Meeting Summary, 10/28: Technology, Student Services, Diversity, Admissions
At today's meeting, we saw three department's budget presentations, which each brought up a number of issues. Here is a brief summary of our initial reactions, questions and as-yet completely unrefined ideas, many of which may be quickly completely rejected. This is just the very beginning of the process! Please post a comment to weigh in with your opinion.
Technology
It is getting increasingly expensive just to maintain equipment and security, and to fight "obsolescence". Thus tech services is requesting an almost $500,000 increase in their budget for next year. Proposals that generated questions:
- How much of a priority should "smart classrooms" be? With only a third of our classrooms wired and technology-supplied, Whitman falls near the bottom of the list in a comparison of similar colleges' percentage of smart classrooms. But is this a priority for students and faculty? Is it something professors would use if it was there but isn't really needed, or is it a valuable learning tool? (If the latter, how valuable - worth spending $70,000 on?) Should we aim for 100% Smart Classrooms or in many cases is a projector and internet access unnecessary?
- How important is Blackboard? They are looking to phase it out in favor of a new system (CLEo) in 2007: Should we spend $18,500 for this new system? What services does Blackboard (or the new, similar program) provide that we really need?
- Could Whitman eliminate the phones from the dorm rooms? What about just one phone per floor instead? Only three - yes, 3!!! - incoming students did not have cell phones last year.
Student Services
One thing that came up was a question about the counseling center. It is overburdened and seeking to increase the hours of some of its staff. The waiting list is currently at 25 students. We wondered if there is anything else we can do to decrease costs and increase the center's capacity. One idea was to start charging students for its services. For those who have insurance, they would cover the cost of visits instead of getting free psychiatric care. For those who aren't covered by insurance, subsidies and financial aid would be made available, so that everyone could get treatment but those who can afford it or have insurance would help pay for the service (like an emergency room, sort of). Complicated, we know, but possible??? If not, what else can we do to ameliorate the situation?
Going along with that idea, could Peer Listeners be made more effective to help with counseling center overburdening? Should it continue to be funded in its present capacity? (Who funds it, anyway?)
Next, there's the question of adding a part-time position to oversee the Whitman Mentor Program and Story Time Project in the Community Service Center. While these programs do require a lot of oversight and there have been concerns about "continuity", they have traditionally been overseen by student interns. Is there a way to make the intern system work better, or do we need to hire a new staff member?
Diversity Initiatives
The biggest proposal is to add a new staff member, an Institutional Diversity Director, who would report directly to the President and lead the diversity agenda and initiatives on campus. It sounds like much of the job would be diversity recruitment and to serve as a liason with "external communities of color", including local Latino and Native American populations but also other ethnicities throughout the country. But it would also involve coordinating with other diversity leaders on campus, perhaps even as a leader of a Diversity Coalition, presumably to help bring diversity to the faculty, curriculum, and events and speakers offered on campus.
$10,000 was requested to "enhance diversity programming," prompting the question, do we want to separate a specific type of programming from all of the other programming bodies and budgets on campus? We already have ASWC, CAB and departmental-funded programming, but none of it is specifically set aside for "diversity causes". One rationale for allocating the money this way is "club budgets have been reduced in recent years due to restricted ASWC funds". But what about the other clubs, whose budgets, and programming, have been similarly impacted? Would this constitute preferencing diversity clubs? Or do we need to target this area specifically?
Similarly, the Action Against Hate Committee has asked for $6,000 because they have no operating budget but conduct hate and bias incident reporting and expensive training for staff and students. Yet would this set a precedent for funding committees and if so, is that something we want to do? (What about other committees that don't receive funding?) A similar problem is introduced by the request for a student intern for GLBTQ. This is a group that can't become an ASWC club because it is not open to all students. (Similar groups include the Working Class student association and the Women's Resource Lounge.) How should we go about funding such groups? Should ASWC provide money for them outside of club budgets? Or should the money come out of the college budget? (Or from the President's or Dean's offices' discretionary budgets?)
Admissions
Should the Admissions office hire another 1/2 time staffer to enable them to have a recruitment officer in the Northeastern United States? (Long-term, should they look into opening recruitment offices in other areas of the country too?)
Should Whitman apply to host a high-profile national conference for Native American students next summer, given that the commitment is $30,000? (They could wait another year or so if necessary but would like to try to get it for 2007.)
