Emory Report

Mar. 29, 1999

Volume 51, No. 25

Issues in Progress: Faculty Council After Chair Virgil Brown called the March 16 meeting to order, President Bill Chace thanked all the council members who attended the previous day's Faculty Town Hall devoted to tenure. He called the town hall a "frank" exchange of views. Provost Rebecca Chopp also thanked the council for its support of the town hall and solicited suggestions for how to further study and promote the issue of tenure to faculty. Chopp updated the council on Emory West, saying master planner Adam Gross is moving "very quickly" on a long-term plan for the site and the Emory West steering committee has surveyed other research centers around the country to gather ideas and information for planning. While saying that the steering committee's "very preliminary" desire is for the property to house a consortia of for-profit and non-profit organizations, Chopp did say the committee does not want only private industry sharing space with Emory. Chopp and Chancellor Billy Frye reported on the progress of dean searches underway in several schools, including nursing, theology, the graduate school and Oxford College. The council then discussed what qualities make for a successful dean, and the range of opinion was varied. Some council members preferred deans with a strong individual vision, others preferred deans who build consensus; some envisioned a dean as someone who serves as role model and teacher to his faculty, others think of deans as more collegial. Chace thanked the council for its input and said if all opinions were incorporated into the criteria of a dean search, "you'll end up creating a Utopian ideal, a paragon of virtue." "And usually what you end up with," he said, "is a normal human being trying to do his or her job in the best way possible--but you do raise the bar." Rich Freer raised the issue of faculty hearing committees and suggested the council discuss whether to make a slight change in hearing committee procedure that would shift financial responsibility for legal expenses from the provost's office to the academic unit in question. Making the school pay these expenses, the predominant logic reasoned, would serve as a disincentive for allowing disputes to progress to the point of a faculty hearing. Chopp said she would solicit the opinion of the deans on this matter for discussion at the next council meeting. Rosemary Magee, associate vice president for Arts & Sciences, and Randy Fullerton, assistant chair of theater and film studies, gave a presentation on the status and design of the Emory Performing Arts Center. They surveyed the landscape of performing arts education at the University and explained how the new center would enhance this mission. Magee said she is "very optimistic" the college will secure the necessary funding for the $30 million facility. The next Faculty Council meeting is April 13 at 3:15 p.m. in 400 Administration Building. --Michael Terrazas   President's Commission on the Status of Women The March 4 meeting began with discussion of the April 14 Spring Event at The Carter Center, where speaker Rosalynn Carter's topic will be mental health, said Catherine Howett Smith. Nomination forms have been sent to all deans, directors and department heads, Chair Mary DeLong reported. Nominations committee chair and chair-elect Smith proposed a one-time, "long" meeting to review candidates and asked for volunteers. Leigh Tillman Partington, Lynna Williams, Deb Floyd, JoAnn McKenzie, Leigh Jacobson and Maureen St. Laurent agreed to serve on the committee. DeLong reminded committee members that the names of at-large members should come from throughout the University but the nominee for chair-elect should come from current commission membership. She added that she hoped nominations this year include Grady and Crawford Long hospital employees. DeLong said she was invited to speak at the University Senate about the child care resolution. She thinks the Senate will stand behind the PCSW's resolution with one of its own. DeLong has an upcoming meeting with Campus Life Dean Frances Lucas-Tauchar to discuss the issue. Tillman Partington said a child care resolution was passed by the Student Government and sent to President Bill Chace and Lucas-Tauchar and endorsed by the Graduate Student Senate. Jacobson and Tillman Partington are co-chairing the PCSW's web site committee. The committee plans to present a paper version of the site to Chace on April 8 and have it available for viewing at the Spring Event. Williams, chair of the faculty concerns subcommittee, said Chace has approved the pilot mentoring project involving 10 junior faculty for next fall. The provost's office is going to fund the pilot, she reported, and provide the program's staffing (see story on p. 2). Kathy Reed reported that the Invisible Barriers to Advancement survey is in the data evaluation stage, and she hopes the report will be finished by the end of the semester. Tillman Partington said the Faculty-Student Tea was successful, and the Emory Women's Alliance had a very successful kick-off event in February at the Carlos Museum that included about 100 participants. Ali Crown announced that the Women's Center received another $25,000 from the Eckerd Corporation to endow its Mary Lynn Morgan lectureship. Cardiologist Nanette Wenger will be the first speaker, Oct. 7 at the Carlos Museum. The next meeting of the PCSW is April 1 in 400 Administration Building at 3:30 p.m. --Stacey Jones Return to March 29, 1999, contents page