Messages from the Chair

February 21, 2024

Dear colleagues,

The FAS-SEAS Senate held its monthly meeting last Thursday, on February 15.
Below is a summary of that meeting.

Cheers,
Meg

In open session, we had two agenda items: 

  1. Open Science and Open Scholarship at Yale (4:00-5:00): Barbara Rockenbach,
    the Stephen F. Gates ’68 University Librarian at Yale University, and librarians 
    Daniel DollarLindsay BarnettSandra Enimil, and Lauren Di Monte,
    who led a wide-ranging discussion of the implications of Open Access academic
    publishing. 

Publishing is changing rapidly and publishers need not hold all the power. For example,
authors routinely sign away their copyrights to the publisher. We could instead negotiate
with publishers to keep some rights. The library will help us develop an author policy
for Yale that will give us power in this negotiation.

Faculty need to become aware of the changing landscape of publishing and to make sure
that our priorities hold sway. To find out more, please look at 
https://guides.library.yale.edu/openaccess/publications

  1. Yale College Council Priorities (5:00-5:30): Julian Suh-Toma, YCC President,
    and Maya Fonkeu, YCC Vice-President, discussed the extensive activities and
    priorities of the undergraduate governing body. Some of these issues intersect faculty
    interests, e.g., the issue of Cr/D/F and whether students can uncover grades after the
    end of semester; the Senate Committee on Undergraduate Admissions and Education 
    will look into this particular issue. Other issues are relevant to the entire campus; for
    example, an upcoming discussion about divesting from companies that profit from war.
    We encourage faculty to learn more about the YCC and its activities.

______________________________________________________________________________________________

February 13, 2024

Dear Colleagues,

The Senate of Yale’s Faculty of Arts and Sciences and School of Engineering and Applied Science will conduct an
open meeting on Thursday, February 15, 2024 from 4:00 - 5:30 PM in Dow Hall Room 100 (370 Temple Street).
The meeting can also be accessed via Zoom (please see Zoom information below). Please note that a closed
Senators-only meeting will precede the open session from 3:30 - 4:00 PM.

Our agenda will include the following topics:

1.     Open Science and Open Scholarship at Yale (4:00-5:00): Barbara Rockenbach, the Stephen F. Gates ’68 University Librarian at Yale University, and librarians Daniel DollarLindsay BarnettSandra Enimil, and 
Lauren Di Monte, will discuss the rapid evolution of academic publishing to an Open Access model, with its
advantages and limitations/costs for faculty and for research more broadly. (See below for more details and references about this critical issue.) 

2.     Yale College Council Priorities (5:00-5:30): Julian Suh-Toma, YCC President, and Maya Fonkeu, YCC Vice-President, will discuss activities and priorities of the undergraduate governing body, particularly those most relevant to faculty-student interactions.

We look forward to seeing many of you at the meeting!

Sincerely,

Meg Urry

Chair, FAS-SEAS Senate

Israel Munson Professor of Physics

Rebecca Toseland

Deputy Chair, FAS-SEAS Senate

Senior Lecturer, Economics

ADDENDUM for Open Science Presentation:

Addendum: Details about Open Science and Open Scholarship at Yale (kindly provided by Barbara Rockenbach)

Definitions

Open scholarship – “An expansive term (sometimes called ‘open science’ or ‘open research’) meant to encompass the rapid and widespread sharing of a range of scholarly activities and outputs, across disciplines. Promotes inclusivity, transparent and trustworthy research, innovation and collaboration.” - HELIOS Open  

Open Access – Part of the broader open scholarship movement, open access (OA) refers to the free, immediate, online availability of research outputs coupled with the rights to use these outputs fully. 

APC offsetting agreements – Also referred to as open access, transformative, and read & publish agreements, are intended to reduce the cost burden of open access publishing by shifting article processing charges (APCs) off of authors and onto the institutions. In this model, libraries pay not only subscription costs to provide read access to Yale users, but publish costs to allow affiliated authors to publish open access at no or reduced cost to the author. Please visit this page for a list of APC offsetting agreements we currently support and our values statement for entering into such agreements: https://guides.library.yale.edu/openaccess

Questions 

1.     Sometimes we must choose between buying access to research articles through database subscriptions and paying to make your research open from the start. From the faculty perspective, what’s the better investment? 

2.     While print and e-books both have advantages, we have witnessed a steady shift in preferences for electronic over print, which dramatically accelerated during COVID. We avoid proactively purchasing the same titles in print and electronic formats to use finite acquisition funds more efficiently. In this context, what is your advice as the library juggles the competing user demands for print and online access? 

