Date of Notice: 09/21/2016
Current Status: Approved 11/30/2016
Motion Type: Legislation
Sponsor: Andy Karduna, Human Physiology
Motion
Section I
1.1 WHEREAS, in recent years, the Intercollegiate Athletic Committee (IAC) has generally been ineffective in either an advisory or oversight capacity with respect to intercollegiate athletics; and
1.2 WHEREAS in the spring of 2014, upon the recommendation of the chair of the IAC, President Gottfredson formed and appointed members to a President’s Advisory Group on Intercollegiate Athletics (PAGIA) and directed athletics to interacted with this committee, rather than with the IAC; and
1.3 WHEREAS the PAGIA has not met since President Schill arrived at the University of Oregon; and
1.4 WHEREAS President Schill wants an effective advisory committee and the Senate has an interest in working with the president on forming this committee; and
1.5 WHEREAS the chair of the 2015-2016 IAC, in collaboration with the rest of the IAC and President Shill, drafted a charge for a new advisory committee – the Intercollegiate Athletic Advisory Committee (IAAC); and
1.6 WHEREAS the 2015-2016 IAC voted to approve the drafted charge for an IAAC and this charge was then reviewed by the 2015-2016 and 2016-2017 Committee on Committees.
Section II
2.1 BE IT THEREFORE MOVED that the Senate approves a replacement of the Intercollegiate Athletic Committee (IAC) by the Intercollegiate Athletic Advisory Committee IAAC, effective immediately; and
2.2 BE IT FURTHER MOVED that current members of the IAC elect 4 current faculty members of the IAC to serve as the elected faculty members on the IAAC for the 2016-2017 academic year and that these member serve until their membership on the IAC would have expired; and
2.3 BE IT FURTHER MOVED that the University Senate encourages the President to select 3 appointed faculty members and 1 student member from existing IAC membership to serve as the appointed faculty and student members on the IAAC for the 2016-2017 academic year, and that these member serve until their membership on the IAC would have expired.
Related Documents:
There were two classified staff members on the IAC last year. Both were fully engaged in this process and both shared concerns about not having a classified staff member on the new committee. I also reached out to Kurt for input.
I pulled up this email I sent to Kurt back in April: “On the point of classified staff, that came directly from the President. We pushed back, but he felt that the committee should be faculty and students, since the new committee would be focusing on academic issues. That doesn’t mean the senate can’t include classified staff, but the more it deviates from the current version, the higher the risk that the president will not support it or engage with the committee.”
Andy, Chris:
While I mull my response to the classified representation this weekend, I have this to share :
1 – It is not clear to me in going through the minutes re. discussions leading the the new restructure that there was input by classified senators in the IAC regarding the exclusion of their elected roles to serve on committee. Were there no classified staff at these meetings, and if not, were there attempts to seek classified staff reps input?
2 – I have a document from a classified staff who submitted comments, alarmed at what she was learning that her elected representatives on committee would be summarily excluded. How would I upload this doc?
3 – I have the following to share from past chair Kurt Krueger (who served six years on committee) to share:
Below from Chair Krueger:
“I have given some thought to the possible discontinuation of classified staff members on the IAC.
What about other standing senate committees? Are they also in danger of losing their classified members?
Certainly, classified staff people have a place in the University’s shared governance. The UO does not function without classified staff. Therefore we should have a voice.
Specifically, the IAC has benefited from the participation and perspective of people who represent hundreds of workers, whose job it is to support the University’s mission.
In fact, the IAC was successfully managed by a chairperson who is a classified staff member.
All these things point to retaining classified staff on the IAC, and other standing Senate committees.”
Thanks
Theodora
You can email me the document and I’ll post it. Thanks!
Andy,
By your definition would the new IAAC advise the president on issues related to the Division of Student Life? If so, I believe that is beyond an appropriate scope of this new committee. I worry about what is left up to interpretation by the etcetera and ellipsis in your definition of “student life.” I understood the purpose of a new IAAC over the previous IAC was to limit the committee’s scope in order to be more effective.
If the intention of including the phrase, “and the student life of athletes,” is to supplant, or even amend, the advice the president would receive from staff in the Division of Student Life, I would strongly oppose. I suspect there’s plenty of oversight for the committee in monitoring the academic performance of student athletes.
I reiterate my recommendation to remove the phrase, “and the student life of athletes,” from the purpose statement of the IAAC, leaving its purpose to appropriately be “the academic performance of student athletes.”
I would take student life to encompass issues that the office of student life would generally deal with (studentlife.uoregon.edu) – eg, campus life, health care, careers, etc…
I am generally supportive of this motion. I agree that having a senate committee not meeting its charge should compel us to act, and this seems like a reasonable solution.
As I mentioned yesterday during the senate meeting, I am concerned about a clause in the purpose statement of the new IAAC, found here: https://blogs.uoregon.edu/senate/files/2016/10/IAC-charge-draft-October-4-1ryzunx.pdf
I propose eliminating the phrase “and the student life of athletes” from the second sentence of the purpose. Without a clear definition of what “the student life of athletes” means, including this phrase would seem to contradict the reason for the motion—narrowing the scope of oversight. If the phrase is not eliminated, a definition of “student life” should be added.
If you click on the current IAC link above and go to the tab ‘Reports and Documents’ you will see these reports and a few more.
I realize the passage of this motion may be difficult, but from my point of view I would rather have a functional committee with some representation rather than two committees: one of which is elected but without the ability to fulfill its charge without the support of Athletics, and the other which is functional, but is completely appointed by the University President.
I’d be happy to answer questions about this motion (either via email, on this blog, or at another Senate meeting). As a start, here is a summary of some issues:
1) I had long discussions with President Schill and last year’s IAC about the proposed charge. The charge was approved by vote by last year’s IAC and President Schill supports it.
2) I surveyed IAC chairs from the past decade – the general consensus was that many parts of charge was not being followed.
3) As Bill mentioned, the current IAC charge was created in response to a Task Force on Athletics from 2004. The changes from an older charge can be found here:
pages.uoregon.edu/uosenate/dirsen045/US045-3.html
4) Here are some past IAC chair reports (including mine):
2015-2016:
committees.uoregon.edu/sites/committees.uoregon.edu/files/IAC%20chair%20report%202015-2016.pdf
2014-2015:
committees.uoregon.edu/sites/committees.uoregon.edu/files/IAC%20Report%20to%20Senate%202014_2015.pdf
2013-2014:
committees.uoregon.edu/sites/committees.uoregon.edu/files/IAC%20Report%202014.pdf
2012-2013
committees.uoregon.edu/sites/committees.uoregon.edu/files/IAC%20Final%20Report%202012-13.pdf
Andy Karduna
karduna@uoregon.edu