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THE GEORGE WASHINGTON IINIVERSITY Washington, D.C. MINUTES OF THE REGULAR MEETING OF THE FACULTY SENATE HELD ON IANUARY 10r 2014 IN THE STATE ROOM Present: Ptesident Knapp, Ptovost Lerman, Registtar Amundson, and Parliamentarian Charnovitzl Deans Goldman andJohnson; Professors Brand, Btazinsky, Briscoe, Costello, Dickinson, Downes, Fairfax, Galston, Gee, Harington, Helgett, Katz, Lantz, Lindahl, McAleavey, McDonnell, Newcomer, parsons, Prasad, Roddis, Sidawy, Simon, Stott, Swaine, Swiercz, Weiner, and Villiams Absent: Deans AkrnanrBrown, Dolling, Eskandarian, Feuet, and Vinson, Interim Deans Kayes and Maggsl Ptofessots Castlebetry, Cordes, Garis, Hawley, Jacobson, Marotta-Walters, Miller, Price, Pulcini, Rehman, Shesser, and Yezet CALL TO ORDER President Ko"pP called the meeting to order at 2:18 p.m. He introduced Ptofessor Christina Gee, Associate Ptofessor of Psychology, who was elected as a Columbian College Senatot, teplacing Ptofessor Eugene Montague, who resigned inJune 20lll. APPROVAL OF THE MINUTES \- The minutes of the meeting held on December 13r2013 were approved as distributed. INTRODUCTION OF RESOLUTIONS No tesolutions wete introduced. REPORT ON RESEARCH Vice President fot Research Leo Chalupa presented the report in powerpoint format (the teport is included with these minutes). The repot focused on the two areas of meEics that depict how the Univetsity is doing in key research areas, and initiatives put into place in the last yeat or so to make it easiet for faculty to be more competitive in obtaining gtants. The fitst chart shows teseatch expenditutes and indirect costs for the University from FY 2009 thtough Fy 2013. Gtant expenditures are the measure that all universities track because that is what is teported to the National Science Foundation. This does not teflect grants received, but tathet money spent on the grants that GW receives. In FY 09 and F f 10 the University did quite well. The chief reason fot that was that the economy was collapsing, and the Obama administration iniected something like $300 million into the economy. Univetsities and teseatch benefited ftom this because the National Institutes of Faculty Senate Minutes, January 10, 2014 Page2 Health received a rnaiot budget increase, as did the National Science Foundation, and the 1 money had to be spent for stimulus-teady proiects. The University gained something on the otder of $32 million but that money stopped after one year, althougi'it took nearly t Io y."r. fot the Univetsity to expend it. After that, research exienditures d-topped, and that droi has continued. I Between FY 12 and FY 13, the University increased total expenditutes by 7.3oh. T11is is tematkable because that occured during thl federal budget seluestration. During this time the NIH budget was reduced by 5.5"/; and the NSF bu-rlget wlas redu ced 4.60/o. While this was golng on, the University actually inceased its tesearlh expenditures while federal funding was going down. The next chart reflects a compadson of data on Exffamural Expenditutes and Indirect Costs fot the first quarter of Fiscal Years 2009-2013 the most recent data available. These figures teflect t steady increase in expenditures from the first quarter of Fy10 though Fy 14, while Inditect Costs have risen by Z.i%, The next chart shows the vatious sources of research funding, Ilf 13 being the latest l2-month period for which complete information is available. As is the case for mosr univetsities, Gw,s f".11:h funding comes ptimadly from the fedetal govemmelt. NIH and NSF account fot 75o/o of the total, with foundations supplying ti.qw, othet sources bl0r'e2oahk,d ostwante ofuf nfeddinegr a_l 5f.u6%nd ainngd c"oor.p.ot"ta."ti.o nsA s2 .i4s% tr. uTeh feo rf omuorhs t "unn#iv eprsriotierisd .w" iuth c ommepdliectael schools, apptoximately 600/o comes ftom NIH, about a $30 billion budget. This year,s lulding will be made public on January 15, ani the expectation is that both NIH and the NSF will do at least as well as inflation and perhap. L oi, better due to changes in the sequestration of funds Corpotate funding is one atea thatVice President Chalupa said he is very anxious to gtow' - Histotically, shortly aftet Sputnik, two-thirds of research funding in this countfy came from the federal government