Staff and Administrative Council

February 08, 2005

Present: Bartolomeo, R.; Brennan, K.; Callaghan, M.; Casali, M.; Cipollone, G.; Colangelo, F.; Feller, T.; Finn, M.; Mastantuoni, A.; Pace, M.; Palladino, R.; Pascuzzi, K.; Patota, N.; Reilly, K.; Southworth, J.; Torigian, A., Wenchell, L.; Young-Wright, K.

Absent: Antonelli, R.; Cagianello, D.; English, L.; Graham, D.; McDermott, J.; Moore, C.

I. Approval of Minutes of November 23, 2004 SAC Meeting

Unanimously approved.

II. Report from the College Council Standing Committees

A) Athletics

The Committee met on February 8, 2005.

The Student Athletic Body continued the trend of maintaining a GPA of 3.0 or higher, achieving an average GPA of 3.07 for Fall ’04. Baseball showed the greatest improvement with a 25% increase to a GPA of 2.96. Softball increased by 7% obtaining a GPA of 3.54 and Men’s Cross County had a 5% increase.

At the Iona vs. Fairfield game there will be recognition of athletes who have a 3.0 GPA.

The Hines Athletic Center is for the general student population and will be open 18 –19 hours a day.

There will be an Academic Center , which will have computers for the student use.

B) Information Technology and Computing

The Committee met online.

Students will need to sign off on a statement when they bring in their laptops to IT for repairs. This statement will say that the student is the owner of the laptop that is brought in and that IT will make every effort to correct any problem, needing at least 5 working days to do this. It will state that the student is responsible for backing up all files on the computer, in the event that the computer needs to be reformatted.

A letter in support of additional funding for the Mass Communication Department’s new lab was approved.

III. Governance - Follow-up of data from the Provost

Dr. Rosenberg seemed pleased with the data that the governance survey generated, in spite of some problems that certain constituencies experienced when it was emailed. The over all sense from the data was positive. The Provost feels that the governance structure is working in regards to the standing committees and how issues are handled. The understanding is that a follow up to this survey from the Provost should be coming out in the near future.

SAC Suggestions related to Governance Survey and Outreach:

Future surveys should be done on paper as opposed to email, to eliminate technical problems that some of our constituencies experienced in regards to not being able to see the entire screen or not being able to send back answers to survey questions.

It was suggested that certain terms be defined so that everyone understands and knows what is being asked.

It was recommended that a test survey be issued prior to any future surveys being sent out, to iron out any unforeseen problems. Having a feedback seminar once the surveys are completed, with a cross section of constituencies will help in understanding the answers given.

It was suggested that by sending out a brochure to everyone on campus identifying what SAC is and who the members are, it would help everyone on campus become more aware of what this committee does as well as get more people involved.

The question remains, how will we divide the campus so that everyone on campus is contacted by SAC members? A separate meeting within the next two weeks will be called. A once a year open SAC meeting for all to attend and participate in, prior to the last meeting of the year, may engage more people to get involved in SAC and will also help create a yearly agenda. A five- minute power point presentation was suggested as a component part of the planned open meeting.

IV. Visioning Committee

On January 24-25, 2005 there was a Visioning Retreat where the Board of Trustees along with approximately 40 colleagues (faculty, staff, administrators, students) were able to interact and communicate their visions for Iona’s future. Endowment is the key for the 10 year vision. The Steering Committee will be collecting more data as well as reaching out to constituents on campus to get a balanced sense of what everyone envisions for Iona’s future.

The issue of everyone on campus being a stakeholder in Iona’s future was repeated in groups and in conversation. Customer Service came up as something we must ensure throughout campus to have a more consistent approach to issues and problems that students encounter. In response to this information, SAC members suggested that courses or seminars on campus for staff and administration training and development should be initiated.

V. New Business

The time-out feature of PeopleSoft was raised. Some departments feel that the system ‘times out’ too quickly when stepping away or when being interrupted by other tasks. Gabriela Cipollone will look into this matter.

The question of whether or not it is an option to have full Fridays off versus half-day Fridays was raised. Is it more cost effective to have entire Fridays during the summer off, for a limited number of days, as opposed to the number of half days currently used? Some members expressed concern over the way this might impact vacation time and coverage of various departments (i.e. Library) which need to be open and available to students. The consensus was that that we enjoy half day Fridays and don’t want to jeopardize this.

Submitted, M.Pace

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