October 23, 2023

I. Call to Order

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Welcome

Erik Woodbury reminded representatives planning to attend remotely to fill out the remote attendance form by Thursday afternoon. Remote attendees not listed in the agenda can still participate but will not be counted toward quorum and cannot vote in that meeting. 

Erik Woodbury reminded representatives to complete their report out.

Approval of Agenda and Minutes from October 16, 2023

Amendment: Patty Guitron was appointed to the Budget Advisory Committee
Mary Donahue moved, Mary Pape seconded to approve both minutes and agenda. No objection.
Agenda and amended minutes approved by unanimous consent.

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Public Comment

Deborah Armstrong:  The Classified Senate have put their public information on Sharepoint. Minutes and agenda are on their website. Their newsletter comes out every Friday. She thanked Mary Donahue for pointing out the difficulty in finding information.

Deborah is putting together a survey for committee requests to the Classified Senate. They will not fill committee needs until they have adequate information on the nature and level of commitment. The information will include time commitment like the times and frequency for the meetings. The amount of work required outside the meetings. The specific skills or experience helpful for the work.

Kevin Glapion asked for faculty feedback on the new bookstore operation.

Shagun Kaur shared about OER training, resources, and adoption. The GP and ZTC team are still looking for departments interested in working on a Zero Cost Degree Pathway. She has reached out to divisions and has been working closely with some departments on grant applications to develop or adopt OER materials. They include Chemistry, Math, Child Development, Psychology. Interested departments should reach out to her. There is still time for funding and training but the window is closing rapidly.

Shagun encouraged faculty to get their classes marked as zero cost and low cost in the course schedule.

Felisa Vilaubi: The Academic Senate Scholarship Committee was formed last year. They met through the year and were scheduled to finalize a proposal this fall. However, the committee is down to half of its members. She asked for volunteers to join her and Elsa to finish the proposal. Those interested, contact Felisa or Elsa.

Erik Woodbury added that there is $3500 available annually in the Senate scholarship account, without touching the principle.

Mary Donahue wrote six 5-year course revisions under the new eLumen system last year. She shared her web page that she put together from her eLumen training and experience in completing the revisions.notes on course revision manual and training – Mary Donahue

There are a lot of helpful hints. Mary has had good feedback on the website and it has helped people to not panic. Feel free to use it and share it with other faculty working on course revisions.

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II. Consent Calendar

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Approval of Consent Calendar

Hiring Committee Confirmations (File)

Instructor, Accounting

Instructor, Women's, Gender and Sexuality Studies

There was a question about candidates in the fourth year of their tenure review serving on hiring committees.  

Typically, those in year 4 have more flexibility to serve in a variety of capacities.

Mary Donahue moved to confirm, Joyanti Roy seconded. No objections. Hiring Committees confirmed.

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III. Needs and Confirmation

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District and College Needs (Attachment)

• RAPP Executive Secretary (1), could be classified or faculty. The committee meets weekly on Tuesdays from 10-11:30 a.m.
• Campus Center Advisory Committee- (1)
• PDL Committee- (1)-training has started, last chance to sign up.
• Student Grievance and Student Conduct Hearing Board-as many as possible.
• J1 Training and Implementation Committee needs another faculty rep.-Ravjeet Singh asked about the schedule for J1 training and if the training could be online. Shagun Kaur replied that it is up for debate and negotiation. People on the committee are working on it. She will send out announcements as soon as the schedule is finalized.
• EO Representatives needed for Hiring Committees- as many as possible. There are many hiring committees. Some of the same people have been serving on them. People will need EO training to serve. Mary Donahue asked if people who have taken the EO training, valid for 2 years, will need to repeat the whole training or take a refresher. 
• Classified Senate Faculty Representative - (1) Tuesdays 2-3 pm, could join meetings on zoom.

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Confirmations

Curriculum Co-Chair

Catherina Wong (statement)

Mary Pape moved to approve, Ravjeet Singh seconded 

Erik moved to approve by acclamation. All Yes.

The Senate will forward the recommendation to Thomas Ray and Christina Espinosa-Pieb for final approval.

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IV. New & Continuing Business

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Governance Update Work Group Formation

This topic was introduced last week. Proposed project - review and update the Senate Constitution and By-laws by next  February.

Work Group for the project: Erik Woodbury, Shagun Kaur, Felisa Vilaubi, Mary Pape, Kevin Glapion

Estimate time commitment: 10 hours

Everyone should review the Constitution and By-laws and bring their questions and issues to the group. These two documents govern how this body functions and conducts business. 

Erik mentioned that the District Academic Senate is having similar discussions defining its structure and operations.  Next meeting will be Nov 8. Contact Erik if interested in joining.

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AP 4105 Regular and Substantive Interaction (RSI) & Training and evaluation proposal

AP 4105 Current Draft

Last spring, the Senate approved a work group for AP 4015 that included Shagun Kaur.

The Senate is asked to review and give feedback on the current draft. The final proposal will come back for Senate approval.

The legal language in the document comes from CCLC, Community College League of California.

As an AP policy the document defines the terms, rationale, and application of RSI. The responsibility starts with the institution, then onto the faculty.

Deborah Armstrong: So are we making any attempt to ask students what they think regular and substantive contact is for them.

Training and Support for RSI/Online Teaching: Developing a model

The district shall provide some kind of certification training. There will be additional training on top of it. Canvas training is not RSI. There will  be separate training on what is RSI and how to implement it in the course.

