Issues in Progress
University Senate
Although some acts of intolerance have occurred on campus this fall, Vice
President and Dean for Campus Life Frances Lucas-Tauchar said the campus
racial climate has improved vastly since last spring. Lucas-Tauchar addressed
the Senate at its Nov. 26 meeting.
Last year, Lucas-Tauchar said, was one of the most difficult in Emory's
history in the arena of race relations. She said the difficulty was prompted
both by incidents on campus as well as national events, including the O.J.
Simpson trial and the Million Man March in Washington, D.C. "This fall
has been very mellow in comparison to last year," she said. "We
have had some difficult incidents, but I think we've handled them better
than we did last year. People are talking more openly and more kindly with
each other."
"I don't think many mistakes were made last year," said President
Bill Chace in support of Lucas-Tauchar and her staff. "No campus is
free of these tensions. I am never happy when these kinds of incidents occur,
but I am never surprised," because of the country's long history of
racism. Chace said he believes Emory does a good job of acknowledging and
addressing such incidents, and then moving forward.
Other topics Lucas-Tauchar discussed include:
* A new day care center: Funding has been approved for a new facility, which
has tentatively been sited at the University Apartments. Lucas-Tauchar said
the site also must be approved by the firm conducting the new campus master
plan.
* Faculty/student interaction: Campus Life has been studying the faculty
residence programs of some other universities to see if such a program could
work at Emory. Lucas-Tauchar said she has not yet gotten a sense of how
Emory faculty feel about participating in a residence program in which some
faculty would live on campus. She said existing opportunities for interaction
include the Emory Bookstores' faculty advisory group and the Barkley Forum.
* Graduate student housing: While the University Apartments Tower is a quality
facility, Lucas-Tauchar said the surrounding garden apartments are in bad
shape. She said the issue of replacing those units will be addressed in
the University's Strategic Plan. She said that improved graduate housing
is a pressing need that she would like to see addressed in a five-year time
frame.
* EmoryCard: Lucas-Tauchar said the EmoryCard is used primarily by students
for food service, parking deck and P.E. Center access. She said the uses
of the EmoryCard will expand even more in the near future, and that one
of those uses likely will be a photocopy card that would be accepted University-wide.
In other business, President Bill Chace asked Senate members to send him
nominations for the position of interim provost. Chace said he hopes to
make a decision on the post before winter break begins. Provost Billy Frye
has announced that he will retire in June, at which time he will become
chancellor of the University.
Senate Past-President Rick Letz announced that a survey design of the EmoryCare
health insurance program has been pilot tested, but results are not yet
available. Letz said that a School of Public Health class on survey design
conducted the pilot testing, and that once the results are available, the
next step will be design of the actual survey, which should be implemented
by the spring. Glenn Maberly of the public health faculty is overseeing
the project.
The Senate will not meet in December. The group's next meeting is scheduled
for Tuesday, Jan. 28. Representatives of the firm that will conduct Emory's
new campus master plan will attend that meeting.
President's Commission on the Status of Minorities
Commission members discussed at their Nov. 25 meeting the possibility of
altering the group's Minority Conference Travel Fund to allow students to
receive funding for travel to professional/academic conferences.
The Commission's bylaws allow funds to be awarded to faculty and staff for
travel to conferences at which they are presenting their work or participating
as panelists. The possibility of expanding the fund to include students
has been raised over the past few years, but no action has been taken on
those suggestions. Commission Chair Bob Lee asked a small group of members
to write a proposal to expand the fund to include students.
In addition, Lee asked Commission members to think about the idea of having
chairs serve for two or two-and-a-half year terms, instead of the current
one-year terms. Lee said the change would provide much-needed continuity
to the Commission's work. He also said the Commission should always have
a sitting chair-elect; the group currently has no chair-elect.
--Dan Treadaway
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