Board of Governors - APPENDIX VI - March 30, 2000

ITEMS REFERRED BY SENATE

FOR APPROVAL

1. Appointments Procedures: Associate Vice-President (Research)

Recommended: That the Board of Governors approve a new section to Appointments Procedures -- Section R - Associate Vice-President (Research) -- as detailed below:

R. ASSOCIATE VICE-PRESIDENT (RESEARCH)

Composition

The committee to select an Associate Vice-President (Research) shall consist of:
(a) the Vice-President (Research), who shall be Chair
(b) 4 members elected by Senate, one of whom will be a graduate student
(c) 2 members elected by the Board of Governors

Procedure

1. The Chair shall convene the Committee.
2. The Chair shall undertake negotiations with prospective candidates.
3. The Chair shall report to Senate through the President & Vice-Chancellor.

Terms

The term for the Associate Vice-President (Research) is five years, renewable.

2. Policy on International Student Exchanges

Recommended: That the Board of Governors approve the Policy on International Student Exchanges attached as Annex 1.

Background:

The University has been actively involved in exchange programs with foreign institutions for many years. These exchanges have been mutually advantageous, benefitting the Universities involved, their faculty and their students.

Western students have been afforded the opportunity to live in foreign countries and study at excellent international institutions, thus developing their cultural awareness, knowledge, adaptability, and critical thinking skills. Their experiences also are aiding them in their attempts to pursue graduate work and employment, since institutions and employers are increasingly recognizing the importance of international experiences. In the last five years, two UWO students who participated in exchanges subsequently were awarded the prestigious Rhodes Scholarship. Western's partner institutions have benefitted from the unique academic and personal views that UWO students have brought with them on their exchanges, and similarly, the University has benefitted significantly from the diversity in attitudes and knowledge that the exchange students have brought to this University. Western faculty and staff have enjoyed the presence of these students in their classrooms, residences, and other parts of the Western campus.

Western students who attend a foreign institution in an exchange program register at Western and pay the usual tuition and incidental fees to Western for the semester(s) spent abroad. These students are given a unique opportunity to gain entry to competitive foreign institutions, often at fee schedules significantly lower than those available to independent foreign students. Courses taken at the foreign institution are accepted for credit toward their Western degrees.

Over the last two decades interest in exchange programs has increased tremendously. Both the number of exchange programs and the number of participating students have risen sharply. During the 1998-99 academic year, approximately 150 students from Western participated in exchanges and approximately 175 students from foreign institutions took courses at Western as part of exchange programs. Western currently has more than 100 exchange agreements in place and about 50 active exchange programs with universities around the world.

There is increasing concern about the lack of a University-wide policy and procedures to govern our exchange programs. Often agreements are initiated by a faculty member who has had some contact with another institution, without a comprehensive review of prospective exchange institutions to verify academic standards, address safety issues, and determine if the exchange is one that will be of interest to Western students. Furthermore, some Faculties continue to negotiate and enter into exchange agreements without review and execution of the agreements by the University's designated signing officers.

The University recognizes that it has an obligation to satisfy itself that an exchange institution has an established reputation and similar academic standards to its own before establishing an exchange program with that institution. Students have a right to expect that the exchange institution has been properly investigated by this University before its approval as a suitable equivalent to Western. Moreover, because we have a continuing relationship with these students, we have a duty to make inquiries as to the safety and quality of the study environment of the institution before sanctioning it as a destination for our students. Finally, it is critical to the economic viability of an exchange program that there be a balance of incoming and outgoing students over the term of the program. There are a number of current programs where the University has been accepting foreign students but there has been no corresponding interest from our students in attending the foreign institution. Such one-sided exchange programs are not economically feasible for the University. The foreign institution retains the fees of these students and the Ontario government does not permit Universities to claim a foreign exchange student for operating support(1). It is essential that the University institute procedures to monitor programs and ensure that a balance of exchange students is maintained over the term of the program.

Many Canadian universities have well-established policies regulating exchange programs. These include Toronto, Queen's, Guelph, Waterloo, Wilfrid Laurier, Dalhousie, UBC, and Alberta. As part of their policies, most of these Universities have established university-wide committees to regulate the programs.