There were suggestions for more precise, specific language in the document. 

The language is taken directly from our course outline. Therefore, any changes will require changes in the curriculum forms.

There was much discussion on the training. What type of training? What is required? Is it required for all faculty to take the training?  Such requirements would have to be negotiated.

AP 4105 Regular and Substantive Interaction

“The district shall provide training and ensure that faculty teaching distance education courses shall be adequately prepared. By proposing a distance education course, the faculty author, department chair, and dean agree that instructors assigned to teach a distance education course section should be prepared to teach online in accordance with college procedures for obtaining agreed upon training. Prior to assigning a distance education course, the division dean shall verify the faculty havereceived current and sufficient training.”

RSI should be regular, substantive, and instructor led.

A faculty member mentioned having had to get training for online teaching from outside the college. 

The policy suggested including at least 2 out of 5 ways listed for substantive interaction.

Someone suggested having a policy that determines and standardizes adequate preparation on the college level. 

This is a top level document on the basic plan that should not have the operational details. After it is approved, there will be negotiation for a college/district level plan.

There was much discussion on the concerns and confusion over the requirements and expectations. Someone mentioned the lack of training makes it complicated and difficult. The training should be college wide and not individual instructors struggling.

Kevin Glapion pointed out the section on security verification and the need to identify students and their presence in a class especially with AI.

The policy states that “the District must authenticate or verify that the student who registers in a distance education or correspondence education courses is the same student who participates in and completes the course or program and receives the academic credit.”

People should look at the guidelines under discussion in the  Current Proposal at Foothill.

For the next meeting, read documents again closely and be prepared for more conversation.

Questions like: What is the content of this training? How does it apply? How is it required? And the evaluation that is related to J1 and training.

More clarity on class versus individual students. Questions on verifying student identity.  Any substantive changes required to revise or renew our procedures and processes.

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AI at De Anza: Identifying steps to establishing policies and guidelines

Formation of the AI Work Group: Erik Woodbury, Chesa Capras, Lakshmikanta Sengupta, Mirsaeid Abolghasemi, Rachel Silveria, Kevin Glapion

The Work Group will delve into the topic more deeply. 

The discussion that followed centered round the questions below to provide the Work Group with some guideposts.

What are the topics you want to see discussed on AI? What do we hear from our colleagues? What do we want to address?

The discussion started with two main concerns: The capabilities of this technology. The available detection software.

There were a lot of concerns with cheating using AI. For example, it can generate a speech on a given topic to specific length and style. Is there detection software out there?

The software is not 100% accurate. There are repeated mistakes. Therefore, faculty should help students use AI for learning and not depend on it to do their work.

Chesa Capras has done a lot of research on using AI.

Chesa’s AI talk on KQED https://www.kqed.org/forum/2010101894757/how-colleges-are-navigating-the-new-world-of-ai-chatbots

Someone suggested having Michele LeBleu-Burns add to the model course syllabus some language about AI in the classroom in terms of  student conduct and plagiarism. Some people are struggling with the best practice in dealing with this issue. Update the college policy on plagiarism and cheating.

Some disciplines, like Speech and Chemistry, do not have the same issue with AI.

The Senate should sponsor a town hall meeting on student conduct, not just AI and plagiarism.

As the world changes and technology changes, our pedagogy has to change.

Have the Office of Professional Development design workshops to go over the fundamental basics of pedagogy, how to create meaningful assignments, how to assess learning outcomes.

Technology is here to stay. Find ways to utilize it to our benefits and to benefit students. Focus on the positive instead of the negative assuming that students will cheat.

AI could be an efficient tool for students who don’t know how but are afraid to ask. Help them to understand the function. Find ways for students to use the technology to promote critical thinking, the ability to write and to organize thoughts.

During the pandemic students missed some years of development, especially in writing and critical thinking. Some students need to learn basic skills

Incorporate AI into learning for interaction and communication. Students can interact with AI to get immediate feedback that can boost self-esteem and self-efficiency.

Change assignments to promote creative thinking and  creative problem solving.

This goes back to the RSI discussion. The better you know your students, their personality, the better you can distinguish their work and AI generated words.

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Goal and Priority Setting: Action Oriented

Jamboard

Topics Feedback and Prioritization

People put their names to indicate their interest for the Business Items, Discussion Items, and the Working Group.

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Good of the Order

Erik Woodbury: Grimm’s Hollow, family-friendly Halloween Haunt, Oct 27-31, Moreland Woods, 4835 Doyle Road, San Jose. For more information: www.grimmshollow.com

Please review all report outs

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Adjournment

Mary Pape  motioned, Felisa Vilaubi seconded, to adjourn, no objection.

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Attendance

In person

Erik Woodbury, Patty Guitron, So Kam Lee

Mary Donahue, Sheldon Fields, Kevin Glapion, Lauren Gordon, Elsa Jimenez-Samayoa, Shagun Kaur, Sherwin Mendoza, Anna Nguyen, Mary Pape, Christian Rodriguez, Jayanti Roy, Lakshmikanta "LK" Sengupta, Rachel Silveria, Ravjeet Singh, James Tallent, Alex Swanner, Felisa Vilaubi, Glynn Wallis

Online

*Deborah Armstrong, Mark Landefeld

Absent

Mirsaeid Abolghasemi, Christopher DiLeonardo, Dawnis Guevara, *Thomas Ray,  Liliana Rivera, Jyothsna Viswanadha