal pertains only to first- and second-year students in the M.D. program, and is with the understanding that few if any students from other graduate programs would ever be eligible to take the courses offered during this early three-week period. Therefore, the Committee on Graduate Studies recommends that the School of Medicine be allowed to change the beginning of Autumn quarter for first- and second-year students to September 2, 2004, and to analogous dates in the future, approximately three weeks ahead of the main campus."

Dean Parsonnet added a few comments about the curriculum itself. "We're doing some exciting things in the curriculum of the Medical School. We are in a ten-year process of assessing the curriculum and planning how to change it to meet with the changing needs of academic medicine. The science and teaching of medicine, as you all know, is changing dramatically. We have difficulties both with identifying people to teach that which we must teach, as well as determining exactly what we need to teach, what the students need to know, and how to deliver that information. There are three themes to the new curriculum. One is the integration of basic science courses and fitting clinical practice into this knowledge base. I estimate that fully half of our faculty have been involved in this process.

"A second theme has been 'decompression.' Our students in prior years have had up to 27 hours in required classroom time per week listening to didactic lectures. If they add on two electives they are sitting up to 30 hours in class per week, learning passively. To decompress things we are trying very hard to identify areas of synergy to avoid overlap presentation of the same information in different classes and therefore avoiding redundancy, using hours better, and employing the best learning techniques. By extending the year there isn't so much time in class each week. Students will have more time to think, study and integrate the material.

"The third theme of the new curriculum is the addition of 'Concentrations' analogous to small majors in the undergraduate setting. We believe that the strength of the Stanford Medical School is scholarship and our research. We also feel that the Medical School can't become just a 'trade school' where students learn in a very superficial reactive way. That is not the way to learn medicine. Therefore, we have made it a requirement that our students learn a focused field in depth, rather than skimming over the surface of molecular science, pathology, physiology and pharmacology. We want them to devote themselves to a specific field and to make scholarly inquiries in that field before they graduate. One obvious pathway for this is for students to take an extra year to do that research, and many do. Now, I want Dr. Gesundheit to provide some details about the changes that will affect all students during the first two years.

Professor Gesundheit said, "I want to emphasize the point that interdisciplinary courses open to graduate students would be given in either the Spring or the Winter quarters when our calendar would be identical to the other graduate schools. The only quarter we are proposing to change is the fall quarter. Each of the courses at the Medical School that begin early will be those that involve M.D. students only, such as Gross Anatomy and The Practice of Medicine, which teaches physical diagnosis, history taking, and other clinical skills."

Questions and Discussion.

Dr. Parsonnet reassured Professor Palumbo-Liu that if there indeed were the rare graduate students who wanted to have some intensive exposure to, for example, Molecular Foundations of Medicine (i.e., molecular biology) or histology that would be offered in the first three weeks, they could view videotapes that are prepared at each lecture.

Professor Simoni wondered how "...adding six weeks to a four-year curriculum could have a very substantial impact on filling the knowledge gap, and whether, in fact, will it not be necessary to extend it your calendar even more?" Dean Parsonnet said, "I guess we'll see. So far this year, it has been great. I should point out that the six weeks extra over two years is about equal to what we're expecting for the didactic component within the scholarly concentrations."

Chairman Wasow then called the question. By unanimous vote, it was approved that:

The School of Medicine will be allowed to change the Fall quarter start date for first- and second-year students to September 2nd, 2004 and to analogous dates in future years, approximately three weeks prior to the beginning of classes for other students on campus.

2. Report from the Vice Provost for Student Affairs, Gene Awakuni (SenD#5557)

Professor Wasow noted that "Reporting with Vice Provost Awakuni are the Chair of the Graduate Student Council, Steve Allison, and ASSU President, Nadiya Figueroa." Dean Awakuni spoke first, with the plan being to limit formal discussion for all three to twenty minutes so that there would be ample time for discussion.

Dean Awakuni began by acknowledging some of the standing guests that were related to his presentation, including Registrar Roger Printup, Shirley Everett, Nadeem Siddiqui, Julie Lythcott-Haims, (Dean of Freshman and Transfer Students) Chris Griffith (Associate Dean for Student Life), and Ira Friedman (Director of Health Services at Vaden). He was very pleased also to introduce (for his first time in the Senate) Dean Greg Boardman, Dean of Students, "...who joined us about a month ago from Tulane University.

