Minutes of the
Second Regular Meeting of the Twenty-Seventh Senate
Indiana University-Purdue University Fort Wayne
October 15, 2007
12:00 P.M., Kettler G46
Agenda
1. Call to order
2. Approval of the minutes of September 10, 2007
3. Acceptance of the agenda – B. Abbott
4. Reports of the Speakers of the Faculties
a. Indiana University – M. Nusbaumer
b. Purdue University – N. Younis
5. Report of the Presiding Officer
6. Committee reports requiring action
7. New business
8. Committee reports “for information only”
9. The general good and welfare of the University
Discussion of OnePurdue system implementation – W. Branson
10. Adjournment*
*The meeting will adjourn or recess by 1:15 p.m.
Presiding Officer: R. Hess
Parliamentarian: A. Downs
Sergeant-at-Arms: G. Steffen
Secretary: J. Petersen
___________________________________________________________________________
Attachments:
“Approval of replacement members of the Subcommittee on Athletics and Distance Education Subcommittee” (SD 07-1)
“Indiana-Purdue Student Government letter to the Senate (with regard to the personal counseling program at IPFW)” (Attachment A)
Senate Members Present:
B. Abbott, N. Adilov, A. Argast, S. Blythe, W. Branson, J. Burg, C. Champion, S. Choi,
S. Ding, P. Dragnev, B. Dupen, C. Erickson, R. Friedman, J. Garrison, I. Hack, S. Hannah, C. Hill, P. Iadicola, D. Lindquist, M. Lipman, G. McClellan, K. McDonald, G. Mourad,
D. Mueller, A. Mustafa, M. Nusbaumer, H. Odden, E. Ohlander, T. Parker, L. Roberts,
H. Samavati, R. Saunders, J. Summers, R. Sutter, J. Tankel, C. Thompson, J. Toole,
A. Ushenko, M. Walsh, G. Wang, M. Wartell, N. Younis, J. Zhao
Senate Members Absent:
B. Brewer, J. Grant, J. Hersberger, J. Jackson, D. Liu, L. Meyer, K. Moustafa, K. Pollock, M. Ridgeway, G. Voland
Faculty Members Present: L. Finke, B. Kanpol, K. O’Connell, S. Sarratore
Visitors Present: J. Dahl, P. Davich, R. Kostrubanic, P. McLaughlin, K. Soderlund (Journal Gazette), K. Tolliver
Acta
1. Call to order: R. Hess called the meeting to order at 12:03.
2. Approval of the minutes of September 10, 2007: The minutes were approved as distributed.
3. Acceptance of the agenda:
B. Abbott moved to approve the agenda as distributed.
The agenda was approved as distributed.
4. Reports of the Speakers of the Faculties:
a. Indiana University:
M. Nusbaumer: I have two things.
1) The report I mentioned last meeting, which Vice Chancellor Hannah was preparing in terms of grade inflation and the distribution of grades, has been completed. The short answer is we do not really have a grade inflation problem here. There are, however, in that report, a lot of other important information and statistics. I believe she will be forwarding the information to the Educational Policy Committee, and I have also encouraged her to make it available to the faculty if possible.
2) I received a report on the number of participants in the Upward Feedback evaluation system for administrators. I am troubled by it in the sense that last year, out of 350-380 faculty, we only had 70 people participating. That is less than 20 percent. I think, as a university citizen, it behooves all of us to provide feedback whenever we are asked and to set an example for our students. With less than 20 percent of the people participating, at this point it does not seem to be a very effective feedback mechanism.
b. Purdue University:
N. Younis: Good afternoon colleagues. I just have two suggestions:
1) I think it is time to revisit the need of some Senate committees, such as the Purdue University Committee on Institutional Affairs. Perhaps we need an IPFW Committee on Institutional Affairs.
2) Also, it has been awhile since we looked at the charges of the Senate committees and subcommittees.
5. Report of the Presiding Officer – R. Hess:
I was at the last meeting although I did not preside. I had asked Speaker Nusbaumer to preside because I had an appointment earlier in the morning and was not sure I would make it back in time. I also wanted him to handle it so that I could get a sense of the room.
