President’s Report to Academic and Professional Faculty

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President Donald P. Christian’s January 2017 report to the Academic and Professional Faculty:

Welcome to the start of the spring semester. I wish you each a productive, engaging and rewarding term. Below, I share news and updates since my December report. My knee-replacement surgery went well, my recovery is on track, and I am gradually returning to work duties, while recognizing that full recovery from an operation like this takes time and patience. I appreciate the good wishes that many of you have sent.

Our Times. I repeat here the “welcome” message I sent to the campus last week – along with some additional thoughts in the final paragraphs.

Our semester begins at a time of political and social division in our nation that has heightened angst, uncertainty and anger – among people of many different political views, for different reasons. Certainly colleges and universities are not immune from these tensions. It is in that vein that I reinforce messages and values I shared with the campus community in the fall. We must remain committed to our educational mission and the academic and human values at the core of our work. Our campus is a diverse array of people of different races, religions, national origins, sexual and gender orientations/identities, ages, physical abilities, intellectual interests and political views. This is a particular time for us to speak and listen respectfully and carefully, and to be wary of “us versus them” polarization and sensationalized rhetoric that impede healthy disagreement, shared understanding and finding common ground.

We condemn hate speech and incidents of bias and take the harm they cause to our community seriously. Anyone who encounters hate speech or incidents of bias is encouraged to contact the Dean of Students, who may refer them to University Police. With equal commitment we must also uphold viewpoint diversity, rights of free speech, and academic freedom. We all share in the responsibility of creating community where all members feel safe, supported, and encouraged in their academic endeavors, employment, and personal lives. We must be intentional in educating for all of these purposes, like the training that we provided just last week for more than 100 Resident Assistants on the boundaries between free speech and hate speech, and on the judicial options available to students who believe their rights have been violated. Students who have such experiences should contact the Dean of Students for guidance or support. The classroom and discussion boards can often be a place of important and provocative conversation. We call upon our faculty to encourage respectful and professional dialogue so that all student perspectives feel included. We remind the community of resources shared last fall which can be found at https://www.newpaltz.edu/president/freespeech.html.

Our campus, like the rest of society, will no doubt struggle with balancing the conflicts that sometimes surround the realization of these values. I encourage patience, good will and a spirit of educating each other as we engage that struggle.

Additional thoughts: Elements of the national discourse will no doubt influence our work and our mission in other ways. At a time when some in our nation question or even ridicule the value of a college education, it is worth reminding ourselves that many others still join us in believing there is no better investment any society can make than educating the next generation of citizens. It is important that we help our students not lose sight of the important investment they are making in their future. At the same time, we must have the humility to recognize the imperative that we evolve with changing conditions.

In this climate, we may find a need to be even more attentive to calling out for our students (and, on occasion, perhaps each other!) positions or perspectives that are inimical to our academic enterprise: The notion that knowledge and expertise are somehow irrelevant; that all viewpoints have equal validity; the failure to recognize that facts, interpretations and opinions are not the same, and should carry different currency in intellectual exchange; the grave risks of dismissing out-of-hand well-established scientific findings, indeed the process of science; the danger of ignoring the lessons of history; the idea that terse verbal jabs at each other constitute meaningful discourse. None of these concerns is new, of course, but there may be reason to expect they will become more prominent in our work, and we should be prepared to address them thoughtfully.

TABLE OF CONTENTS:

  • Mumps – We have increased educational efforts to reduce the spread of mumps among continuing and new transfer students.
  • Rankings – We again were included in Kiplinger’s Best Values national ranking of public college and all (public + private) institutions, and scored highly in a Social Mobility Index ranking.
  • Faculty Numbers – Numbers of faculty positions in all categories were largely stable from fall 2015 to fall 2016, as was the percentage of courses taught by part-time adjuncts.
  • Budget News – I provide a brief summary of relevant elements of Governor Cuomo’s Executive Budget, the starting point of developing next year’s State and SUNY budgets. I also remind faculty and staff that this spring we will continue a consultative process to inform essential decisions to bring expenditures and revenues into balance.
  • Undocumented Students – Board of Trustees passed a resolution Jan. 24 affirming and highlighting several protections already in place for immigrant and undocumented students. These are consistent with recent guidelines issues by New York State Attorney General Eric Schneiderman. The resolution and guidelines preceded last Friday’s Executive Order and its resulting disruption, and will continue to guide SUNY action to support students, faculty, and staff. Our national organizations are monitoring implementation of the Executive Action and sharing further information as available.
  • Diversity Initiatives – We await feedback from SUNY on our Diversity and Inclusion Plan before sharing the plan more broadly; Diversity and Inclusion Council to meet Feb. 3; new faculty and student members to be added.

