Minutes for November 2002

Attendees: Margaret Ashworth, Elizbeth Aversa, Doug Birdwell (Chair), Gayle Baker (Co-Vice Chair), Denise Barlow, Bill Blass (Co-Vice Chair), Billie Collier, Bill Dunne, David Eastwood, Arlene Garrison, Marcel Grubert, Joanne Hall, William Hamel, Ray Hamilton, Carol Malkemus, Tamara Miller, Faye Muly, Bonnie Ownley, Mary Rogge, Elizabeth Sutherland, Gretchen Whitney, Luther Wilhelm

• Opening remarks (Doug Birdwell, Chair):
  • Chair Doug Birdwell reported that Mike Combs, Faculty Senate President, drafted a letter to President Shumaker and Provost Crabtree
    asking them to withdraw the present Information Technology Policy. An ad hoc committee on Information Policy has been formed for
    Faculty Senate to review the policy. It will become a standing committee as soon as the Faculty Senate charter is revised.
  • Birdwell distributed copies of President Shumaker’s UT 2010: Vision for UT, including the Scorecard table that will be used to
    quantify progress towards goals.
  • The Chair also made available copies of draft documents and a presentation about the UT Research Foundation (UTRF).
    He maintained that the UT Research Foundation is essentially the renaming of the UT Research Corporation (UTRC). Birdwell
    stated that UTRC failed to flourish due to lack of funding, lack of accountability, and the failure to reinvest F & A back
    into the research enterprise. Concerns were expressed about the lack of sharing of the planning documents and solicitation of input early in the process.
  • Birdwell reported on Federal relations in the absence of Lillian Mashburn. In short, the funding situation looks grim after the election. Until the Federal budget is in place, new contracts or contract modifications will not be issued. Also, the doubling of the NSF budget is off the table.

   

• Statement of importance of research: Birdwell led the discussion about a draft statement of research to send to the Educational Marketing Group (EMG). Several suggestions were given to improve the document. Birdwell will rewrite the document and share it with Council members via email for fine tuning. (Final document)
• Discussion Items:
  • SARIF funds (EPPE, Infrastructure, etc.) and Institute of Agriculture Faculty (Elizabeth Sutherland, Chair, EPPE
    Committee: There is a separate research office at the Institute of Agriculture. Since their research funding does not contribute to SARIF funds administered by the Office of Research, faculty from the Institute of Agriculture are not eligible for SARIF funds. The web pages associated with these funds need to be updated to reflect this.
• Intellectual property (Tamara Miller): Miller, the UT Libraries’ resource person on intellectual property, distributed a handout “Reclaiming Intellectual Property,” which encourages faculty to take control of their own copyright.
  She that every institution should have copyright and intellectual property policies as required by the Federal government and suggested that a committee of Research Council take a look at this.

Meeting adjourned at 5:10 p.m.