3.     Academic publishing has been largely commercialized and consolidated to a few large commercial publishers (SpringerNature, Elsevier, etc.). What, if any, concerns does this raise for you? Has this affected your decision-making when choosing where to publish?  
 

Additional Questions: 

  • Do you or your colleagues publish open access or deposit preprints of your articles in open access repositories? 
  • Many peer institutions have author’s rights policies, Yale does not. Would such a policy be of interest to Yale faculty? 
  • Do you know your rights as the author/original copyright holder of your scholarship? Are you exerting these rights when negotiating contracts with publishers? 
  • Our researchers are working on topics with collaborators and co-authors all around the world. Have you encountered an issue where co-authors or collaborators are not able to access research? 
  • Are you aware of federal mandates that might impact publishing and access to scholarship (ex. Nelson Memo)? Are you hearing about compliance with federal mandates from colleagues or from elsewhere on campus? Please see the recent Yale Daily News article about the Nelson Memo: https://yaledailynews.com/blog/2024/01/30/white-house-memo-pushes-yale-research-toward-public-accessibility/

January 29, 2024

Dear FAS and SEAS faculty,

The FAS-SEAS Senate had a productive and informative meeting on January 18, 2024, which we
summarize here in case you were not able to attend.

In the closed session, updates on current activities were given by chairs of the Senate Diversity
Committee (interactions with the Belonging to Yale Office), the Science and Engineering Committee 
(graduate student unionization), the Undergraduate Admissions and Education Committee (how to
deal with student mental health issues, plus increasing faculty input to admissions), the Governance
Committee (reviewing Faculty Handbook), the Faculty Advancement Committee (faculty salary path
for January hires), the Peer Advisory and Ombuds Committee (discussion with General Council Alex
Drier), the Budget Committee (faculty salary gap with respect to peer institutions), the Committee
on Outreach, Nominations, and Committee on Committees (11 open seats to fill during the Senate’s
spring 2024 election). 

In the open session, we first addressed the topic of (Don’t) Pass the Harasser, with a presentation
by Philip Kass, Vice Provost for Academic Affairs and Distinguished Professor of Analytic
Epidemiology, and Sandi Glithero, Associate Director of Academic Employee Relations at the
University of California at UC Davis, about UC Davis’s new policy: candidates selected for tenured
faculty positions are asked to sign a release authorizing their current institution to provide
information about “any substantiated allegations of misconduct” before a formal offer is made.
The implementation has not been onerous, and no adverse cases have turned up. (UC Davis has
roughly the same number of faculty as FAS and they make ~30 tenured offers per year.) The Senate
is continuing to look into this issue and is consulting with relevant offices at Yale about possibly
implementing something similar.

We then welcomed FAS Dean Tamar Gendler and SEAS Dean Jeffrey Brock, to address the
FAS-SEAS Senate’s report from May 2023 on Revisiting the Status and Condition of Instructional
Faculty
Dean Gendler said that she and Dean Brock want to ensure that all instructional faculty who
work in FAS and SEAS are respected for the work that they do and have the resources they need.
After giving some background about variations across schools, divisions, disciplines, and rank, she
noted that instructional faculty were given salary increases,  benefits were added for some (short-
term medical disability, laptops, subsidized lunches, phased retirement, teaching relief for child-
rearing, travel grant funds, PI status, professional development funding, leave opportunities).
Other benefit enhancements are being explored. Also, there is a new annual FAS Dean’s Award for
Inclusion and Belonging for an instructional faculty member, the FAS Dean solicits input from
instructional faculty to inform major decisions, and her office works with departments to improve
departmental dynamics and instructional faculty inclusion. She reviewed the differences between
instructional faculty and ladder (tenure-track) faculty. Dean Brock added that he is doing the same
things for SEAS instructional faculty. He stressed that a key issue is honoring and acknowledging
professional development for instructional faculty, and that SEAS includes instructional faculty in
all departmental activities, which in turn promotes a strong community among SEAS faculty and
students. We thank Deans Gendler and Brock for their ongoing work, and for addressing the Senate
on this important topic. The Senate will continue to advocate for the advancement of instructional
faculty in FAS and SEAS.

We hope you will join us at our next FAS-SEAS Faculty Senate meeting, on February 15, when we
will welcome Yale’s Stephen F. Gates ’68 University Librarian Barbara Rockenbach back to the
Senate for further discussion on how to allocate library resources to publishing in the age of open
scholarship. We hope to see you there.