This Policy on International Student Exchanges establishes a similar committee at Western. All new programs would be evaluated by this committee to ensure that programs are in the best interest of the University, its faculty and its students. All programs, both new and existing at the date of the approval of this Policy, would be assessed by the committee for their viability in those areas discussed above. All agreements would be required to be signed by the Board-designated University signing officers as well as the appropriate Dean. Both new and existing agreements will be retained in the University Secretariat. The University's Exchange Coordinator will be responsible for ensuring that exchange program agreements are current and will maintain a list of agreements and approved programs. Approved exchange programs will be reviewed from time to time if there are concerns that they are not meeting established criteria.

FOR INFORMATION

1. First-Entry Undergraduate Enrolment for 2000-2001

Senate has approved the following with respect to first-entry undergraduate enrolment and entrance requirements for 2000-01:

1. The first-entry undergraduate enrolment objective for 2000-01 is set at 4350 students. The approximate program-specific objectives are as described in Annex 2.

If this enrolment target is achieved, Western's forecasted total enrolment, including the Affiliated Colleges, will be 27,003 in the coming year, an increase of 1,862 FTEs over 1998-99, the base year for calculating enrolment changes in the SuperBuild Growth Fund program.

2. The Provost may alter this enrolment target, following consultation and approval from SUEPP, as might be appropriate given the particulars of a government funding announcement.

3. Entrance requirements will be set by the Provost to achieve these objectives as a function of final admission numbers, qualifications of applicants, and estimates of the rate of offer confirmations in each program.

4. No program-specific entrance requirement will be set below 76% except where performance is a major element of the selection process. Confirmed admission to any program will be contingent upon a final average of no less than 72%.

Implementation:

Given the experience of recent years, there is a real possibility that minimum entrance requirements in most programs will be higher than 76% in 2000-01.

The timing of the new application and offer process for OAC students (implemented in 1999-00) is such that early offers are made in March when less information is available regarding applicants than was the case prior to 1999-00.

The same framework will be applied to making early offers to OAC students in March, 2000, as was the case in the last year. Grade value (highlighted) will be set as a function of final information regarding applicant qualifications in each program.

Offer made if:

The details of this matrix may vary slightly from program to program (e.g., Music where auditions are an essential part of the admission process).

Every effort will be made to maintain single minimum standard of admission in Arts, Social Science (including ACS), Science, Information and Media Studies, Kinesiology, and Health Sciences. A higher standard may be necessary in Nursing to meet enrolment targets. The goal will be to set the same standard for Engineering Science as for Science, but given the special funding opportunities of the ATOP program, consideration will be given to maintaining the minimum entrance requirement at 75% even if other programs have a marginally higher entrance requirement in 2000-01.

As indicated in the Senate resolution of Spring 1998 and 1999, consideration may be given in the admissions process to factors such as performance in program-relevant courses (e.g., mathematics and sciences in Science and Engineering Science), relevant extra curricular activities, and the academic record of the secondary school.

As was the case in 1999, the period between the availability of initial application information (still not including final year, winter semester applicant grades) and the offer date does not permit an admissions proposal that includes detailed program-specific admissions criteria to be brought to Senate for consideration before initial offers were made.

An additional round of offers will be made in May 2000. Criteria used for those offers will be set as a function of additional information on applicant qualifications and program-specific patterns of acceptance of early offers, but will observe the general entrance requirements established by the Senate on March 3, 2000.

2. Affiliated Colleges - Entrance Requirements for 2000-01

Senate has approved the following entrance requirements and processes for the Affiliated Colleges for 2000-01:

All Affiliated Colleges will be bound to the entrance requirements established by the Constituent University for limited enrolment programs, including MIT, BHSc, and Kinesiology.

3. Academic Development Fund Awards, 2000-2001

The total budget for the Academic Development Fund in 2000-2001 is $1 million. Of this, $71,877 is required to fund the second and third years of projects given multi-year funding in the 1998-99 and 1999-2000 competitions. The sum available for allocation in 2000 is therefore $928,123, plus $67,680 reverted to the ADF budget from unused portions of previous awards totalling $995,803.

