Remarks by the Secretary. Professor Poland said that the evening meeting with Dean Paula Burger on Tuesday, September 14 was very productive. Deans Weiss and Falk will attend the evening meeting on October 12 to discuss the upcoming departmental reviews. On November 9 Dean Douglas and Janet Weise will come to give the perspective of the Engineering School on undergraduate education. John Bader, head of academic advising, is the guest for the evening meeting on December 7. Professor Poland said that Council had five scheduled events for January including an evening meeting. He suggested canceling the January evening meeting. Council members agreed.

A Council member commented that the student ethics issue was not discussed with Paula Burger. He suggested discussing that at some point. A Council member commented that the meetings on undergraduate education are going to be very useful. She suggested that a discussion of fundamental questions concerning the overall goals of undergraduate education at Johns Hopkins would be useful. Dean Weiss said that in the last few years a lot of attention has been given to undergraduate education. He suggested that the evening meetings focused on undergraduate education will cover many of these new initiatives and will provide a way for Council members to get caught up with what has been going on. At the end of that process there could be a substantive discussion and decisions could be made as to what to do next.

Dean Weiss commented it is his impression that the general sense of the Council is that this is an issue worth discussing. The question is how to proceed from here. He asked if the Council had a sense of what would be satisfactory. A Council member suggested having a committee with some Council representation, similar to the tenure committee. Dean Weiss commented that there is a strong tradition of decentralization here. CUE's mandate was so broad that they focused on a few things that could be fixed relatively quickly. The next step may be to think about a process involving faculty from the two divisions and a few Council members, have a focused discussion and then come back to Council. A Council member commented that since there is an on-going evaluation of all undergraduate programs in the School of Arts and Sciences and Dean Jones has something in the School of Engineering, he suggested waiting until Council has the data resulting from these discussions. Dean Weiss said that would probably be in the spring. Council members agreed.

Dean Weiss commented that information about the status of faculty hiring was on the table.

The Council turned to consideration of the Dean's suggestions of candidates to serve on the committee for the departmental review of Engineering Programs for Professionals. Dean Jones referred to the handout on the table and said that this is a point of information and if anyone had concerns he would be happy to hear them.

Dean Falk proposed that Professor Veena Das be the liaison to Board of Review, and Council agreed.

The Council turned to discussion of composition of Academic Council. Dean Weiss said that there was data in two forms showing the composition of the Academic Council - a color chart showing representation by area, and a summary. Dean Falk added that the color chart had been updated since last year. He noted that over time the representation on Council tracks divisional size pretty well, though there is fluctuation by area in 5-year memberships. Dean Falk added that the second chart shows the number of cases denied in Arts and Sciences over the years is very small, with more denials in Engineering. A Council member asked about other models for electoral procedures that might improve the situation and noted that our nomination procedure appears crazy, but seems to work. Dean Falk said that one idea that has come up in the past is to reconfigure Council for three or four-year terms and eliminate one-year terms. He said that this might improve area diversity as there is anecdotal evidence that people are inclined to vote first for those in their own areas. A Council member raised the idea of a nominating committee. Dean Weiss suggested finding out what peer institutions do in regard to election procedures.

Remarks by the Deans. Dean Jones observed there are many opportunities and the Deans do not always have the financial mobility to respond to some of them in a timely manner. This creates challenges and some concern about the risk of being left behind in certain key areas. Dean Weiss added that this is an issue in Arts and Sciences as well. A Council member suggested gathering information from other institutions on this issue.

The meeting adjourned at 5:22 p.m.

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