Sincerely,

Meg Urry
Chair, FAS-SEAS Senate
Israel Munson Professor of Physics

Rebecca Toseland
Deputy Chair, FAS-SEAS Senate
Senior Lecturer, Economics


December 17, 2024

Dear Colleagues,

The next FAS-SEAS Senate meeting will be held on Thursday, January 18, in Dow Hall Room 100 (370 Temple Street). Our main agenda items are (1) how to prevent “passing the harasser” from one campus to the next, and (2) administration response to the Senate’s recent report on Instructional Faculty. This meeting will be followed by a Winter Reception to which all faculty are invited.

In the meantime, here is a belated summary of the last Senate meeting, on December 14, 2023: 

  1. In the senators-only closed session, we had a lengthy discussion on how the Senate could address issues on freedom of expression. We talked about organizing an in-person event about freedom of speech, which would review the 1974 Woodward Report on freedom of speech on campus and address what freedom of speech looks like, best practices for discussing difficult topics, the role of freedom of speech in education, and how faculty can engage with this topic. Beginning soon, the Senate plans to host weekly faculty lunches as a means of building community across the campus. More details will follow.The Senate has compiled a summary of Senate accomplishments, including Reports and Resolutions (which are already available on the Senate’s website), so faculty can see the work that has been done. We need input about what issues are most important for faculty now. Faculty are encouraged to attend Senate meetings, and Senators plan other forms of outreach directly to individual faculty and departments. 
  2. In the open session, Jeremiah Quinlan, Dean of Admissions and Financial Aid, shared the current Yale Undergraduate Admissions Roadmap, which takes into account the recent Supreme Court decision on affirmative action. He noted that Yale has the largest undergraduate enrollment ever, with 1,650 first-year students in the class of 2027. One fifth of Yale undergraduates today are first generation and/or low income students, and a half the incoming class identifies as people of color. He stressed that Yale cares deeply about diversity—our students love learning in a diverse community, our professors enjoy teaching a diverse student body, and Yale is committed to ensuring a diverse student body, while respecting the SCOTUS decision.
  3. Joe Sarno, Director of Labor Relations, and lead negotiator for the university, provided an update on the graduate student unionization process, and discussed how unionization might impact FAS-SEAS faculty. The first of 27 bargaining sessions began in March 2023, and proved to be very professional and productive. The final tentative agreement was formalized on December 8, 2023, which is an incredibly short amount of time. Local 33 held its ratification vote on December 15 and 16, and Joe was confident that it would pass.

We hope you all had a happy and restful holiday break, and we look forward to seeing you at a future Senate meeting or event.

Sincerely,

Meg Urry
Chair, FAS-SEAS Senate
Israel Munson Professor of Physics

Rebecca Toseland
Deputy Chair, FAS-SEAS Senate
Senior Lecturer, Economics


December 4, 2023

Dear colleagues,

At the FAS-SEAS Senate meeting on Thursday, November 30, we addressed two major agenda items: 

1.    Open Science and Open Scholarship at YaleBarbara Rockenbach, the Stephen F. Gates ’68 University Librarian at Yale University, and her team Lindsay Barnett, Scholarly Communication Librarian, Lauren Di Monte, Associate University Librarian for Research & Learning, Daniel Dollar, Associate University Librarian for Scholarly Resources, Sandra Aya Enimil, Program Director Scholarly Communication and Information Policy, discussed the rapidly evolving landscape for scholarly publication, and how the library can best support faculty dissemination of scholarship. This was a highly informative and thought-provoking presentation punctuated by a lively discussion. We plan to invite our outstanding library team to return next term to continue the discussion. All faculty should be thinking about how best the library can deploy its budget for scholarly publishing.

2.    How Can Faculty Best Support Students in Stressful Times? Pericles Lewis, Dean of Yale College and Douglas Tracy Smith Professor of Comparative Literature and English, Lynn Cooley, Dean of the Graduate School, Vice Provost for Postdoctoral Affairs and C.N.H. Long Professor of Genetics and Professor of Cell Biology and Molecular, Cellular, and Developmental Biology, and Maytal Saltiel, Interim University Chaplain, gave a thorough and moving summary of what they have been hearing from students over the past 7 weeks, and how, in such times of conflict and profound disagreement, faculty can further an environment that is both supportive and open to inquiry. This topic was by no means exhausted, however faculty present felt reassured by the dedication and humanity of these Yale leaders and their teams.

Please join us on December 14 for the next FAS-SEAS Senate meeting where we will hear from (1) Jeremiah Quinlan, Director of Undergraduate Admissions, about Yale admissions in the wake of the SCOTUS decision on affirmative action, and (2) Joe Sarno, Senior Director of Labor Relations and lead negotiator for the Yale University talks with the newly formed graduate student union, about the unionization process and its potential impact on FAS-SEAS faculty.