"The reason that we are presenting this joint report is because one of the things that I was told early on in my tenure at Stanford was that it is the perception of the students that there is a gulf between what we in Student Affairs and the administration were doing and what the students felt that they wanted. They wanted more of a 'say' in policy decision-making processes.

"When I arrived about two years ago, students and staff from the Dean of Students' office took me on a tour of student's activity space on the campus. What they showed me was in bad need of repair and clearly sub-standard. I will talk about the evolving Student Activities and Services Space Projects. Second, I want to talk about the Student Service Enhancements. From focus groups we found that students were concerned about what they perceived as the 'bouncing' that occurred from one administrative office to another. Third, is our attempt to increase collaboration with students in all ways."

Dean Awakuni has just recently presented the Student Activity Space Master Plan to the Provost for his consideration. It has three principal components and emphases. First is the conclusion that the "campus center" is the right site for the focus of student activities, and that this should be expanded beyond and around White Plaza, stretching from the Bookstore to beyond Kingscote on one axis, and from the Old Union through to beyond Tresidder on the other. The second is improving the mix of activities and conditions of the buildings. The third, and following both, is the belief that if the campus center could be revitalized as a core for student activities, student life would be energized. Part of the plan is to restore Old Union to its original use as a gathering place for students, a "living room" for the entire campus.

Awakuni talked about building and space projects that had been accomplished in recent years, placing special emphasis on Career Development Center, Office of Accessible Education, the Nitery, Tresidder (phase 1), and Vaden Health Center. He showed "before" and "after" pictures of dining/food service areas in Tresidder that have become much more appealing and user-friendly. Another project moving at "warp speed" is the Graduate Community Center project, developed by students and staff which should be ready within the year. Fund raising is underway to finance the Black House which would add 2500 nsf.

Dean Awakuni was pleased with progress in "...improving the internal communication and collaboration between the offices, primarily on the administrative services side (e.g., the Financial Services Office, Financial Aid, and the Registrar's office). Roger has 'pushed' communication out to students through Axess and e-mail." Other "cosmetic" changes have made a positive impact. These include the "look and feel" of the term bill, availability of online payment, facilitating the process to allow students to waive health insurance online, and the availability of a regional HELP desk for maintenance service that is available 24/7. A "virtual" one-stop service help center is being implemented. As examples of increased collaborative projects around campus with students, Awakuni pointed to the ISIS calendaring system, which has been a "phenomenal success," and Blender, a program to provide expertise to students who want to start up a project or a business. This is located in the Nitery. "Absolute Fun," alcohol-free alternative social events have been very popular.

Students have also been proactive in policy review, with plans to be proactive instead of just reactive to events such as "Full Moon on the Quad" and the "Exotic Erotic Ball." Students have helped get the word out about Stanford's stance on alcohol through prevention and education. Students have helped design "The array of food offerings that you see at Tresidder; they are taste-testing the food items and giving critiques about pricing and so on."

The Dean turned over the floor to Steve Allison, the Graduate Student Council chair who "Absolutely!..." agreed to keep his remarks short (and did so, nicely). He emphasized that collaborative efforts can really improve academic performance in the classroom and research as well as in space planning and student service. He pointed out "...the graduate student population has been changing dramatically over time." Housing units have increased from ~1850 in 1978 to more than 4000 in 2004. The percent of minority students has increased from ~10% in 1980 to 22% in 1998, although there has been a slight decrease from that level in the 21st century. Women represent more than 35% of graduate students. One third of all graduate programs are interdisciplinary programs at present.

Allison moved from statistics to the new challenges that are arising: Child care, social interactions and sharing of cultures, and the task of preparing graduate students for diverse and interdisciplinary careers. He then raised the question, "When should academics have families?" He summarized a study at Berkeley of 160,000 people who are earning their Ph.D.s. "What that study showed is that women who have families during the first five years of their faculty appointments are 56 percent likely to earn tenure. In contrast, men whose spouses have children in that same time are 77 percent likely to get tenure. This is a major discrepancy that we're worried about. The problem with having children after the tenure process has been completed is that it's biologically risky. But here at Stanford there is not a lot of financial support for graduate students with families. We're trying to generate some more support for students with families so they have the options of having a family earlier than later in careers when it appears to be quite detrimental, especially for women with families. We are calling on Stanford to be a leader in this arena to stand up and make some progress so that women, especially, have more opportunities to make these choices that may affect their careers significantly.

