The University of Maine
The President's Council on Women
Minutes
January 23, 2006
Minutes (notes taken by Pauleena)
Present; Mary C., Anne S., Diane G., Cathy B., Sherrie D., Sue E. Dianne K., Jean Mac Rae, Anne L., Pauleena
Announcements: WIC lunch flyers have gone out. Please note one mistake; Cathy’s
presentation should be listed on Wed., not Tuesday.
Please try to attend the nonsexist language history discussion
Sharon said: still in mainstream conversations people are not gender sensitive
Sue: This is a trend e.g., police force.
Ann S.:
faculty members involved in policy making have very little representation from
women.
Engineering environment largely male—sexist language is more of a pervasive
problem.
Sharon
Barker reported on the strategic plan.
Overall progress:
Sharon sees a strong
backlash against women.
The strategic planners are thinking about ways to deal with pervasive gender
issues on campus.
2 major mtgs. to look at major issues
Identified general goals
Research strategic plan and graduate ed. Strategic plans already completed.
Emphasis: graduate education and liberal arts and humanities
Concern about UM developing in to a tech or professional school.
Much emphasis on access for Maine students, trying to reach high school students
and encourage them to come to UM. Looking for ways to encourage use of the
campus by communities.
Environment committee: emphasis on access, disability, how people feel being on
campus
Visions: include quality of life issues, excellence, contributing to Maine
economy, community connections, K-12, relationships with other colleges [shared
governance]
Incentives for access of students (especially 1st generation) Not
pitting UMS colleges against each other.
Next few weeks develop strategic directions and strategies
Getting a draft together for people to respond to.
Suggests PCWE find ways to inject some benchmarks to help move us along
Suggest: good gender ed. On campus but not making the impact we should How to
move forward? Some resistance still encountered.
Suggested action item: use ed. Resources, make more available to staff
Prof dev. Activity for staff guaranteed that reflected stated objectives of the
University.
Question about 1st gen students—want to attract to UM but also other
colleges and community colleges.
Discussion: How do we set benchmarks? Base on other institutions or some other
way?
How meaningful is the process? Identify system level and other strategic plans and look for things that we can emphasize.
Leave
benchmarks general? Do we have information to work with?
Benchmarks need to be measurable. Also include values.
Separating research strategic planning process from environment Issues lets it
go quite far down the road in emphasizing the high powered (male?) researchers.
Gender-neutral issues on research, grad ed, etc.
Guiding principles for strategic planning accountability, shared governance,
access, etc.
Is there an overall focus? Research? Certain programs?
Made distinction between instate and out of state marketing
Vision 2000 women land grant.
Sue Estler presented info on gender/tenure at UM. Annual report to trustees gives gender data. Office of institutional research [enrollments, fac. Info. some by gender]
Nursing, social work, education, almost no full professors.
Ask the
President:
How often does he examine this aggregate data in order to inform the planning
process?
Make recommendations of sources.
UMass Amherst study.
Show where climate issues are located Equity Score Card process
Work w senior administrators
Economics, race, gender, disability data
EO and HR campus and system has the data
Are we
using the data?
Meeting set for March 24, 1-2:30 and April