Cabinet Meeting Minutes

29 April 2004

Present: Tony Macias, Duane Elms, Barbara James, Julie Morales, Christie Miller, Chris Casey, Rick Johnson, Gwen Cassel, Chris Farren, Carmen Maynes, Dan Tressler, Donna Rees, Julie Miller, Faye Vowell, John Counts

The President welcomed Dan Tressler from the Foundation to the Cabinet.

Reminder: May 13 is the last day to change your health insurance coverage.

There has been a change in the federal regulations governing overtime. If you make less than $455 per week, you are eligible for overtime. HR is going through the list of employees to see who this will affect.

May 17 is the start of the renovation of Phelps Dodge/Martinez. The parking lot in front of PD will be staging area so there will no parking there this summer. In the fall semester, some handicapped spaces will be available for parking. Jan 7, 2005is the projected ending date for the project.

Our Sodhexo contract has ended. Henry Sanchez is acting director of maintenance.

The budget will be sent to CHE on Friday.

The RFPs for nursing and education will be sent to CHE today.

Rick Johnson was re-elected as President of the Faculty Senate.

The President approved the plan for increases to the adjunct and overload budget put forward by Rick Johnson and Faye Vowell subject to being sure it does not bust the budget.

Chairs are discussing the change to the salary plan for adjuncts and overloads. We are discussing moving to a two step plan from ranks.

The Farmers Market in Deming laid off 60 people yesterday. WNMU has put together the team to help address the issue.

There will be a meeting on the Playas project on Friday.

Mary Billings, Donna Rees, Faye Vowell and Chris Farren met with four area superintendents to discuss the needs of their middle school teachers in regard to having 24 hours of content in their teaching areas. We will be taking some action to help them address the problem.

Hearings for reallocation of graduate assistants and institutional work studies in Academic Affairs will be held on Tuesday afternoon. These are open to the public. The Budget Committee and the President of the Faculty Senate will sit with the VPAA and the AVPAA to make the allocation decisions.

On May 15 from 3:00 to 5:00, congressman Steve Pearce will be here.

Faculty in Gallup have expanded the scope of BIA project. Martha Gomez has been hired to help.

We are testing lots of GED people in TorC and Deming.

Donna Rees is asking for $167,000 from WIA next year for a number of projects.

Offices need to talk with work studies to be sure that they are giving out the right information on the phone. For example, students in Gallup who want to attend classes in Silver City can enroll in Gallup. They do not have to go to Silver City to enroll.

Faye Vowell met with the Grad Deans at the state level on Friday. There has been a freeze on approval of new graduate programs at CHE.

The Foundation is working on scholarship awards for fall semester. They are reconciling billing for 03-04 scholarships.

Kathryn Elms has volunteered to work with the Foundation on their accounting software package.

Dan Tressler is working with Michael Metcalf and a group from Salary and Benefits on the Endowed Professorship effort. The President asked for a meeting on this topic to stay abreast of the planning and aggressively pursue fund raising.

James Stadium plaques are being installed.

Dan Tressler has begun work on the GO bond publicity fund raising.

There was a retreat in the School of HSHP last Friday. Katherine Woodard will be the next dean. She will officially take over on July 1. Gwen Cassel and Katherine Woodard are working on a smooth transition. Faculty positions in the school are being searched for.

Judy Alfred will be the new Public Services Manager in Miller Library. We are pleased to welcome her.

Eight people in library will do A plus certification training during the interim.

The NM library conference took place last week; 5 people from Miller library attended. Julie Miller presented a workshop.

Next week, the Salt of the Earth 50th anniversary symposium will take place. Daytime events will be at Cobre High School. The night time events will be on our campus. The library has tickets for sale. There is a lot going on, please attend and enjoy.

Tonight is the Meet the Mustangs night in Las Cruces. Admissions is doing the organizing for this event.

There will be an alumni get together on May 18 in Deming. We are honoring people who have provided scholarships.

The Great Race was successful; we had a wonderful turnout.

Christie Miller will attend the Indianapolis alumni chapter meeting the last weekend in June.

The Westwind will be out this week.

Walmart is repainting its walls; we are working to get the Western sign repainted.

Mary Hittle has been elected president of Staff Senate; she will take office in October.

The employee of the year has been selected and will be announced at graduation.

A campus wide cleanup will take place on Saturday, from10 to 11.

Duane Elms will be gone next week to Baldrige boot camp.

Extended University will fund microwave transmission to Watts. It will provide better faster service to Watts.

The FIPSE grant will pay for student kiosks in a number of places on campus.

Magdaleno Manzanares and MEChA will work with IT to translate our webpages into Spanish . We will also do Navajo and Zuni web pages.

A wireless test is being set up in Chino. IT hoped to set up a couple of campus hot spots this summer.

Installation of wireless surveillance cameras are being discussed. IT and Housing are talking about a trial of this technology. Security is an issue with our students as documented by the Noel Levitz survey.

Duane Elms shared his concern about a student worker who was assaulted last week off campus.

Tony Macias attended conference in San Antonio on career and technical education. He attended sessions on portfolios and on certification.

Tony Macias, Socorro Rico, and Maria Rolfe made a trip to the Technical Institute at Casas Grandes on Tuesday and Wednesday . He is finalizing a grant proposal. A faculty exchange in the technical English and Spanish language areas was also discussed.

Jasmine Fallstich and Eric Broyles were elected as Student Senate President and Vice President.

The Student Senate is meeting this evening to discuss the naming of the Student Memorial.

Housing is completely full in Regents and Muir Heights has only one left.

Cafeteria reconstruction will be done this summer.

The Document Imaging PMT is continuing to plan implementation.

Dr. Farren is planning a summer meeting with campus representatives and the Foundation to brainstorm campus priorities for fund raising.

On Monday May 3 from 6 to 8:00, the Student Government banquet will be held at President House. Cabinet is invited.

May 6 is Salt of the Earth reception at McCray patio.

President Counts meets with the Council of Presidents tomorrow. CUP will visit with the chair of the Higher Education Task Force.

President Counts is meeting with Daniel Mora , Director of the Technologico de Monterry (ITESM) in Cd. Juarez, Mexico on May 17 from 12:00 to 7:00 and from May 18 from 8:00 to 10:00 to discuss collaborative activities.

Our last Cabinet meeting will be the week of 10 May 2004

Executive Council Meeting

Barbara Taylor met with Executive Council to discuss staff unit assessment plans. As a result of the discussion, Barbara Taylor will go back to Staff Senate and ask that they do an inventory of the assessment currently being done in staff units on campus. They might present results at the Assessment Convocation.

Lloyd Cowling and Donna Rees came to discuss an online course fee. We will go with a pilot project of a $100 lab fee for the graduate level information security courses taught online.