"Second, we're calling on the faculty to provide support and recognition for the Student Affairs Office and all of its efforts to improve the graduate community. We also call on you to support cultural and social activities directly through your departments and schools. Finally, we are hoping to see bigger improvements in career services that address the interdisciplinary careers that students are entering into, as well as providing more career services at the program and departmental level. In summary, we are calling on the Senate to act through its normal mechanisms of establishing policies, acting on resolutions, forming committees, and using its influence at the University to try to address these issues that we are interested in. Thank you for your time."

ASSU President Figueroa spoke last, and introduced a guest, ASSU Vice President Joey Natoli. "We want to highlight two undergraduate issues we thought were most relevant to the Faculty Senate, those being student cost of living and student/faculty relations.

Cost of living. "We are very, very proud of our diversity at Stanford. Accompanying racial and ethnic diversity is economic diversity; 60 % of our student body is on financial aid of some kind. In trying to advocate for lower costs of living on campus we do realize there are certain costs we cannot impact, such as tuition, which has increased about 11 percent over the last few years. But we suggest that 'nickel and dime issues' such as laundry, printing, books are a big problem. What can faculty do about the cost of books? We pay (per student) an average of about $1,200 per year for books. That is higher than our peer institutions. And, sadly, representatives of the bookstores tell us that publishers sell to the Stanford bookstore at a higher price because of socioeconomic brackets that Stanford students are perceived to be in. Students are being hurt because of the Palo Alto address.

"What can we do? As examples, we share articles instead of buying very expensive course readers through the bookstore. What faculty can do is to retain rights for their own articles so that students don't have to pay for those articles. It's very disturbing for the students when they are asked to pay for articles from their very own professors. High costs can lead to less learning and lower grades. Students come to class and haven't done the reading because they couldn't buy the book and other students got it on reserve at the library, or the book share scheme they worked out didn't work out the night before, and they didn't get to read the material. We want faculty to find ways to be very sensitive to this particular need."

Student-faculty Relations. "Why is this important, particularly for undergraduates? When students and parents do a lot of research they come to find time and time again that Stanford University does pay much attention to undergraduate education. Students come here because they want to interact with the amazing faculty. We also find that our academic success is dependent on how successfully we interact with faculty. We cannot declare a major without faculty supervision. We cannot embark on a research project without faculty supervision.

"I know I'm preaching to the choir. You are among the courageous few who do it all, serving on committees, the Faculty Senate, helping students with their research, and doing the advising. But there are relatively few faculty who go out of their way to mentor students to help them grow them in such a way that they will stay in touch with academia and go on to become the next generation of university faculty. This a special problem for students of color, for whom there are 12 students per faculty advisor of color, compared to two students for each white faculty member.

"We currently are involved in a group project, having conversations with hundreds of sophomores on what can done to improve advising. I have facilitated ten of these groups. Over and over we hear that the faculty 'do not want to hear from us.' Students feel shut out if they don't have a specific question that pertains to class. What can be done? We feel that there needs to be a higher value placed on advising and mentorship. There should be a creation of more and better-publicized opportunities to work with faculty. Also, we have to include commitment to and demonstrated effectiveness as advisors as criteria in departmental faculty hiring processes, and also in tenure promotion processes."

Before opening the floor for discussion, Chairman Wasow reminded the Senate that the new Faculty Director of Undergraduate Advising will be reporting to the Senate on May 13th, a guarantee that the issues raised by Ms. Figueroa would be discussed once more this year.

Questions and Discussion

The Senate was obviously impressed with the student presentations, their sincerity and concern for their peers. But Professor Andrea Goldsmith took issue with Mr. Allison's suggestions about family planning for academic faculties. She said, "While I really support women students having children, I very much object to the language in this report. First of all, I had two kids five years after getting my Ph.D., and I wouldn't describe that as 'damaging.' That is very negative language. I don't think that for women to have children as graduate students makes getting tenure easier. They still have to care for the children when they are a few years older, and they may want to have another child. I haven't read this study from Berkeley that you referred to, but I don't think that encouraging women to have children before Ph.D. or else 'all hope is lost' is appropriate."

Warming to the subject, she continued, "I also find it very presumptuous of you to suggest to women when the best times are to have children. There are a lot of factors that go into making those decisions. While I encourage the goal of supporting women to have children and still pursue academic careers, I don't think that you should make a stereotype of pre-tenure women having kids as you have in this report."

