The University Senate discussed random drug testing of student athletes, motions for establishing faculty input in hiring administration and creating a process to review executive administrators at its Wednesday meeting.
Senate President Robert Kyr told the governing faculty body there would be no vote on the random drug testing policy because, after review, it was decided the issue had to be handled by administrators. However, Kyr said, “Reviewing the OAR has brought up important questions about scholarships to student-athletes.” The Intercollegiate Athletics Committee will reconsider the current policies about revoking scholarships for student-athletes and prepare a report to be given in January.
The big issue of the night was the motions presented by Prof. Bill Harbaugh to establish faculty input on hiring executive administrators and creating an open-review process of them.
Presenting the motions, Harbaugh said, “Neither of these motions are meant to be contentious. My hope is that we can have consistent faculty input in reviews. From what I’ve been able to tell, there has been no regular review process for UO administrators in the past 16 years.”
University Provost Jim Bean refuted the assertion: “I had an audit done just this morning for all the deans and vice presidents and other administrators, and there was just one person who had not been reviewed in the last five years. It’s not accurate that we haven’t been doing them. We do them on a five-year cycle. We are doing a full slate of them this year.”
Prof. Randy Sullivan stood up, asking that if there was an existing review process, why hadn’t the faculty been told of it before.
Bean clarified later that there was a review process, but the results are completely confidential.
Before the motions came up, University President Michael Gottfredson had endorsed the spirit of the idea, saying, “I wanted to note that all of us are totally committed to periodic evaluations with peer input that are done on a routine basis.”
ASUO President Laura Hinman spoke during the discussion, advocating that students be included in any review process. Harbaugh said he had intended for students to be included, but the language was unclear, and he would change it to reflect student representation.
Both motions passed unanimously. Now, an ad hoc committee will be assembled to fashion an official policy for the UO on reviewing executive administrators.
Later on in the meeting, Carolyn McDermed, interim chief of the UO Police Department, came to the Senate meeting to collect questions for consideration as they transition into becoming a full police force. In January, they plan to return to discuss carrying firearms on campus. ASUO Sen. Will Steiner@@checked@@ asked UOPD if there were any studies on how armed police affects campus safety.