and the fest came from corporations. As of 2011, this has revetsed, and now two-thirds of R&D funding in the U.S. comes from coqpotations, and only one-third comes from the fedetal gorr.ro*.rt. Thus, GW needs to coml up with new ways to engage these coqporations and compete for their research dollars. TtansfeVt i(cTeT Pote)s. idGeWnt f-aCchualtylu paate bintciereflays itnegv itehwee ndu mmbeetrri cosf dfoisrc lothseur eosf ftihceey oarfe Tmeachkinnogl,o gsyo when a faculty membet has d-eveloped something that is of potential commltcial value, they are obligated to the let the TTo office know ttrat. Ttre office is headed by Steve Kubisen, who came to the Univetsity 8 months ago aftet working at Hopkin. in Utah. Mr. Kubisen meets with faculty in the different schools tha-t are doing re"sreda rch that could potentially be commetciahzed - this is key because many faculty dI not know they have something with commetcial potential. Another metric for the of{ice shows that the number of patents GW has applied for has gone down, the reason fot that being that GIV is now much more selective in what it Faculty Senate Minutes, January lfl,r2074 Page 3 Pateots because the process is expensive and the result uncertain. In the atea of licensing, income has dsen steadily from about $271000 in FY 10 to g118,000 in Fy 13. yice president Chalupa said he expected this to rise to over 92001000 in Fy 14. Research in the tech tansfer atea has btought in $2.3 million, a tenfold increase from FY 10. GW has now launched g companies and taken an equity position in two of them wofrh over g1.2 million. This may or may not generate resoufces for the University. The Office of the Vice President for Research (OVPR) has numerous outreach mechanisms to fostet the gtowth of reseatch at GW. Three years ago, the University established an Entrepreneutship Office. Jim Chung, who was rained at Stanford and MIT, qras recruited from Maryland to head it. There are cuffently ovet 30 student startups at GW; one student has a company that is valued at over $50 midon. Over 41000 individuals have attended the OVPR's business meetings. Mt. Chung was able to secure a NSF gtant, with the University of Maryland aad Vitginia Tech .. prrt r.r.. GW,s portion is g1.2 million. This money is provided so that courses can be offered for faculty members to learn how to commercialize their findings. The only other conglomerate that received this grant was comprised of Stanfotd, the University. of Southern California, and Berkeley.- The Entreprerierrship Office is cutrently 256 in the country quite remarkable for such a flew progtam. The OVPR also tecruited an Assistant Vice President for Industry and Corpotate Research, Tom Rus.so. In the last year and a half Mr. Russo has secuted funding for |CAS, SEAS' and the ESIA totaling $2.5 million. GW will expand its efforts in the y.*., particularly in the Northern Vitginia area whete GW'; Vitginia Science ,rd" oT-i.n.fgrn tlogy campus is located. The OVPR has done a numbet of things to help faculty become more efficient in what is an extremely ferocious and competitivC cfimate for obtaining research funding. A Principal Investigator (PI) Dashboatd has been launched, in part at tf,e utging of the Senate Research Committee. Faculty can now go online and access up-to-date-inlormation that tracks exactly how much money he ot she has in each account and what is left to be spent. Representation on the Advisory Council on Research has also been increased from 30 to 40 faculty members. It is expected this group will be enlarged even further. This is a group that meets about six times a yeaf, to teview center and institute applications as well as individual intramutal grants from the University Facilitating Fund ,rri'C.rrt., and Institute Facilitating Fund. It also advises the OYPR on things it should be doing. A retreat will be held in the near futute to further gather input from this group on i"r.r."h areas the Univetsity should focus on in the future. This group's input has proven invaluable, and vice President chalupa expressed deep gratitude iot their work. In othet areas, research suPport services have been aligned so the OVpR is now ptoviding staff to work in schools with the open budget model. Thete are seven positions allocated in a Partnership between the Office of the Provost and