Bravely, Mr. Allison said, "Can I just respond to that?....I apologize for the language.... Right now, we're out of balance, forcing people to have families at a particular time."

Professor Ball asked, "I realize that the University of Michigan has funds available for child care allowances for students that have children and are going to school. Is that program available here at Stanford, so that individuals can have children and be helped with the cost of child care while they are studying here?"

On solid ground, Mr. Allison answered. "A comparable program doesn't really exist here for students. Public universities are more fortunate in that they have access to public funds for some of these programs. Stanford doesn't have access to those funds; that's one of the challenges." He assured the Senate that the GSC was working with "...the Provost and the University officials to try to accomplish that."

Professor Ball kept the floor. "I was wondering, Ms. Figueroa, it is possible to make public the programs that you have available to get faculty involved with mentoring students of color here at Stanford? I am not aware of too many. I get some e-mails every now and then, but it's usually a pre-fixed date that often does not fit my schedule." Ms. Figueroa answered. "Usually, through the community centers there are programs set up for specific ethnic/racial groups, and then also through LGBT and the Women's Center for those community groups. There's also been a new position created, a Special Assistant to the Vice Provost for Undergraduate Education for Diversity Outreach, Laura Selznick. Her office will also be trying to make those monitoring connections with faculty in general who are interested in mentoring and advising students.

Professor Palumbo-Liu spoke with gratitude. "I wanted to especially thank Nadiya Figueroa. I thought you did very good job of giving us very precise ways we can help you in these areas. I want to encourage both representatives to give us very precise practical advice that will be helpful in those particular areas. Yes!"

Professor Giudice, who runs a large fertility program at the Medical Center, had a question for Mr. Allison. "With regard to the data on the average age at which women get their Ph.D. at Stanford, do you recall what it is? The message I get from your talk is that when women hit 28 years old...it's over. Of course, they are not. But this is important. Do you have these data?" Mr. Allison had no data at this time.

3. Three Reports: Faculty Gains and Losses; Recruitment and Retention of Faculty; Status of Women Faculty (SenD#5550, 5551 and 5552).

Professor Wasow realized that there were many more questions for the three presenters brewing, but because of time limitations, he moved the Senate on to the next report. "We now have three interrelated reports which will be presented by our Senate colleague, Pat Jones, Vice Provost for Faculty Development. Senate documents 5550 and 5552 were distributed in your packet of materials for today's meetings. Senate document 5551, Faculty Recruitment and Retention, has been placed at your desk.

"The report on Status of Women Faculty was requested annually by prior Senate resolutions and the others are normally presented each year as well. Please welcome a number of guests for these reports, including the members of the Provost's Advisory Committee on the Status of Women Faculty, several members of the Faculty Women's Caucus, including Professor Penny Eckert and Professor Amy Ladd, members of the Women's Caucus Steering Committee, and members of the Provost Faculty Affairs staff who have toiled long and hard over the data in these reports. I hope you've all had a chance to read the reports you received ahead of time and to dig into the data, even though some of it is a bit dense! I understand Pat will not be speaking about all the tables and charts today, but you are welcome to ask questions about any of the material during the discussion period."

Professor Jones began by apologizing for the Steering Committee (of which she is a member) that "...doesn't appreciate data-intensive reports which, of course, runs very counter to my usual presentations as a scientist! So, what I've planned is a fifteen minute summary of the key findings of each of the reports. Then I will focus on the new material that we have placed at your desk. In addition, the report on our survey of factors affecting faculty Recruitment and Retention, had not been mailed to you. I will go over that briefly with you.

"I'd first like to thank members of the Provost's Faculty Affairs staff, particularly Jane Volk-Brew and Emily Chow, who not only maintain the FAAS, but also generate all of the reports that we're presenting today and many others as well. In addition, I would like to thank Rana Glasgal from the Office of Institutional Research and Decision Support, who has done the tenure cohort analysis, and Nicole Reed from my Office of Faculty Development, who has done the bulk of the work on the Survey of Factors Affecting Recruitment and Retention with, of course, a lot of help from departments and schools who provided the basic information."

Professor Jones began with her PowerPoint presentation. "The faculty grew by 29 members last year. As of September, 2003, this represented a 1.6 percent increase, up to 1744, reflecting 109 new appointments and 80 departures

"During the past three years we have grown a little bit more slowly than in the previous seven years of the last ten, and the faculty has grown at a rate of under two percent during the last three years, whereas it had been 2-3.7 percent beforehand. The biggest single site of growth in the University has been in the Medical Center Line, which was initiated around 1990; it grew by 14, somewhat less than in many of the other years of the last decade. There is relatively small growth in both the tenured and the untenured tenure line faculty, and no growth in the non-tenure line faculty.