At the last meeting, there was discussion concerning parliamentary procedure and addressing comments and remarks to the chair. Since then, there has been discussion of a gavel and, thanks to one of our senators who wanted to get it out of her house, I have a gavel. It may or may not be used depending upon what happens. The idea of directing comments to the Presiding Officer is simply so that on those issues, when we have serious discussion and we want to hear both sides, we have a systematic and orderly way of presenting that. So that is the rationale for that.
I want to thank Andy Downs for acting as parliamentarian. I have asked him to be responsible for the projection and internet access rather than having four or five people standing around trying to figure it out.
I want to thank Gary Steffen for serving as the sergeant-at-arms. I have gotten him a membership in the health club so he will be physically able to handle all of the rowdies in the group. I want to thank Jacqueline Petersen for her excellent service as secretary of the Senate.
I received a letter from the student government. It is a letter concerning the counseling program. It is a thoughtful letter, and I will have it included in the minutes. (R. Hess read the attached letter to the Senate.)
6. Committee reports requiring action:
Executive Committee (SD 07-1) – B. Abbott:
B. Abbott moved to approve SD 07-1 (Approval of replacement members of the Subcommittee on Athletics and Distance Education Subcommittee). Seconded.
Motion to approve passed on a voice vote.
7. New business: There was no new business.
8. Committee reports “for information only”: There were no reports.
9. The general good and welfare of the University:
C. Erickson: The Arts and Sciences Executive Committee met and talked about OnePurdue and our general dissatisfaction with the implementation of OnePurdue: the difficulties that chairs and others have had accessing their budgets and the question of timely paychecks. Apparently some people have not been paid on time, and there are hassles in accessing our paycheck stubs. The Arts and Sciences Executive Committee wanted to make some sort of statement expressing our dissatisfaction with it, and then perhaps have Senate approval and send that statement on to Purdue through our liaison to Purdue University.
W. Branson: I did get a copy of your e-mail. I will try to address the issues one by one from our perspective. There are really four issues that I will hit on.
1) Lack of consultation during development and implementation. Whether you are aware of it or not, during the development of the system we had staff members on virtually every committee. I cannot think of any committee where we were not represented. We had a lot of input as a campus. We had significant participation by people like Philip Davich, Kirk Tolliver, folks from Information Technology Services, Jack Dahl, Jim Ferguson, and me. We really tried to get the right people involved in the process. We had, and still continue to have, an oncampus committee made up of folks from Financial Affairs and Student Affairs. Jack Dahl was also on that committee. What we tried to do was to get input from those who we felt it was important at the time. To give you one example of that: there were a whole lot of things we did during implementation that really did not deal with faculty; but on ones where we did feel that input was important, we did seek that input. For instance, if you all remember, we had a lengthy discussion on pay periods because they were proposing two different pay cycles for faculty. Also, you had the ability to go online and provide input. We tried to get input from where we felt it was important. We tried to use our discretion and not involve people where we did not think we needed that input.
2) Instances of not receiving timely paychecks. Any payroll that is wrong is bad. We try to ingrain into all business office people that their number one priority is to get people paid on time and correctly. The bad news is that with the OnePurdue system, we have a couple of examples that we know that did not go right. One is that there were about four people in the summer who did not get paid right on the July 31 date. The other is that we did have a number of faculty in the fall who did not get their overload payment with their regular paycheck on the first pay period of the fall. Those are some of the kinds of things that have been happening.
An example of good news is that with limited-term lecturers, we are now paying them on August 31. About 80 percent of them got paid on August 31, which is sooner than they were paid a year ago. A year ago, it was the middle of September before they got a paycheck. Most of the payroll problems have been related to getting used to the new deadlines and getting paperwork submitted on time. The system appears to be, for the most part, calculating the pay correctly. The problem is getting information into the process, because deadlines are constantly moving. What we are finding is that it takes more time to process payroll than it used to, and so all the submission dates are sooner. That has created some challenges. During the implementation period it has been easier to get off-cycle paychecks, which means if somebody did not get paid, it has been easier to get a make-up paycheck than it was in the past. We feel good about that.
