Senate Meeting Minutes
Minutes
Sonoma State University
AS Senate Meeting
Associated Students
12:00pm- Monday, October 23, 2023
Sonoma Valley Room – 2nd Floor Student Center
AGENDA
I. Call to Order & reading of the Land acknowledgement- The meeting was called to order at 12:02 pm;
II. Roll Call -everyone is present except for EVP Lopez, but her absence is excused;
III. Public Comment – pursuant to California Education Code 89306, the AS Senate provides this time for any member of the public to address the AS Senate on any item affecting higherm education. Pursuant to California Education Code 89306(b), each speaker will be allowed no more than three (3) minutes to address the AS Senate.
IV. Liaisons Reports a. University President’s Designee- reported: Dr. Ryan reported: Parents and Family Weekend this week; Flu Shots are available; CARE team is also available, about 120-130 cases are currently open, so if you have concerns or if your friends have any concerns or going through something, direct them to the CARE team for support;
b. Academic Senate Representative- no report;
V. Special Guest
a. Jeff Keating - Associate Vice President for Government Relations and Strategic Communications- Mr. Keating reported: the position is currently new made by the University; important date: February 21st, 2024: Legislative Advocacy Day in Sacramento; Sent a letter for tuition and financial aid today via SSU email; if there are any questions or just want to talk, roll by Jeff’s office; Legislation Being Worked on: TITLE IX/Sexual Harassment, California Governor’s recent passed legislation; focusing on the Native American Partition Art for Artifacts; another legislation that makes CSU system more accountable for;
b. Provost Moranski - Vice President for Academic Affairs and Chief Academic Officer- Provost reported: concerns of enrollment 5 years and having an impact on budget; to increase enrollment and move forward, we need to think carefully about how we organize to deliver majors, classes and new programs that possibly will emerge ; one of the purposes for reorganization is to have departments to collaborate together and create new curriculum and new ideas; it is important for new enrollments, because more new majors can emerge; it encourages faculty to teach in multiple departments, since we have not able to replace them for various reasons, so it ensures that we have faculty to teach those classes in order for students to graduate; main thing is that we do not want to impact graduation at all and help students graduate on time and focusing on student success; we are looking for budget saving from the admin re-organization; At the moment, academic departments will stay the same and should not see any changes in your department in the nearest term; major or degree programs will be the same, but could possibly add new majors and change existing programs, but we will let you know when that happens ; Departments with other departments will collaborate to form schools; The ones that are already named schools will be changing the name to colleges; Each school will have a chair instead of the department having the chair; We now have 5 academic colleges, but will mostly like will move to 4 academic colleges instead; getting some proposals for 3 colleges, but 4 feels like a nice number that gives us savings, but does not have an huge impact on identity, including the schools, departments, etc; This fall, there are various meetings and report of every month for Academic Senate and EVP Lopez are also there at those meetings; any is welcome to join the Senate meeting; chair chat; workshop and reports of Senate Executive Committee; Budget Forum, meeting with department chairs; we begin to see the proposals coming out and have until Nov 3rd to put ideas and given access to the students for the ideas; primarily it is faculty and staff submitting the ideas and how it will impact students; Next item: Impact on Students, they aim to improve coordination with student services to ensure more feedback and specific answers, including mentoring and keep the retention rate as well; FY and SY are most at risk to not continue at SSU and want to keep track of them and help them more; development tracking mechanisms to ensure the students and keep them here. However, it does not work with every student. Also, as the Graduation 2025 Initiative and move on the next item, and wanting to focusing on equity gaps and make sure they can graduate at a fair chance at success; Academic reorg should not impact your class structure or degree program until they change the curriculum development; We are having elections for the chairs of those schools at the end of the current academic year and in the Spring ; The chair of your school may not be the chair of your current department and may change or stay the same; There will be also training for chairs in other departments as well;
VI. Reports
a. AS President- President Garcia reported: attended the Campus Planning Forum a couple weeks ago;
also attended the Student Fee Advisory Committee meeting; A couple action items from that meeting were: the audit for the course fee will be completed for the current semester, the second item is recommendation for IRA programs; the second item was voted no and the first one was tabled for another time; President Garcia had a 1on1 with Dr.Mills and discussing a possibility of collabing with BSU, Marketing, and Nursing Club; met with Alan Bryant, and discussed about working for the application for next semester; attended both Personnel and Audit and Rules Committee; the tuition statement sent to all SSU students this
morning; for next Senate meeting, there will be again two guest speakers;
b. Executive Vice President- EVP Lopez reported; ERC faculty for reorg of department, had ARC and working on reviewing bylaws and codes; Excon discussing university standards for academic probation, course modality program for the next semester;
c. Vice President of Finance
d. Senator of Diversity- Senator Lopez reported: acknowledgement for Israel and if anyone needs a brave space, HUB
has held spaces and have many resources; had an 1-on- 1 with Salvador and discussing on support and communication with each other; attended Personnel and talked about Flexible Holiday Policy; also attended Audit and Rules; tabled with Senator Fast and Frickman; met with Jeralina and getting to know each other and creating meeting schedule; DI, office hours on Thursdays in the HUB from 11-12 pm;
e. Senator of Student Resources
f. Senator of Government Affairs- Senator Frickman reported: Open Forum last Monday, 21 students participated including getting some aware of the tuition increase, having the Open Forum outdoors and many more items on feedback; the next Open Forum will be in November;
g. JUMP Representative
h. Basic Needs Representative- Representative Hernandez reported: last week on the 17th, collabed with the Academic and Advising Center for Transfer Week; talked with students with food insecurity and gave out recipe bags with the produce that are in the pantry and planning to do this more in the next semester; received 2nd order on last thursday; receiving fresh produce from Farm to Pantry; Greek Life receiving donationsn for hygiene and food items; however, it was low on hygiene
items, but restocked; CALFRESH outreach; also working with CALFRESH for the CALFRESH applications since delay in the system; 13 students have been signed up to come to the pantry twice instead of once;
i. ASP Representative
j. Children's School Representative- Rep Nelson reported that Children’s School had a Fall Event last week; good turnout and student families is ready to be a community again; met with families via Zoom; another conversation: lack of facilities for nursing parents;
k. Student Government Representative
l. Executive Director
XI. Items for the Good of the Order - N/A
XII. Adjournment- The meeting was adjourned at 1:21 pm
Posted in accordance with the Gloria Romero Open Meeting Law of 2000 by: President Cassandra Garcia
The Associated Students of Sonoma State University acknowledges Indigenous Peoples as the traditional stewards of the land. Let it be acknowledged that the Associated Students and Sonoma State University is located within the traditional homelands of the indigenous peoples collectively known as Coast Miwok and Southern Pomo.