"Folded into this Gains and Losses Report is the report on the representation of faculty of color among faculty. Faculty of color increased last year by 13 (279 to 292), which is actually significant relative to the total net increase in all faculty of 29, but in terms of percent change, it is small, from 16.3 to 16.7 percent of the total faculty. Progress here has been, and continues to be, very slow. For example, over the past ten years, even though there has been some modest growth in the black faculty from 36 to 45, as a percentage of the total faculty this represents no change. Hispanic faculty show an increase from 33 to 60, but again, as a proportion of the total faculty, this is a very minor growth. It is interesting to note the representation by gender in different racial ethnic groups; among the faculty of color, women are more highly represented in the total group than they are among the white faculty.

"Let us now turn to the Status of women Faculty report. The net change last academic year was very small, an increase in the total faculty from 22.2 to 22.6 percent. There were eight new senior faculty hires, and 14 new junior faculty hires. What about departures? Because of our age structure in the faculty, most of the retirements are men. For the first time we have seen equal numbers of departures for other reasons in the non-tenured segment of the tenure line between men and women, meaning that a higher proportion of women left the University before coming up for tenure.

"The number of women faculty increased modestly, by 14, a change from 22.2 to 22.6 percent. And this is actually somewhat slower growth than we have been experiencing, which has been more like 0.5 to 1 percent per year. The number of tenured women increased by 8. The number of tenure-line women without tenure decreased by 2. Some of those, of course, got tenure and moved into the tenured faculty. Almost all segments of the University have shown increases in women faculty over the last five years. There have been a significant increase in the School of Engineering, which added six new women in the span of two years. This reflects a determined effort on the part of these departments and the Dean's Office. We should recognize the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering for adding two of those six women during those two years. The School of Education and the School of Earth Sciences also had significant increases.

Interestingly, 27 percent of the junior or untenured line hires were women, and 36 percent of the senior or tenure line hires were women. This sort of flips the numbers that we've been experiencing in recent years. Actually did somewhat better in the proportion of senior faculty hires who are women and a little bit less well in the proportion of junior faculty hires who are women. Over the last five years the proportion of women has increased in most faculty lines and schools and divisions, with a lot of variation.

"Over the last 25 years, the period of time over which we have been doing analyses of tenure decisions, 75 percent of those male and female untenured faculty hires having a tenure decision have been tenured. Over that same period, of all untenured faculty hires, 40.3 percent of men and 43.6 percent of women have been tenured. The handout distributed at your desks today were revised to include consistently all tenure-track faculty initially hired in untenured positions.

The graph showing the data for the recent annual yearly hire cohorts for all faculty hired into untenured positions suggests a lower tenure rate for women than men. The significance of this pattern is uncertain, in part because all the numbers of women in these cohorts are small there are a significant number of women in this group who have not yet come up for a tenure decision and several men as well.

Vice Provost Jones continued. "We report annually on women in leadership positions and as holders of endowed professorships. We continue to see increases in both of these areas. Women are more highly represented in these leadership positions than they are in the senior faculty or the tenured faculty, where women are only 16.6 percent. This is a positive indication in terms of the involvement and participation of women in leadership positions and a continuation of the increase in the representation of women as holders of endowed professorships.

"The final report is on our survey of factors affecting faculty recruitment and retention. This is a survey we do almost every year. We send the survey that you have now in the packet at your desks to the departments and the deans of the small schools who don't have departments, and ask them to indicate whether they had any unsuccessful recruitments or unsuccessful retentions of faculty who they wished would stay at Stanford. For these groups, we asked what were the reasons for the person either not coming, or leaving.

"During the last academic year, we had more successful recruitments than unsuccessful for both men and women. Stanford continues to be an attractive place for faculty recruits to come. 'Spouse/partner career issues' was the single major factor cited for unsuccessful recruitments among both male and female faculty recruits. However, if you pool together a number of individual reasons that were cited that relate to an individual's personal financial situation, including cost of living, housing cost, and salary, this 'economic' issue ends up being more highly cited in the aggregate than are spouse/partner career issues. Difficulty in finding affordable housing, which was the top reason cited for unsuccessful recruitments during the peak of the housing crunch, has not subsequently been number one probably because of our improved housing programs.

