To streamline the large agenda set for this Nov. 13 faculty assembly I am sending out in advance as much of my president's report as I can:

1) CA Reception, 11/13 4:00 p.m. The November 13, 2002 assembly meets from 2-4 in SC136-138. We will begin and end promptly. Following the meeting there will be a reception held in H-Wing 1^st floor lobby to introduce everyone to the renovated space in H-Wing. The reception is co-sponsored by Faculty Assembly and the School of Contemporary Arts. CA has invited everyone to attend.

2) Iraq resolution: The faculty resolution to sponsor a campus-wide forum on a possible conflict with Iraq has led to a tremendous effort on the part of Pat Keeton, Hank Frundt, Yolanda Prieto, Chuck Carreras, Peter Scheckner, Judith Peck, Linda Wolfson, Chris Irving and others to put together an extraordinary series of speakers, roundtables, etc. We owe this group a vote of appreciation for their very hard work on this event. The events begin Wed. with a speakout at the Atrium from 1-2:30 sponsored by SGA and then the faculty sponsored two day forum from 11-5 Thu. Nov. 14 and Fri. Nov. 15 in the Berrie Center's Sharp Theater. A detailed schedule is available at http://phobos.ramapo.edu/facassem/iraqteachin.html

3) Twelfth Night and the Raven: Bravissimi CA Faculty and Students! I attended with great delight the recent production of The Raven produced by Jim Calder and the production of Twelfth Night directed by Richard Topol. They were both sheer joy! Ardent congratulations to all involved. Twelfth Night plays again in the Sharp Theater Thursday Nov. 14, Fri. Nov. 15, and Sat. Nov. 16 at 8 p.m. each night. Don't miss it!

4) TLTR grants: Deadline for TLTR technology grants Mon. Nov. 18, 2002. See http://phobos.ramapo.edu/facassem/tltrapplic02.html for forms and details.

5) WAC: Dr. Albert Romano, Director, Center for Academic Success will discuss WAC and tutorial support on Mon. Nov. 18 and Tues. Nov. 19 from 1-2 (pick one of the two sessions to attend) in E216 (the Faculty Resource Lab.) There will be an informal lunch.

6) Founder's Day: Our Founder's Day events are on Tuesday, Nov. 19 from 4 to 6. You should all have received invitations by now. Please rsvp asap to Shirlee Caruso at scaruso@ramapo.edu . The event will begin right on time in consideration of those who need to leave for classes at 6 p.m. Founder's day honors the founders and pioneers of Ramapo and celebrates Ramapo's "birthday." There will be a dinner and a program celebrating the achievements of three of Ramapo's faculty who will be receiving awards that evening. Amruth Kumar of TAS will be the recipient of the Fred and Florence Thomases Award for Excellence in Teaching, Scholarship and Service. Bravo! Amruth. Ira Spar of AIS will be receiving the Henry Bischoff Excellence in Teaching Award. Congratulations! Ira. Anthony Padovano will be named as Distinguished Professor. Kudos to Anthony! Each of the award recipients will speak briefly. We will also be recognizing this year's inductees into Ramapo's Quarter Century Club. Please come out and celebrate Ramapo and honor your colleagues. Note: Prior to the event at 2:30 p.m. on Tues. Nov. 19, there will be a program in the York Room on Creative Retirement sponsored by the Quarter Century Club and hosted by Elaine Winshell and Joe LeMay.

7) Foreign Language Forum: "If International Education is a hallmark of Ramapo's mission, it seems axiomatic that there should be a language requirement for all graduates." Provost's report, September 2002. The Foreign language group in collaboration with the Office of International and Intercultural Education are organizing a Foreign Language Forum Wednesday, November 20^th, 11-2 pm at SC 136-7. The Ramapo College Community is cordially invited to attend this event and express their opinions, voice their support or concerns on the proposed all-college foreign language requirement. Lunch will be served. Contact Val Flenga, Convenor of Foreign Languages if you have any questions.

8) Promotions Process Information Session: Ed Cody, Provost and the Promotions Committee are providing an information session on the promotions process and guidelines on Wed. Nov. 20 from 3:30-4:30 in the Commons.

9) Brothermen: Yet another score for CA faculty!! Kudos to Demetria Royals, Director and Co-Producer, Rachel Budin for the lighting, Mack Brandon for the music, and the CA students who served as interns for Brothermen , a "one-hour documentary featuring African-American men who through their art transmit the historical, political, and cultural realities of the African-American experience" which airs on PBS WNET/Thirteen at 10 p.m. on Thursday, Nov. 21, 2002 . The documentary examines the work of Chester Higgins, Jr., photographer, David Rousseve, Choreographer/Writer/Performer, Pop Staples, Performer and patriarch of The Staple Singers, and Kenneth Gamble and Leon Huff, Songwriters/Producers of "The Sound of Philadelphia." Brothermen is a companion piece to the award-winning documentary Conjure Women which Demetria Royals directed and which appeared on PBS several years ago.

10) Statewide Faculty Leadership Meeting: Ramapo is hosting on Fri. Nov. 22 a meeting of faculty leadership from the other state colleges to discuss common interests, concerns, and ways that we can support one another in strengthening faculty governance on our campus and in preparing for the impact of the emerging megaversity. I am delighted to report that Montclair, Rowan, Kean, and William Paterson have all confirmed that they are sending representatives. I have yet to receive confirmations from New Jersey City University or from Stockton. The College of New Jersey has declined. I understand that Eddie Saiff attended a similar meeting last year at William Paterson University.