Mumps. We continue steps to contain the spread of mumps on campus following last fall’s outbreak. About 1,500 campus community members received booster shots during a two-day clinic in mid-December in collaboration with the county and state health departments. “Mumpsbusters” posters around campus caution about common modes of transmission, encourage frequent hand washing and use of hand sanitizers, and announce free booster shots for students at the Student Health Center (again, the dual immunization that most of our students had as children confers <90% protection). Educational efforts with residence hall students and student athletes have been boosted. We have been vigilant about getting proof of immunization for new transfer students joining us this spring. We are hopeful that these steps will have a positive impact, even as we are aware that other campuses that have had outbreaks continued to have isolated cases as the disease faded away.

I again want to express my gratitude to the faculty and staff who worked with students last semester who were infected with mumps or directed to leave campus because they were given religious or medical exemptions from vaccination, and to the staff and administrators in the Student Health Center, on the Emergency Management Team, and beyond for their care, diligence, and expertise in guiding our community response to this outbreak.

Rankings. Kiplinger’s Best Values Listings. SUNY New Paltz was again named to Kiplinger’s Personal Finance ranking of “100 Best Values in Public Colleges,” based on educational quality, graduation rate, and affordability. New Paltz also (again) was included in the top 200 institutions in Kiplinger’s “Best College Values of 2016,” a ranking that includes 300 public and private institutions drawn from a starting group of about 1,200. We joined six other SUNY campuses on each list.

Social Mobility Index. I shared last year that SUNY New Paltz ranked #88 (among more than 900 public and private institutions) on a data-driven ranking system measuring practices that reverse the growing economic disparity in our country – how well schools improve economic mobility and provide affordable education to disadvantaged families. In this year’s ranking, New Paltz was #72 of 918 schools ranked. We joined the four SUNY university centers, SUNY Maritime, and two other SUNY comprehensives in the top 100.

I often tell people that I share healthy skepticism about college rankings, but as long as they are being published I’d rather be included in them than not. And, rather than the rankings themselves, I am always more proud of the underlying metrics (retention and graduation rates, low tuition, financial aid, low average debt at graduation) and the way that we fulfill our public mission. These are collective achievements, and I am grateful to all members of our community for your contributions to our continuing success.

Faculty Numbers. Each year at this time I provide an update on trends in faculty numbers. The number of full-time faculty in fall 2016 was 373, up from 366 in fall 2015. Tenured and tenure track faculty numbers have been essentially stable at 285-287 for 2015 and 2016; those figures are up from 274 in fall 2013 and from 258 in 2011, before we began investing tuition increases in new faculty positions. I continue to hear the perception – most recently shared by several faculty with the governance consultant who visited campus last month – that the number of tenured/tenure-line positions has decreased. That perception is inaccurate. Tenure-track positions did not grow in the past year because our budget has been flat with no increase in either state taxpayer support or tuition.

While we have been growing tenure-line rolls, we have also increased the number of lecturer and visiting assistant professor positions – combined, from 54 in 2011 to 81 in 2016. Some of these hires have been one-year “placeholders” while tenure-track searches are underway; others are in areas where non-tenure track full-time faculty help meet high instructional demands, and others where a need must be filled more quickly than is possible with a tenure-line search. The intended strategy has been to increase reliance on full-time faculty and continue our long-term goal of reducing reliance on adjuncts. However, the number of adjuncts has not decreased to the degree expected. The number of part-time faculty in fall 2016 was 247, compared with 249 in fall 2015, and the percentage of courses taught by adjuncts increased slightly from 28.9% in 2015 to 29.1% in 2016 – above our record low of 26% in 2012 but below the >30% in 2008-2011 and 50% in the early 2000s. We offered 1,346 course sections in fall 2016, compared with 1,341 in fall 2015.