"Unsuccessful retentions...there aren't as many of these, and a number of reasons were cited as major factors in faculty deciding to leave, including personal family preferences, better opportunities elsewhere, academic environment and spouse/partner career issues.

Professor Penny Eckert added some comments about the reports. She expressed appreciation for the administration's commitment to increasing the representation of women on the faculty. She had some observations about the two five-year intervals, 1993-1998 and then 1998-2003. She commended Earth Sciences, and Natural Sciences, and Engineering for having significant increases in women faculty during the second period. "Earth Sciences," she added, "has accomplished this by hiring four times the percentage of their current women on the faculty." She emphasized that if we continue to hire women at the same rate that we already have achieved, no increase will be achieved. She added that "...it is really encouraging that we're making gains in the administrative positions and in leadership jobs." She then returned to a topic brought up in the last presentation by Steve Allison. As part of the activities of the committee formulating the report on the status of women faculty "...a lunch was held for faculty with small children a month ago. Twenty came, four of whom were men, to eat and discuss child care here. I have never been in a room full of people so angry at Stanford!" From the discussion Professor Eckert developed the hypothesis that, possibly, one of the reasons that insufficient child care is not cited as a reason for leaving is, in fact, so few faculty families are having children.

Vice Provost Jones reminded the Senate that Provost Advisory Committee on Status of Women Faculty [PACSWF] is still in the process of doing the analysis of the responses to the Quality of Life survey, and that that we are scheduled to report specifically on the gender issues to the Senate at the end of May.

Questions and Discussion

Professor Palumbo-Liu was impressed with the volume of the data and its good organization and analysis, and wondered whether the numbers were sufficient to derive conclusions about the "...increase in the percent of tenured male faculty and decrease in the percent of tenured women, not because of the difference in the rate of tenure, but rather to an increase in the number of women resigning and a decrease in the number of the men resigning. Professor Jones acknowledged that, "A variety of factors clearly can affect resignation, which could include 'writing on the wall' about an impending tenure decision, or personal preferences, or cost of living and personal expenses issues. I think there are fairly recent examples of each of these, both for men and women."

Professor Camarillo was very pleased to point out that "...something's happened in a unprecedented way this year: the largest number of potential appointments of faculty of color to Stanford in history!" He gave the credit for this to President Hennessy, Provost Etchemendy, Dean Sharon Long of H&S and her associate deans, "...getting the message out and making commitment of resources. Fifteen possible appointments, some already approved by departments and others that are pending, could materialize as the largest number of faculty of color ever appointed at Stanford. We don't know yet. The list of departments is very important; Political Science, Classics, Economics, Sociology, History, Drama, and others, all considering appointments of faculty of color this year. We hope that Pat's report next year will, in fact, indicate that we've been able to snag some of those folks. I think it's very important that we understand the alignment of messages and the source of commitment and resources that are coming from the President's Office, the Provost's Office, and Dean Sharon Long and her colleagues. Their synergistic efforts have been phenomenal!" He also applauded Professor Claude Steele [also a Senator], chair of the Diversity Action Council's Faculty Committee, together with the folks at the Center for Comparative Study for Race and Ethnicity.

This positive comment allowed Professor Jones to segue to "...this brand new brochure that is at your desks on the Faculty Recruitment Office within our Faculty Development Office. Another demonstration of the commitment of the University is the successful recruitment of Sally Dickson back to Stanford from Duke where she had been Vice President of Institutional Equity. Sally is leading the effort on our behalf to work with the schools, the departments, the search committees, and the recruits, to enhance our ability to recruit all faculty whom we're interested in, but in particular, faculty who will enrich the diversity of Stanford. Sally, would you like to comment?"

Sally Dickson was very pleased to be recognized, and reviewed the functions of the Faculty Recruitment Office (FRO). One is to assist all searches that are going on in the University to help create a more and diverse applicant pool. The second is to help land the candidate that has been chosen, with particular emphasis on candidates of color. She added, "One thing that I have learned in the year I've been back - and I am delighted to be back - is that we really must have a concentrated effort to recruit, because candidates that are we trying to recruit are very talented, are being sought by many institutions. We must make those extra efforts to bring them here to Stanford. I am delighted that when I went over the list of the possible faculty recruits that we could have here next year, it's really, really encouraging!"

