The University Council met Thursday with updates on the progress of various committee projects.
Here's a breakdown of new developments:
Responsible research expansion
The University Council is looking to expand upon federal guidelines regarding how to fund research proposals. The research committee is awaiting a draft on a "more expansive" and "robust" policy, committee chair Scott McFadden said after pointing out the committee has made no progress on the new policy since late 2015.
In conjunction with the research committee, the areas not covered in federal guidelines that the Office of Research Integrity aims to emphasize include research ethics, education training, professional misconduct, appropriate research planning, data management practices, mentor training and responsibilities, collaborative research, publication integrity and peer and academic review of procedures.
Next University Council meeting: 4 p.m. April 6 in the David Letterman Communication and Media Building Room 125.
Aside from policy expansion, the research committee approved and funded 10 graduate research grants in various subject areas out of 16 submitted.
Class registration for veteran students
The admissions and credits committee is researching ways to allow students with veteran status to register for classes early. This follows a request the committee received earlier in the year, which is now prompting a look into how many students it would affect and how other MAC schools handle their veteran students.
Although the current Student Government Association slate's platform points include a focus on ROTC and active service students, committee representative Kari Gayes said this was not how the issue first originated in University Council and it does not have the same focus that admissions and credits does currently.
SGA did, however, bring its point to University Senate. Gayes said the Senate returned the proposal to SGA so it could narrow the scope of its proposal.
"Theirs is a little more broad [than ours]," a council member said.
Senate restructuring
The ad hoc committee met with Marilyn Buck, acting provost and acting executive vice president for academic affairs, to discuss the format of University Senate membership and possible problems that may have arisen from it. Tiffany Peters, vice president of University Council, has already identified a few possible problems with the current framework.
“For example, Faculty Council is duplicated in University Senate," Peters said. "If you’re a faculty member, if you’re assigned to University Senate, you’re also signed to Faculty Council, and you have to serve on at least one other committee so your service is quite tremendous.”
Right now, the ad hoc committee is requesting information from other universities so that the University Council may use their structures as references when moving forward.
Students are welcome to attend the next council meeting at 4 p.m. April 6 in the David Letterman Communication and Media Building Room 125.