the OVPR and the deans, and people to fill these roles are being hired now in CCAS, SEAS, and GSEHD. Othet outreach areas undettaken by the OVPR include launching a monthly newslettet and an updated Sponsoted Projects Handbook. Associate Vice president Jennifet Visdom held a PI summits with ovet 250 faculty to provide information on how the Faculty Senate Minutes, January 10r Z0l4 Page 4 OVPR office can be of assistance in their effots to secure research funding. AVp Wisdom also holds a boot camp to help faculty, especially new faculty, learn how-to put together grant applications. Ovet 90 faculty members ,tt.nd.d this lasi year. Last but not least, the OVPR started monthly lunches ovet the last year with rwo groups. One group consists of leniot faculty who are very successful in research. 8 to 10 ti-. attenl, and offer their "i " feedback on how the teseatch enterptise is going and what can be done to imptove it. Anothet set of monthly lunches is held with new faculty in research-oriented discif,lines, so that they can become acquainted with OVPR staff and staff can learn what they can do to make them functional and competitive in obtaining grants. Vice Ptesident Chalupa concluded his report with an excerpr from President George Washington's Iirst annual addtess to Congtess: "there is nothingwhich can bettet deserye your patronage, than the promotion of Science and Litetature. Knowledge is in every country the surest basis of publick happiness.r, Discussion followed. Ptofessor Bdscoe commented on the indirect cost figures in the first slide, which show less than 10o/o ovetalL He added that he pays substantialy more than that for his grants' Vice President Chalupa responded that the overall figure ior the campus is about 15.8 oh. This figure includes all grants. Because the highest indirecr costs ate paid by fedetal gtants, with foundations and other sources paying flr less, the avetage figute is reduced. Ptofessot Costello said that in the School of Medicine and Health Sciences, there are faculty who have teceived gtant funding that requires a data use agreement. This process of getting approval of the data use agreement has been very lengthy, up to a year, involving GW's Of{ice of Genetal Counsel. This is significant because racutty members, particularly ii Medicine and the Health Sciences, are beginning to wotk with very latge drtu ,"t, which rcquite data use agteements, and this has potential to delay or interrupt-grant funding. As the agreement does not identiry individuals and therefore is not a HI-PAA issue, professor Costello asked the Vice Ptesident if he had any thoughts about this roadblock. professot McDonnell, a faculty member in the School of Public Health and Health Services, voiced the same concern. She also exptessed an additional concern about the duplication of effoft required to work with the OVPR and the General Counsel,s Office and the lack of collabotation between the two entities. Vice President Chalupa responded that there are really rwo different issues, the fitst being the review process by the internal Review Board (IRB). A majot effort has been launched in the last yeat to make the IRB process more effective. A consulting fitm in this area was engaged to conduct meetings afout this with a wide range of people, including faculty trri*b.r. and deans. The OVPR is now implementing step by steP a number of suggestions from this effort, and the tesult has been significant improvement in the IRB ptocess and a teduction in the amount of time it takes for teviews to take place. Vice President Chalupa noted that the OVPR has no control o1ier the Universiry's Office of General Counsel, but said that he meets weekly with Beth Nolan, the head of that office, and het senior staff. He added that if Senate members or their colleagues ericounter problems in the research area, they should not hesitate to e-mail him, and that he would follow up promptly on these inquiries. Faculty Senate Minutes, January l0, Z0l4 Page 5 Ptofessot Btazinslqy inquired about tesearch spending in the humanities. Vice President Chalupa confirmed that funding in this ,r"" i. much less than that availabLe for reseatch in science and engineering. To offset lower tesearch funding in this area, the University gives out something on the order of $800,000 per year in internal grants, an