SUPAD has unanimously agreed to set aside 8% (approximately $80,000) of the $995,803 available to support a Small Grants Competition to commence in 2000, contingent on approved revisions to the ADF Terms of Reference by SCUP and Senate. The Small Grants Competition will be administered through SUPAD and funding will be provided jointly from ADF funds and the Research Promotion Fund. Matching support from the Research Promotion Fund cannot begin until the 2000-01 fiscal year (i.e., for the Fall 2000 and Spring 2001 Small Grants Competitions).

This year SUPAD reviewed 54 applications for funding under the ADF, a decrease over the previous year when 63 applications were received. Of the 54 applications, 24 were recommended for funding. The total amount requested by these 54 applicants was $3,318,876; of this, $2,823,797 was requested for 2000-01.

As in previous years, SUPAD divided into three subgroups in order to facilitate the detailed review and preliminary ranking of the applications. The subgroups and the number of applications within each are noted below.

Applications Funding
Received Recommended Recommended
Biosciences 24 8 $257,159
Physical and Mathematical Sciences & Engineering

25


12


$486,127
Social Sciences, Arts & Humanities 5 4 $160,087
Total: $903,373

Reports from a total of 89 arm's-length external referees contributed to the assessment of the projects this year.

The total amount of the awards recommended for 2000-2001 is $903,373, excluding recommendations for multi-year projects totalling $12,700 for 2001-2002 and $6,700 for 2002-2003. Details are provided on the attached table (Annex 3).

4. Honorary Degree Recipients

The Honorary Degrees Committee of the Senate announces the following persons who are to be honored by conferment of honorary degrees at the morning and afternoon ceremonies to be held on Tuesday, June 6 through Friday, June 9, 2000.

Tuesday, June 6 - 10:00 a.m.

Noam Chomsky - D.Litt.
Clifford von Kuster - D.Mus.

Faculty of Graduate Studies*
Faculty of Arts
Faculty of Music

* = students in programs hosted by the Faculties of Arts and Music

Tuesday, June 6 - 3:30 p.m.

Pamela Wallin - LL.D.

Brescia College
Huron College
King's College

Wednesday, June 7 - 10:00 a.m.

Sr. Helen Prejean - LL.D.

Faculty of Graduate Studies*
Faculty of Education

* = students in programs hosted by the Faculty of Education

Wednesday, June 7 - 3:30 p.m.

Ian McWhinney - D.Sc.

Faculty of Graduate Studies*
Richard Ivey School of Business
Faculty of Information and Media Studies
Faculty of Medicine & Dentistry (DDS only)

* = students in programs hosted by the Faculties of Information and Media Studies, Medicine & Dentistry, and the Richard Ivey School of Business

Thursday, June 8 - 10:00 a.m.

Madam Justice Louise Arbour - D.C.L.

Faculty of Graduate Studies*
Faculty of Social Science (Honors and ACS)

*= students in programs hosted by the Faculty of Social Science

Thursday, June 8 - 3:30 p.m.

Joseph B. MacInnis - D.Sc.

Faculty of Graduate Studies*
Faculty of Science

*= students in programs hosted by the Faculty of Science

Friday, June 9 - 10:00 a.m.

Jack Granatstein - LL.D.

Faculty of Social Science (3 year programs)

Friday, June 9 - 3:30 p.m.

Jack Cowin - LL.D.

Faculty of Graduate Studies*
Faculty of Engineering Science
Faculty of Health Sciences
Faculty of Law

* = students in programs hosted by the Faculties of Engineering Science and Health Sciences

5. 1999-2000 Winners of The Edward G. Pleva Award for Excellence in Teaching

The Subcommittee on Teaching Awards (SUTA) has chosen the following faculty members as recipients of The Edward G. Pleva Award for Excellence in Teaching for 1999-2000:

6. 1999-2000 Winner of The Marilyn Robinson Award for Excellence in Teaching

The Subcommittee on Teaching Awards (SUTA) has chosen the following faculty member as recipient of The Marilyn Robinson Award for Excellence in Teaching for 1999-2000:

7. New Programs

Effective September 1, 2000, a Bachelor of Arts program in Family Studies will be introduced at Brescia College.

1. The Ontario Operating Funds Distribution Manual 1998-99, section 5.3.3. The only exception to this is a student studying in Ontario as a participant in an Ontario government sponsored exchange agreement.