11) Holiday Party: This year the two parties traditionally held at holiday time (the staff party during the day and the faculty party always at night) have been combined into a single evening event set for Dec. 6, 2002 in the Pavilion. A very nice evening is planned with music, dancing, a light dinner, etc. Please mark your calendar and come out and celebrate the holiday seasons with the whole Ramapo community! More details will be forthcoming with the invitations which will be sent out shortly.

12) Emeritus and retired faculty resolution: In response to the resolution passed at the October faculty assembly, President Smith has asked Ed Cody to put together a committee of retired faculty, active faculty, faculty in transition, and administrators to examine and make recommendations to the faculty assembly regarding the rights, privileges, etc. of retired and emeritus faculty. They will begin work shortly and I hope get back to us in a timely fashion.

13) Sustainability, Buildings and Grounds Roundtable (SBGR): In accordance with the faculty resolution passed in May calling for sustainability to be placed in the college's mission and to actively involve faculty in planning and development of capital projects and campus changes, a group of faculty experts in sustainability, environmental issues, etc. have agreed to establish a Sustainability, Buildings and Grounds Roundtable in a manner parallel to the Technology Learning and Teaching Roundtable. In other words, the SBGR, like the TLTR, is a group of experts and people knowledgeable and interested in sustainability etc. rather than a committee of faculty representatives. The core group for this roundtable has already begun discussions with the Faculty Advisory Council and with Dick Roberts and his staff. Members include: Angela Cristini, Michael Edelstein, Howard Horowitz, Anthony Iannarelli, Roger N. Johnson, Eric Karlin, William Makofske, Eric Wiener. Roger N. Johnson has agreed to call the initial meeting to get things underway. They will periodically report to faculty assembly on emerging issues and seek periodic input from the faculty at large. This group is taking on a big task and I am very grateful to them for their willingness to step up. If other faculty have expertise that they are willing to share on capital projects in general -- or on specific projects -- please contact me. I would be delighted to have you join the SBGR on an ongoing or a temporary basis.

Part of the effort to get faculty more involved in the capital planning process has led to the arrangement for the Nov. 13 faculty assembly to have Dick Roberts, Gene Dubicki, and Bill Alagna come and answer questions. The faculty advisory council met with Dick, Gene and Bill last week along with several members of the new SBGR and got some initial answers to the current status of the capital projects and the various parameters that go into the planning steps. At that meeting the faculty advisory council requested that the various documents such as environmental impact statements, master plan etc. be made accessible either through library reserve or through some other staging area for faculty to read as they wish. The overall powerpoint presentation on the fall 2002 status of capital projects is already up on the web for faculty to view at http://phobos.ramapo.edu/facassem/capitalproject.html

(Note: This is a downloadable and you must view it through Internet Explorer on a PC with Powerpoint loaded...)

14) Other F02 status reports: We also now have access to downloadable status reports on the Budget, on Enrollment Managment, and on Institutional Advancement (along with a Presidential overview) available on the web at http://phobos.ramapo.edu/facassem/statusreports.html

Please review these reports and get back to me or to the Faculty Advisory Council with questions or reactions. We can ask Vicky Bruni, Cathy Davey, and/or Rita Tepper at different points to come to Faculty Assembly to answer questions if that is the wish of the faculty. All of them have expressed willingness to make themselves available to us.

15) Academic Meeting Schedule, Spring 2003: The academic meeting schedule for the spring semester is now available at http://phobos.ramapo.edu/facassem/schedsp03.html

We have tried to accomodate the meeting needs for various groups and have included times for Graduate Program Meetings and for WAC. ARC has made arrangements to meet from 11-1 each Wed. in the spring. Note that times on the Meeting Schedule are the guaranteed times. Groups may of course set upadditional times outside the 2 1/2 hour Wed. afternoon time block.

16) In-service Day Meeting Opportunities: January 29, 2003 has been set aside an in-service day for faculty. There will be a faculty assembly lunch served in SC136-138 from 12-1:30. Rather than introduce a new agenda, the remainder of the in-service day is set aside for extended meeting opportunities for on-going groups such as the various task forces, ARC, convening groups working on 5 year self-studies, etc. I would recommend that groups select times from some (or all if needed) of the following blocks: 8:30-10; 10-12; 1:30-3:00; 3-5. Please advise me of which times you have selected and I will assemble and publish an overall list on the Faculty Assembly website. Also let me know if you need help with arranging for rooms.

17) Factalk: Factalk is up and running. About 30 people have signed on and have begun discussions. Please consider subscribing to factalk for an opportunity to chat electronically with your colleagues on a number of topics. To subscribe to the list, simply send an email to mailserv@ramapo.edu with the exact words "subscribe factalk-list your-email-address" in the body of the email. For example, "subscribe factalk-list jlipkin@ramapo.edu". This will be sent to the list moderator (currently Johnathon Lipkin -- Thank you Jonathon!), who will approve the subscription. This is so the list moderator can limit access to Ramapo folk. Further guidelines for factalk are available at: http://phobos.ramapo.edu/facassem/ftguidelines.html

18) New Committee on Academic Integrity: Martha Ecker is convening a group of faculty, students and staff to look at our current policies on academic integrity and to analyze the results of a survey to be conducted on all our students in the course of this year on the topic of academic integrity. We will be hearing more about this as time progresses.

19) Faculty Assembly website and Office: We continue to build on the faculty assembly website and have begun the work of scanning in archival material from the faculty assembly. The student assistants to the FA, Christina Medina and Fatima Duena, are doing an excellent job with the website and other services for the faculty assembly. Our thanks to both of them. The faculty assembly office at E221 is set up with a file cabinet and bookcase and is available to store old committee archives and current materials etc.