amount that has iust been increased by $3001000. The composition of the group that reviews these gtants has. been changed so there are more hum-anities people thete. As a result mote than one third of this money is going to the humanities and social sciences. vhile the total amount available seems smafi]moiey needed fot research in these areas is fat less than that required for science and engineering proiects. Ptofessor Roddis said that in the past it was very difficult to hite post-docs for tesearch ptoiects. On a NSF gtant, for example, students had to be hited as GW employees inste-ad of being suppoted as graduate studints. she asked if progress had been made on -attgring this system actoss the University. Yice President Chaluia r"esponded that his office had spent a lot of time wotking with the Provost's office and the Human Relations office on this problem' In the last three months, a new policy has been adopted to address this issue. The policy is now available on the OvpRwebsite Th;1 bti"g^y lrthet questions, Vice President Chalupa described an initiative sponsoted by the qYPl in cooperation with the GW Center itr Civic Engagement & Public Seruice and the office of Government and Community Relations. nrorn lanuary Z0 to Match 21, new and used children's books will be collected at designated locations on all three of GIV's campuses-_ Fre encoutaged everyone to participate in"this book drive which will provide children's books to childten in the through local nonprofit otganizations. "o-rr,rrrity GENERAL BUSINESS ELECTION OF PE9EISSORJOYCE PULCINI (SON) TO REPUCE tffirve PROFESSOR KIMBERLY ecouevrve oN COMMITTEE Ptofessot Harington moved the nomination of Ptofessor Pulcini to replace professor Acquaviva, who resigned from the Senate and the Executive Committee due to a decanal appointment effective January 7r zor4. ptofessor pulcini was elected. II. Ptofessot Hattington moved the nomination of Professor Cherian to serye as Acting chair of the committee, and professor chetian was elected. Faculty Senate Minutes, lanrary 10, Z0l4 Page 6 III. INTERIM REPORTS OF SENATE STANDING COMMITTEES No Interim Reports were received. IV. REPORT OF THE EXECUTIYE COMMITTEE Because Professor Rehman was on GW ttavel, Professor Hartington presented the Report, which is included with these minutes. IV. PROVOST'S REMARKS Provost Lerman brought the Senate up to date on three issues. The firct was the publication of an article in which GW was described as pursuing lawsuits against people who have defaulted on theit Perkins loans. Ptovost Lerman said he thought the artilb somewhat incomplete in its repoting, in that one of the things about Perkins loans that is not well known is that by law, the federal goverirment requites this. This is not true of othet types of federal loans. In otder to stay eligible to conrinue issuing Perkins loans, the University is rcquired to take all teasonable measures to collect *orr.y fro* those who have defaulted. This is ss6sthing the university does with great reluctance. Anyone who makes a reasonable effort to communicate with GW, and makes an effofi, however small, to try and 'ate work with the Univetsity would not be brought into court. Unfottunately, thete a numbet of people who have tefused to communicate with the University over multiple years and the point has been teached whete G\V believes the law requires it to pursue the maitet. Another impoftant factor is that the Perkins loan pool is a tecycling pool within the Univetsity. Thus every dollat not collected is one that some other studentlannot get. The fitst thing that happens with money collected from defaulting individuals is that it gets recycled into the pool fot future loans. And of course, if the money is not collected, it islot available to be loaned. The University works very hard thtough the financial aid office to try to wotk with individuals who are having trouble paying these debts to help them find away to begin paying back theit loansl it is only when they break off communication that legal action is undettaken. The Provost next desctibed developments related to one of the themes of the Strategic Plan -- that of citizenship and leadership. Vice Provost Teri Reed has been asked to lead a steering committee including academic affahs staff and faculty members to begin to look