3) Inherent security problems in an online system. I am not quite sure what that means, but I am assuming that the concern is with databases, data files, and those kinds of things, when you keep them online versus hard-copy records.
a) Whether you realize it or not, we actually transmit information back and forth to West Lafayette in the OnePurdue system on a dedicated fiber optic line. Even though you are using your browser and it looks like you are on the web, you are not. We direct you through a dedicated line that has security, and that is how information is going back and forth. So we do not feel that is real vulnerable.
b) We are using better access controls than we had with the old system: stronger passwords and more password changes. Also, host equipment, particularly in West Lafayette, has stronger security controls than they used to including firewalls and data encryption; and they actually have intrusion prevention schemes that help provide security for the system. They also (and we did that here) tested the security. They hired a company to come in and actually try to probe the system and find holes where they could get in. Through that process, we have made some changes up here, and West Lafayette made other changes. So, it seems to be a fairly secure system.
In my opinion, the most vulnerable place is with the user. If people are still downloading information that they should not to their personal computer or they are creating files on their personal computer, that is going to be a problem more so than trying to get into the core of the system. But also, that is not any more vulnerable than the old system was. To give you another example of security in the new system: the old system keyed off social security numbers so, any time you did an entry in the old system, you had to have a social security number. The new system does not key off social security numbers – they are buried deep inside the system because you still have to have them for tax purposes – but they do not come up on reports.
4) Difficulty in accessing the information by people responsible for the budget. That has been a tough one. The reports have their shortcomings. They can be very difficult to read. I can understand those issues, and that is something we are trying really hard to address. There was a committee formed by West Lafayette about a month ago. It was put on a fast track to address many of the shortcomings of the reporting format and to come up with a list of reports that are needed. The target date for implementing those reports is before the end of the year. I hope they can meet that deadline. In the meantime, the data and information are there. We have been instructing department deans and others who need that information to go to their business manager and ask for the information. We are trying to address that problem.
Overall, the system has had its problems with implementation. Any system does. As we find the problems, we are trying to deal with them. I would be happy to answer any further questions.
P. Dragnev: With regard to the security of the system, the only important reason a faculty member would go into the career account is to look at the pay stub. Why was the pay stub eliminated? I do not remember what my password is, and I have to change it so often. So, now, if someone finds out my ID and my password, he can go in there and change the bank account of my electronic transfer. Is that not an obvious flaw in the system?
K. Tolliver: Your Indiana University-paid colleagues have had this same system since February, 2006, so Indiana University stopped printing their pay stubs over a year and a half ago. They are very aware of what problems you may be experiencing.
It is an electronic world. Any time you have to shuffle paper around, there is always a vulnerability there that someone will intercept it who should not intercept it. That is why Purdue University chose to go with electronic processing rather than continuing to print out pay statements.
P. Dragnev: Did they consult anyone about that change? The faculty is frustrated by that.
W. Branson: Yes, there was consultation. I am not sure where, but I know there was a lot of discussion about that. As Kirk Tolliver said, it really is actually a more secure system than shuffling paper around, because one of the biggest security vulnerabilities is piles of paper sitting on peoples’ desks.
B. Dupen: I think in terms of security and passwords, the passwords that I never change are the ones that I keep in my head. Passwords that I have to change every month are the ones that I write down on a piece of paper. If anyone would get into my office and find that, he could get into my account. But they cannot get into my phone voicemail because that password never changes. I think maybe a two-year change on passwords would make more sense than a 30-day change. If I am only checking it once every 30 days, I have to change it for every time that I use it.
W. Branson: There was a tremendous amount of discussion going on up until recently about changing passwords for folks who only have self-service access, who do not actually do anything in the system beyond what information they find for themselves. They have changed the policy to 120 days. For the account administrators, like Philip Davich, Kirk Tolliver, and me, we have access to the system to actually work in the system – we have a 30-day password. There was a tremendous amount of discussion because, quite frankly, that is one of the long-running security discussions – what makes sense in terms of passwords? You are right, if it is a 30-day password and especially if it is not anything you are familiar with, you have to write it down.