Should Whitman create a summer enrichment program for local diversity students at a cost of $15,000?
-
Technology
It is getting increasingly expensive just to maintain equipment and security, and to fight "obsolescence". Thus tech services is requesting an almost $500,000 increase in their budget for next year. Proposals that generated questions:
- How much of a priority should "smart classrooms" be? With only a third of our classrooms wired and technology-supplied, Whitman falls near the bottom of the list in a comparison of similar colleges' percentage of smart classrooms. But is this a priority for students and faculty? Is it something professors would use if it was there but isn't really needed, or is it a valuable learning tool? (If the latter, how valuable - worth spending $70,000 on?) Should we aim for 100% Smart Classrooms or in many cases is a projector and internet access unnecessary?
- How important is Blackboard? They are looking to phase it out in favor of a new system (CLEo) in 2007: Should we spend $18,500 for this new system? What services does Blackboard (or the new, similar program) provide that we really need?
- Could Whitman eliminate the phones from the dorm rooms? What about just one phone per floor instead? Only three - yes, 3!!! - incoming students did not have cell phones last year.
Student Services
One thing that came up was a question about the counseling center. It is overburdened and seeking to increase the hours of some of its staff. The waiting list is currently at 25 students. We wondered if there is anything else we can do to decrease costs and increase the center's capacity. One idea was to start charging students for its services. For those who have insurance, they would cover the cost of visits instead of getting free psychiatric care. For those who aren't covered by insurance, subsidies and financial aid would be made available, so that everyone could get treatment but those who can afford it or have insurance would help pay for the service (like an emergency room, sort of). Complicated, we know, but possible??? If not, what else can we do to ameliorate the situation?
Going along with that idea, could Peer Listeners be made more effective to help with counseling center overburdening? Should it continue to be funded in its present capacity? (Who funds it, anyway?)
Next, there's the question of adding a part-time position to oversee the Whitman Mentor Program and Story Time Project in the Community Service Center. While these programs do require a lot of oversight and there have been concerns about "continuity", they have traditionally been overseen by student interns. Is there a way to make the intern system work better, or do we need to hire a new staff member?
Diversity Initiatives
The biggest proposal is to add a new staff member, an Institutional Diversity Director, who would report directly to the President and lead the diversity agenda and initiatives on campus. It sounds like much of the job would be diversity recruitment and to serve as a liason with "external communities of color", including local Latino and Native American populations but also other ethnicities throughout the country. But it would also involve coordinating with other diversity leaders on campus, perhaps even as a leader of a Diversity Coalition, presumably to help bring diversity to the faculty, curriculum, and events and speakers offered on campus.
$10,000 was requested to "enhance diversity programming," prompting the question, do we want to separate a specific type of programming from all of the other programming bodies and budgets on campus? We already have ASWC, CAB and departmental-funded programming, but none of it is specifically set aside for "diversity causes". One rationale for allocating the money this way is "club budgets have been reduced in recent years due to restricted ASWC funds". But what about the other clubs, whose budgets, and programming, have been similarly impacted? Would this constitute preferencing diversity clubs? Or do we need to target this area specifically?
Similarly, the Action Against Hate Committee has asked for $6,000 because they have no operating budget but conduct hate and bias incident reporting and expensive training for staff and students. Yet would this set a precedent for funding committees and if so, is that something we want to do? (What about other committees that don't receive funding?) A similar problem is introduced by the request for a student intern for GLBTQ. This is a group that can't become an ASWC club because it is not open to all students. (Similar groups include the Working Class student association and the Women's Resource Lounge.) How should we go about funding such groups? Should ASWC provide money for them outside of club budgets? Or should the money come out of the college budget? (Or from the President's or Dean's offices' discretionary budgets?)
Admissions
Should the Admissions office hire another 1/2 time staffer to enable them to have a recruitment officer in the Northeastern United States? (Long-term, should they look into opening recruitment offices in other areas of the country too?)
Should Whitman apply to host a high-profile national conference for Native American students next summer, given that the commitment is $30,000? (They could wait another year or so if necessary but would like to try to get it for 2007.)
Should Whitman create a summer enrichment program for local diversity students at a cost of $15,000?
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posted by Snarkily Single at 8:35 PM
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