Espy to be watched over by "council of elder faculty"

That's the latest JH rumor, following closely on Gottfredson's decision to have Jamie Moffitt keep an eye on Robin Holmes and her ongoing EMU fiasco. Still nothing solid on who will get stuck with child-care for Jim Bean and Randy Geller - or for how long - but keep the speculation coming.

We'll know more after the head's retreat tomorrow. At the top of the agenda is building trust between the administration and faculty. Whoops, that was from Bean's 2010 agenda. Never mind. 10/1/2012.

Update: New UO CIO Melissa Woo is liveblogging the retreat, here. 
Woo's notes, used without permission, my emphasis added:

9am-ish... President Gottfredson is addressing the room
- Recruitment / retention important, means need for more faculty, means space needs
- Institutional Board matter - Pres has spent considerable time speaking on- and off-campus about this. A report was issued on the matter; Pres thinks it's a good document. Paying close attention to aspects of how such boards are formed and type of authorizations involved. 

Jim Bean talking
- Looking at new org chart
- At the top of the chart is The Box (containing both the President and Provost)
- Direct reports to President: General Counsel, Dir Intercollegiate Athletics, VP Development, VPFA
- Big part of the tree reports through Provost
- Number of VPs reporting directly to Provost rather than President
- Note that the new org chart and doc about responsibilities will be posted to Provost's web site 

- Enrollment is around 24.8K students; would prefer to bring infrastructure up to meet needs if exceed 24.5K students
- Study in College of Education showed that economy is more suited to a 30-40-30 ratio
- Challenges resulting from growth - offices, classrooms, faculty
- President has an interest in more growth in tenure-track faculty than is described in the Academic Plan
- Expansions - Global Scholars, Allen Hall; addt'l big project is to add 1000 more classroom seats, still needs fundraising
- Capital project list that has gone to gov office - 3 projects "above the line" - renovation for more classroom seats, Chapman Hall, Science LIbrary
- Other projects being considered on campus - new A&AA bldg (University St up to 18th St), global institute (largely classroom/office bldg btwn Chapman and Art Museum) 

Online education
- History of campus is that f2f instruction has been favored
- Many on campus want to get involved in online instruction
- Big time universities are getting into online education... and this should scare us
- Addt'l driver for online - K-12 not offering foreign languages, but a requirement for admission to UO. Does this mean we have to offer foreign languages to K-12 students or drop requirement?
- Trying a couple of experiments this winter - 3-year experiment starting in Jan to offer Masters; Oba learning platform
- Major changes - move of instructional tech into library; IDR data warehouse; CRM (constituent relationship management); additions to machine rooms/data centers 

- Initiative to renovate EMU - President has put together a task force to look at this in a way will reduce load on student fees
- Evaluate UO Portland 

- Setting the priorities for the Provost's office:
-- needed to address concerns from the faculty that the Provost wasn't spending enough time talking/listening to campus constituents
-- started prioritization at summer retreat: do strategic planning based on the Academic Plan; develop clear academic vision and align resources to the plan; develop an IT strategic plan; increase funding to campus; improve quality of undergraduate program; support spires of excellence; globalization
-- next steps?
--- Have a Senate-supported, full community survey to see if the broader community agrees with the results of the retreat
--- do a review of the Big Ideas
--- do a review of the Academic Plan 

Questions
- Is there a plan for retention of faculty?
-- Considered to be a critical issue; will be beginning talks with bargaining unit, can't change contracts broadly until bargaining is completed; recruitment and retention of faculty are critically important
- How are making sure that our resources are aligning against our goals, especially in light of AAU metrics?
-- President wants to understand the campus budget model more fully; perhaps move the model in the direction of the academic purposes and priorities; believes that AAU metrics are important to us, a major source of inspiration in the President's opinions though there are concerns about it
- Where did the carry-forwards actually "live," and why can't depts get interest on that money?
-- Note that the budget model is a relationship between the deans and the Provost; the college has a relationship with the dept heads and the college; in the last legislative session, campus got the right to get interest on carry-forwards (didn't have previously) that are kept centrally w/state; can have conversation about distribution of the interest
- Concern about the short-term impact on the long-term education. Feels that undergrad education at UO is the worst it's been.
-- Mentioned what happened at UWash and UC System that increased students at UO, putting strain on infrastructure. Most concerned about the ratio of tenured faculty. Need to work on "dialing back" to get back to better levels.
- re: the new org chart - looking at the direct reports to the President and is concerned... no direct reports to either President or Provost are responsible for educating the students and maintaining quality of undergraduate programs
-- President says that an org chart serves both symbolic and pragmatic purposes. The practical aspect of the org chart shows two leaders for institution (president outward facing, provost inward facing), also demonstrates that the Chief Academic Officer is also the Chief Operating Officer which means that academics are the focus of operations; the new org chart is an initial plan and can be adjusted as needed
- Concern about graduate student education. How to provide a high quality research experience for our grad students?
-- The 19% grad student metric is based on our peers. Feels that budget model should be subordinate to our academic goals. One of the goals is a commitment to strong graduate programs.
- How do you envision space in the context of the capital campaign, and how can we think of debt differently?
-- Something of focus w/institutional board matter is how we can handle debt. Looking into many options for how we can acquire space.
- Is UO Portland a priority?
-- Need more analysis, but do feel it's important to have a presence in Portland.
- Has UO considered taxing the athletics program?
-- Evaluating relationship with athletic program
- Looking into non-tenture track faculty and educational experience for students?
-- NNTF are important, but can't lose sight of tenured faculty in relationship with AAU metrics; # of credits tenture track/NNTF = 0.6; AAU institutions ranged from 0.6 to above 1 for ratio; matter of balance between teaching loads of NNTF and tenured faculty; critical to have both for success 

GTFF president
- Graduate Teaching Fellows have a chance to unionize
- Represent 1400 GTFs on campus; 17-18% are full members
- Bargain and represent GTFs on grievances
- Main goals - solve issues and protect GTFs
- Responsibilities of GTFs and collective bargaining agreement posted on website