H. Samavati: I am an Indiana University faculty member, and this is exactly what happened to us with the Indiana University system, which needs a phrase for the password. They never solicited the faculty’s input as far as I know. I have not been able to get on several times. Finally I got on, but if you print it, it is just off-print and you cannot see the right information. Basically, it is the same issue that you have, Indiana University just switched to electronic, and we are having the same problems.
R. Sutter: Not that I have a real issue with it as I am a Mac user, but those of you who are PC users, is there spyware detection software installed on everybody’s computer so that when you type in your password and user name, it is not somehow tracked and traced? If that is the case, then what Senator Dragnev is discussing is a real possibility if somebody changes the account where your monies are routed.
R. Kostrubanic: There are a couple of things that we are looking at in the Information Technology community, because your gripes are our gripes. I have to remember the same passwords, and I have many more systems to deal with. One of the things that we are looking at is if we can go to the pass phrase as it is a lot easier to remember a pass phrase. The second thing we are looking at is a fob. If you are an infrequent user, having a fob that has your password on it that is changeable every 30 days is a good idea. You just put the fob in your USB port, and you can get in. It can also have multiple passwords on it, so that is another approach to doing that. Spybot is another thing we are looking at. You are right, I run Spybot on my system about every three days and I catch people phishing for my keyboard. So there are quite a few things we are looking at to try to make this a lot easier.
P. Dragnev: I have been on this campus ten years and never used my career account until that changed. Why exactly are we doing this, just to save pay stubs? Is that it, because I am printing it anyway. This is a common thing that you keep with your records. What does this save?
W. Branson: When you look at the overall system, in terms of printing and mailing, it is a tremendous savings.
C. Erickson: I am still sensing some real dissatisfaction here in the body, and I am wondering what is going to happen with this statement that Arts and Sciences created. Will it go on to Purdue University, because I am not hearing as many satisfactory answers as I would like. I know they are still working on the system and there are still bugs to be ironed out, but how long are we going to have to wait until this system is working and in place; and we will not have to worry about security issues, or have to punch in a new password every 30 days.
W. Branson: I cannot give you the timeframe. The password, though, if you only have access to self-service, is 120 days now. That is the new policy. They are trying to be reasonable and reactive and adjust those things. If this body wants to send a statement, then you should.
A. Ushenko: I am one of the few people left who is not computer literate. When computers were first out, people were complaining about how they were used – garbage in garbage out. We have problems that go along with a cybernetic world. There were also problems that went along with piles of paperwork. There are security problems that are just indigenous when you have a system relying on artificial intelligence which, when you trip the right pattern, it is going to come up with the right response. How much is this due to changes that are being made and how much is this due to the nature of the new cybernetic world we live in? There are so many advantages, which even I can see.
M. Lipman: I want to make it clear that the sense of the Arts and Sciences statement, as we talked about in the Executive Committee, was not addressed at the efforts being put forth by the folks on this campus who we all know are having a hard time with the system. It was directed at the original designers and implementers. There is no one here that we are grumping about because we see the efforts being put out. It is more along the lines of we had systems that worked.
R. Sutter: If my memory serves me correctly, we were consulted on changes to the pay periods. I did the online survey and requested the status quo. I seem to remember getting a response that around 78 or 80 percent of the faculty wanted the status quo, and they said that was not possible with the new system. I know I am speaking for a number of other individuals, this half paycheck in May and half paycheck in August is a killer. I do not care how you budget, it is difficult to deal with.
W. Branson: But I think we have provided ways to help budget for that, for one year.
K. Tolliver: That is correct. There was a salary advance available for this year only.
J. Tankel: In regard to Speaker Nusbaumer’s reference to the study on grade inflation, just so you know, that report was delivered to the Educational Policy Committee. We did look at it and, just to elaborate on one sentence, we do not have a problem. What that data says is, across the timeframe of five or six years, there has been no change at all in grade distribution. We may argue about what that grade distribution is, but there has been no grade shift over at least the last five or six years. That is the main piece of information we got out of it in the Educational Policy Committee.
10. The meeting adjourned at 12:37 p.m.
Jacqueline J. Petersen
Secretary of the Faculty