at the translation of that theme, specifically how an option, or even a tequiremJnt, might eventually be cteated so that students can acquire skills in these t*o Most "ri".. likely, this would involve an experiential core that spans an undergraduate,s four years. The Provost added that he thought Vice Provost Reed has a number of great ideas. Departments will be contacted to elicit feedback on how this conceptual atea might be transformed into a programmatic idea that students can actually follow. Individual iaculty members are also welcome to shate theit thoughts and input with Vice Provost Reed as she spearheads this effort. Faculty Senate Minutes, January lr}r}Ot4 PageT Ptovost Lerman also bdefed the senate on developments in implementing ilnanuonvcahteiodn bs yin v itchee aptteoav oosf t teEahcrhminga iann.d T lehaer nninrlgt . nA.s n buemebne rr aomf pininitiga tuivpe ss uhpavpeo rbt efeonr luanbdoerargtotarideusa, teb urte saelsaor-cdha.t aT hanisa liynscislu dines t h_neo st oocnialyl sthciee ntctaedsi taionnda ll ibmraoriye tr eosfe awrochrk iinng t hine humanities and law' The success of these gfforts d.p.rrl. upon faculty wanting to do this. Ahictaed aenm uicn dAefrfgariarsd uisa tneo wto owfoferrki nogn snoemwe pmroaietcchtsin. g" \igorrrki tro,r so thinatte fgarcautl.tyi wwehbos ihtea vies gunradnetrsn rcaayn, so that all of the oppottunities around tir. ilr.irr.r.ity ,"""oe ssible to srudents. "t ffaaccuullttyy Aww hhseooc awotnead ns tat tiieltl,a a ficasq ccuuoilattiycn hgiei natger anacinnhgdin mcgo esmnktmiollrtsri.nn gi-tI ienfas a cdhuadltvyite.io Tbneh teiosn p isct ronevoaidtt eiendxg ci nluc sowiavhecihlcyih nf goc rof oyhoto urthtnsog soeerf l':dry get togethet to exchange infirmation on classroom skills and what can be done to help them become better teacGts. Nelways of letting flcurty experiment, for example, in technologies, have been developed. . once againr.fcademic Affairs is providing more support to faculty who wish to leam about thesJthings .o-g- r.: them. Many young facutty ate taking this up with geat enthusiasm, and people"feel like this coaching and mentoring is a great addition to theit leaming experience.'"" i.* teachets, paticularly the post-docs. pmoosssti bsAiilmi titpehlseit' d aA na dtne easw fitn aw igpehrbotsfcoietersw spa titsod v hiwdoeawsy tghoua eisdv aabnleuceaent e o pnte; 2awc.a.hryi-snu_gir nte wxtchheeilcrleehn acfaere ca uanlt dyn utwemhwboae radr t eoi tfu. opTt hfhoeerr promotion and tenure caa befter documint teaching exJellence. This canle done in many bdiyff efarecnutl tyw amyesm' bTerarsd, itwiohnearle sftaucduelntyt wasisthes psmerehnatsp sc amno bree euxspeedr.i eTnhcee teca anr es iat lsino pae celta tsesvrioeowms hpcwletaao stvhcsiadhtodeion mmga e alaitn tcwg otehilltteeh am agderueenepau saa roontmffd wp eeeanvdyta ascl guhioanagt eiwyi s th haaicnenhditd_ ftdateheuaevletc yhiho ;"piipiig,r;r .g" aA roc.r"*a.h-.dir".erarrm.'cn*ihct, itAnhlgefa itii rdase cwcaosilml. cpTolhinsehti nmputeoenv totsos ittn rsy ta htideo think have done a gteat job teaching to use different wa"yI"so o.rfr rdge.m f"o"n,rsrttrya twinhgo tihheeiyr accomplishments so that the univetsity can continue to teward those colleagues who really demonstrate an excellent commitment io better teaching.-- imnpeuetti nagIbnso uctoto onrtechlpueosr riotth noin,n gP sato stvhpoaesttc AiLficcea tmdaseapmne iccst a Aigdf-!f atthhiraset sshtuea rfpf't l"iangni n" edrdtoa antotr ses auimcphpp oolerf tm thteheen r teacmotiroaeni nm aininsgds i sosenonslai cotietf the University. V. CHAIR'S REMARKS President Krrpp made no remarks. Faculty Senate Minutes, January 10, 2A14 Page 8 BRIEF STATEMENTS (AND QUESTIONS) Ptofessor Parsons related that when he was chair of the Economics department, there wete sttong ditectives coming ftom the Academic Affairs Vice President that research should be emphasized. At the same time, there was little money left over to internally reward good teaching or good sewice. There was no indication from top administrators that departments should reward these financially. Provost Lerman responded that he could not comment on the history of this befote he came to GW. He added that the University waflts to tecognize, acknowledge, and value both great research and gteat teaching. During merit teviews, department chairs are not