Cheers,

Meg Urry (Chair) and Rebecca Toseland (Deputy Chair)

FAS-SEAS Senate


November 28, 2023

Dear FAS and SEAS faculty,

The next meeting of the FAS-SEAS Senate is this Thursday, November 30, 2023, in Dow Hall 100, at 370 Temple Street, and on Zoom for anyone who is unable to attend in person (see link below). The meeting begins at 4 PM for all faculty, following the Senators-only closed session from 3:30 PM – 4 PM. 

The agenda for the open session is as follows:

  • Open Science and Open Scholarship at Yale: Barbara Rockenbach, the Stephen F. Gates ’68 University Librarian at Yale University and her colleagues, will discuss library investments in the infrastructure to help disseminate scholarship more broadly, incentives for faculty to do so, and how faculty can retain rights to their scholarship.

·      How Can Faculty Best Support Students in Stressful Times? Pericles Lewis, Dean of Yale College and Douglas Tracy Smith Professor of Comparative Literature and English; Lynn Cooley, Dean of the Graduate School, Vice Provost for Postdoctoral Affairs and C.N.H. Long Professor of Genetics and Professor of Cell Biology and Molecular, Cellular, and Developmental Biology; and Maytal Saltiel, Interim University Chaplain, will discuss what they have been hearing from students over the past 7 weeks, and how, in times of conflict and profound disagreement, faculty can set the tone.

We look forward to seeing you on Thursday, and hope you will join us in person. 

Sincerely,

Meg Urry
Israel Munson Professor of Physics
Chair, FAS-SEAS Senate

Rebecca Toseland
Senior Lecturer, Department of Economics
Deputy Chair, FAS-SEAS Senate


October 19, 2023

Dear Colleagues,

The Senate of Yale’s Faculty of Arts and Sciences and School of Engineering and Applied Science will conduct an open meeting on Thursday, October 26, 2023 from 4:00 PM - 5:30 PM in Dow Hall Room 100 (370 Temple Street). The meeting can also be accessed via Zoom (please see Zoom information below). Please note that a closed Senators-only meeting will precede the open session from 3:30 PM - 4:00 PM.

Our agenda will include the following topics:

·      Generative AI Guidance for Teaching and Learning. (4:00-4:50pm) 

Jennifer Frederick (Executive Director of the Poorvu Center for Teaching and Learning and Associate Provost for Academic Initiatives) will discuss generative AI in the context of teaching and learning at Yale. The discussion will include:

o   General observations about generative AI in education at Yale as of early fall 2023

o   Top recommendations and a useful framework for thinking about generative AI use policies in your courses

o   Mitigating the risks – what faculty should know

o   Broader campus action and planning framework – an early preview

o   Q&A

·      Diversity Committee Report on Romantic and Sexual Relationships Between Faculty and Graduate Students. (4:50-5:30pm)

Senators Oswaldo Chinchilla and Maria Piñango will present a report of the Diversity Committee concerning a proposed policy change concerning romantic and sexual relationships between faculty and graduate students.

We look forward to seeing many of you at the meeting!

Sincerely,

Meg Urry
Chair, FAS-SEAS Senate
Israel Munson Professor of Physics

Rebecca Toseland
Deputy Chair, FAS-SEAS Senate
Senior Lecturer, Economics


September 25, 2023

Dear FAS and SEAS faculty,

Welcome to the 2023/24 sessions of the FAS-SEAS Senate (formerly the FAS Senate). The Senate is beginning its 9th year of representing your interests and concerns to the administration. Numerous Senate Reports and Resolutions from previous years are posted on our website, where you can also access meeting schedules and additional information.

Our first meeting of the year took place last Thursday, September 21. This was a closed meeting for senators only, to organize the coming year. We discussed priorities, which include faculty salaries, the faculty handbook, continued improvements for instructional faculty, and admissions following the Supreme Court decision on affirmative action. Concerning the latter, we received an update from Vannesa Martinez Cecchini (Senior Associate General Counsel) and Jeremiah Quinlan (Dean for Yale College Admissions). This topic will be revisited soon in a public Senate meeting.

To do our job effectively, the Senate needs your participation. We encourage you to attend the monthly Senate meetings and voice your ideas (meeting schedule). To request a faculty speaking slot at a future meeting, please contact the Senate Chair (meg.urry@yale.edu) or Deputy Chair (rebecca.toseland@yale.edu).

Each month we will email you the agenda, date, and location of that month’s meeting, as well as the Zoom link. Following the meeting, you will receive a brief summary of what was discussed. Thank you in advance for helping make the Senate an effective, coherent channel for faculty action.

Meg Urry
Chair, FAS-SEAS Senate
Israel Munson Professor of Physics

Rebecca Toseland
Deputy Chair, FAS-SEAS Senate
Senior Lecturer, Economics