Professor Jones added information about functions of Dickson's office. "Sally's office is developing databases of young scholars in different fields who have potential of being outstanding faculty, and these databases available as resources to the departments and the search committees, both for faculty of color, recruits of color, but also for women candidates for faculty slots in the sciences. Again, this resource is not limited to diversity recruits. It is a service to help all of us in our faculty recruitments. For example, if you are a chair or member of a search committee or a dean, and you can't answer the question such as 'What are the elementary school districts like in the East Bay?' Sally (and Nicole and Dom, the staff in the office) either can answer the question or will help the recruit find the answer."

Professor Dale Kaiser asked Sally Dickson whether her FRO was interested in helping with finding job opportunities for spouse/partners of recruits. Ms. Dickson responded with an enthusiastic "yes" and enlarged on this. "There is a new on-line referral and information about jobs. It's called HERC, Higher Education Recruitment Consortium (url is www.bayareaHERC.com). It is a group of Bay Area colleges and universities that have gotten together and created a web site that lists all of the jobs, both in academic areas and non-academic areas. For our recruits who need information about employment opportunities outside of Stanford, we can refer them to that. But you are right, it is a challenge." Professor Jones pointed out that when both of a couple are seeking academic jobs, especially if both want faculty positions at institutions of the level of Stanford, the problem is compounded. She added that Bob Weisberg in the Provost's Office is a good contact person, as well as the Provost himself and the Deans.

Professor Rosemary Knight pointed out that since every university wants superb women faculty, Stanford's tenured women are very attractive targets for recruitment away from us, and "...we have to go above and beyond what we do in mentoring young faculty to make sure they stay here."

Professor Goldsmith said that, "I do think we can do a lot more about child care and family/work balance, rather than just talk about it. We know what will come out in data analysis. So, do we need to wait for these analyses, or can we start thinking about creative ways, big and small? There are many small things that can be done that can make a difference, as well as big things that can be done for tenured women and untenured women and students."

Professor Hensler mused that there were both encouraging and discouraging interpretations of the data on women and faculty of color, their recruitment and retention, and that this was in part a function of the small numbers that are available during each year. "When you look at the final chart in the materials that were circulated before the meeting, you see a story that looks like the top administration of the University is investing heavily in concern for women's positions in the University; there are very positive trends there. But when we look at the tenure data we see a story of much less change. Most schools and most departments, of course, continue to be dominated by men who have the key roles in these decisions about who we are going to tenure.

"There is a kind of Catch-22 in these data, both with regard to faculty of color and with regard to women faculty. The numbers are so small, that whenever we see data that look like they're trending in a negative direction, we can comfort ourselves with the fact that the numbers are so small that they don't demonstrate a statistically significant difference in over time. We must be very careful not to discount data that look like they are going in a negative direction, and be aware of the fact that when we see equally small numbers moving in a positive direction, we congratulate ourselves on them. Second, 'culture' takes a very long time to change, and what I see in these data involve a lot of things to celebrate over the long haul, and that there are still a lot of gains to make."

Professor Jones agreed with this assessment. "We certainly are not discounting trends in the data. Our next step is to look at the individuals to understand what their history has been. Numbers, per se, do not provide these kinds of details.

Professor Satz admitted thinking of herself "...as sort of a mini-social scientist, gathering data from women I know at Stanford. The attitude of a lot of the women at Stanford is one of not feeling empowered and enriched but being despaired that there are still so many obstacles. The culture is not a friendly one, and it's particularly not friendly if you have a child." Pausing to wonder about the disconnect of positive "macro" data and her negative "micro" data, she finally said, "...maybe it's my friends!"

Professor Jones again reminded the Senate "...that when we have the results from the life survey we will be able to answer the question and better understand how the women faculty are feeling. We will present the data in May, including analysis of the individual prose responses." In responses to Professor Chang's question about comparison with other institutions, she urged senators to go to other university web sites, including one at Stanford (<www.universitywomen.stanford.edu>) that is a partial repository for these surveys. In closing, she gave credit to Myra Strober and her committee that, years ago, led the enthusiasm for having PACSWF report each year to the Senate.

VI. Unfinished Business -- None

VII. Old and New Business - Nothing was raised.

VIII. Adjournment

By unanimous consent, adjournment occurred at 5:15 p.m.

Respectfully submitted,

Edward D. Harris, Jr., M.D.

George DeForest Barnett Professor, Emeritus

Academic Secretary to the University