directed to partition merit money into rewarding teaching ot research. Gteat teachers should certainly be rewarded not iust with recognition and thanks, but also through the merit pool ptocess. The deans and chairc have teceived a very cleat message that the University ought to reward excellence in all areas of faculty membets' tesponsibilities. President Knapp said he thought that ttaditionally, the metrics available for measuring performance in research have always been more obvious, visible, and easily recorded than other dimensions of faculty achievement. Rewarding achievement in othet areas, as Professot Parsons pointed out, is a challenge in areas like service and also clinical cate [in the case of medicine] and in other practice-odented professions. At the same time, thete has been a move toward trying to develop alternatives to metrics that take into account broader mnges of data that can inform the evaluatiofl process. This is leading toward a more balanced approach to recognizing quality and measuring and evaluating the kinds of conttibutions that cannot easily be assessed by traditional measures. Professot Costello said she thought the emphasis on teaching and learning is an excellent focus. Thete ate a lot of new faculty in Health Science who are developing their scholarchip around these two areas in addition to pursuing more traditional paths, such as applylng fot grant funding. Flowever, duting the tenure and promotion ptocess what is evaluated by external teview is a faculty membeds written work telated to reseatch and has nothing to do with othet areas of faculty performance such as teaching and leatning. She added that if all aspects of faculty performance could be teflected in the evaluation process, this would better reflect a faculty member's overall achievements. Ptovost Lerman said it had been his experience at his former institution that when extemal reviewers wete asked to evaluate teaching perfotmance, they often demutred because they had not had the oppottunity to observe it. Then, the teviews turned to an evaluation of reseatch. The Provost added that some departments do peer reviews of teaching pedorrnance, and this is a great thing. Othet depattments sometimes ask former students, particularly those who are now in academia, to comment on their educational expetiences with a faculty member whose perfotmance is being evaluated. Beyond that it is impotant to be as creative as possible in finding ways to document teaching in all of its aspects, not merely in the classroom, but also in mentoring and coaching students. Some of this is hard to document, but it is real. Ptofessor Lindahl said most of the comments about teaching and learning seem to emphasize documentation fot tenure and ptomotion reviews. Ovet the 6 ot 7 years of a teflure clock, that is not insignificant. Howevet, it is also important to find ways to encourage faculty imptovement orrer the next 30 ot so years of their employment. Effotts to Faculty Senate Minutes, January 1iO, Z0l4 Page 9 encourage this in the top lo/o of faculty is impotant, but it may be that a focus on the \-" bottom la to 25o/o might also be fruitful. vice Piovost for Teaching and Leaming Ehrmann described the new l:rd.Ply of Distinguished Teachers at Gw *ii"h is currently defining its mission and initial activities. Thelssue of ptoviding peer coaching is very much under discussion by this grouP, as well as other practices ,rra [ou"i.s that .rppo* excellence in teaching at GW. "rl, Ptofessot veiner said he wanted to encoufage the Ptovost not to give up on the idea of sending out elem-ents of teaching for external revi:ew. He added that he-thought one thing that could lend itself easily to these reviews arc a faculty membey's course syllabi, for those whose syllabi ^te an important element of the course. Fie said he thought thlte is no rea'on extemal teviewets could not also be asked to teview these, because a lot of inforuration can be gleaned from them. Provost Letman said he would be willing to incorporate rhis into the process and said he would tfy to roll it into the rrext memorandum sent out about evaluations. ADJOURNMENT -There being no futthet business befote the Senate, and upon modon made and seconded, the meeting was adiourned at 3:09 p.m. Efrzahetfr A, Amrtttfrort Elizabeth A. Amundson Secretary