Budget News. Governor Cuomo has released his Executive Budget for the 2017/18 fiscal year. This is an important factor in the process toward an enacted budget for next year, setting the stage for the compromises and tradeoffs among the Governor, Senate, and Assembly and the influence of our advocacy with legislators. Here I summarize some of the key elements of the Governor’s budget of particular relevance to SUNY:

  • Excelsior Scholarship Program: Beginning in the fall of 2017, resident undergraduate students from households making less than $100,000 will be able to attend any SUNY or CUNY school tuition free. The income threshold will increase to $125,000 in 2019. Recipients must be full time, and on track to finish an associate’s degree in two years, or a bachelor’s degree in four years. There is some expectation that the program will lead to increased enrollment, especially at the community colleges. How the program will be funded is already a topic of major discussion. The Governor has included a line item in the budget of $163 million to cover the program’s estimated costs. Scholarship recipients cannot be charged tuition higher than 2016-17 rates, carrying possible financial implications for campuses.
  • No increase in taxpayer support for state-operated campuses like New Paltz.
  • A five-year tuition plan that would empower the Board of Trustees to increase resident undergraduate tuition up to $250 per year.
  • An increase in “critical maintenance” capital funding from $200 million to $550 million annually for five years to invest in campus infrastructure, modernize academic buildings and spaces to meet demand, and renovate spaces to facilitate collaborative learning and consolidation of student academic support services. We would expect our campus share of this funding to be on a scale of about $15 million annually. That is likely insufficient for any new construction, but the Chancellor has requested an additional major piece of capital funding, and we are advocating with our legislators for funding for new construction. The budget authorizes the use of a “design/build” method of contracting that may reduce costs and allow projects to be completed more quickly.
  • Continuation of $18 million for the Investment and Performance Fund;
  • A New York State DREAM Act that would allow undocumented students to be eligible for the Tuition Assistance Program (TAP) and other types of state financial assistance programs.
  • The Executive Budget includes provisions for increases in oversight of procurement and of campus-linked foundations.

We will join SUNY efforts to continue advocating for restoration of “maintenance of effort” in the budget plan, and for funding for the costs of any new collectively bargained salary increases. We are beginning our conversations with legislators and our involvement in SUNY budget advocacy.

In the coming weeks, you will hear more about a process for consultation and input to inform decisions we must make to address an imbalance between revenue and expenditures – independent of changes in the State budget. Continued declines in graduate enrollment this semester have made that situation more challenging than we had assessed previously.

Undocumented Students. At its meeting last week, the SUNY Board of Trustees passed a resolution reaffirming longstanding policies and practices that strongly support undocumented students and address many of the concerns raised by those advocating for campuses to declare themselves “sanctuaries,” a term with no common legal basis or meaning. Also this month, New York State Attorney General Eric Schneiderman issued guidelines for local law enforcement agencies about participating in immigration enforcement; the Trustees resolution is fully consistent with those guidelines. The resolution and guidelines preceded last Friday’s Executive Order and its resulting disruption. These documents will continue to guide SUNY action to support students, faculty, and staff. As we shared in yesterday’s communication, SUNY leadership is tracking this situation closely. The American Association of State Colleges and Universities, of which we are a member, is monitoring implementation of the Executive Order and will share actionable information as appropriate.

Key elements of the Board of Trustees resolution include:

  • Continuation of longstanding policy that University Police departments do not participate in enforcement of federal immigration law except under court order or other legal mandate;
  • Strong support for DACA, citing the letter to the President-elect signed by the Chancellor and several campus presidents (including me) supporting continuation of the program;
  • Continue longstanding practice of prohibiting discriminatory actions on the basis of protected class, including national origin;
  • Continue to advocate for federal and state financial assistance for undocumented students;
  • Continue longstanding practice of defending privacy rights of students and requiring a subpoena, court order, search warrant or other exception to FERPA;
  • Continue longstanding practice of allowing undocumented individuals to pay resident tuition, provided criteria specified by State law are met;
  • Continue practice and policy of not considering national origin or immigration status in admissions decisions;
  • Continue longstanding practice of welcoming students of all religions;

Working with UPD Chief David Dugatkin and Interim VP for Student Affairs Wayne Brumfield, I will comply with the requirement of the resolution that each campus president shall certify by April 1, 2017 that the campus has adopted policies for its University Police Department consistent with the Attorney General’s Immigration Enforcement Guidance.

The full text of the Trustees resolution is available here and the Attorney General’s guidance here.

Diversity Initiatives. We have not yet received feedback from SUNY on our Diversity and Inclusion Plan. We will share the plan with the entire campus community once we know that the SUNY review does not point to needed substantive revision. Nonetheless, our Diversity and Inclusion Council will meet on Feb. 3 to begin its work, including prioritizing the most important issues for implementation. We will be adding additional members to the initial group of faculty, staff, and administrators constituting the Council.

Again, best wishes for a successful and enjoyable spring semester. I will respond to your questions and comments about this and my February report at next month’s meeting of the Academic and Professional Faculty.

Sincerely,

Donald P. Christian
President