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Spring 2023 - Issue 9
Fall 2022 - Issue 8
Summer 2021 - Issue 7
Spring 2020 - Issue 6
Summer 2019 - Issue 5
February 2019 - Issue 4
September 2018 - Issue 3
March 2018 - Issue 2
November 2017 - Issue 1
Introduction

Fall 2022 - Issue 8

Dear Academic Senate Colleagues, Senate Staff and UCSF leaders:

As I enter my second year as Chair of the Academic Senate, I am proud of all that we accomplished together in the face of inconceivable stresses and interruptions brought about by the pandemic. Faculty engagement was at an all-time high at our standing committee meetings, special events, and town halls. The exercise of shared governance has been strengthened. The Senate has forged stronger relationships with UCSF leaders to better our University and now regularly meets with senior administrators in the Offices of the Chancellor, Executive Vice Chancellor and Provost, Academic Affairs, Finance and Administration, Human Resources, and UCSF Health. Chancellor Hawgood committed to meaningful faculty consultation and shared governance and worked directly with Graduate Council (GRAD) to review UCSF’s potential partnerships with both Altos Labs and the Arc Institute. In collaboration the Chancellor’s Office, the Senate plans to formalize a ‘Compendium,’ which will memorialize agreements, shared understanding, and processes that govern academic Senate review and consultation. Such a document will not only assist the campus in regularizing review processes for academic units and programs that are unique to UCSF, but it will increase the efficiencies in establishing such entities.

Academic Program Approvals. The Senate worked closely with both the Graduate Division and individual program proposers to approve1 the following innovative programs last year:

  • Intercampus Program (UC Berkeley/UCSF) of Graduate Studies in Computational Precision Health for the Ph.D. Degree: With an initial $50 million gift, this program will create an entirely new augmented graduate group, where four 'Type 1' faculty appointments would be made at its onset. Executive Council was unanimous in its appreciation and praise of the academic merits of the program, and engaged with the proposers to optimize the novel joint structure.
  • Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP): Executive Council members approved a newly proposed School of Nursing DNP, which will create a new pathway to the DNP for post-baccalaureate applicants, including the students who complete the UCSF MS Entry Program in Nursing (MEPN), beginning in Fall 2024. The program brings UCSF into accord with significant trends in professional nursing education.
  • School of Dentistry International Dentist Pathway & D2 Curriculum Proposals: Executive Council endorsed the Committee on Educational Policy’s and the SOD's Curriculum Development Proposal for Full Integration of the International Dentist Pathway and the DDS Curriculum Development Proposal to add the D2 summer quarter.

Recovery from the Pandemic. Recognizing 2021-22 as a transition year from the global pandemic, the Senate established a special COVID Faculty Support Working Group, which not only responded to the 2020-2022 systemwide joint Administration-Academic Senate faculty working group on Mitigating Impacts of COVID-19 (MCIF-WG) report (also see the CFW review), but also examined specific divisional issues that the pandemic has laid bare. Particularly at UCSF, the following issues and proposed initiatives include:

  • Achievement Relative to Opportunity (ARO): The Senate recommends that faculty be invited to include an ARO-type statement with their review packets to allow individuals to explain barriers they faced or overcame to accomplish what they did during their review period (CFW).
  • Bridge Funding: In 2021-22, the Senate both conducted a faculty survey and worked with the EVCP & the School Deans to relax the strict two-thirds matching requirement borne by the School and the department. In the fall, CFW and COR are reimagining Bridge Funding to serve as a vehicle for research recovery from the pandemic.
  • Burn-out & Sabbaticals: Burn-out continues to be a challenging problem, but expanding sabbaticals at UCSF faces sustainable funding and duties coverage hurdles.

Human Resources. Over the past year, the Senate’s Executive Council engaged directly Chief HR Officer Corey Jackson and his team to improve hiring and onboarding of academic staff who are critical to UCSF’s research mission and to increase process transparency for continuous monitoring. This consultation resulted in comprehensive analyses and the following early HR commitments: 1) faculty hiring leader has access to HR personnel for a 15-minute kick-off meeting (campus Control Points concurrence) to express needs, and gain alignment around recruitment strategy, candidate qualifications, and candidate screening criteria; and 2) two additional HR Recruiters are being hired to support the higher volume of posted/vacant positions on the campus.

Climate Crisis. UCSF has enjoyed strong leadership from its standing Sustainability Committee (SUST). Following the approval of the systemwide Senate’s Memorial2 to the UC Regents, which SUST publicized on the UCSF campus, the Executive Council enthusiastically endorsed the adoption of a ‘Sustainability Theme Year’ at UCSF for the 2022-23 academic year, which includes several types of activities:

  • Awareness: Informing faculty and other UCSF community members about issues related to climate health and sustainability.
  • Engagement: Involving faculty and/or campus leaders in climate health and sustainability projects.
  • Institutional Commitment: Securing funding or other institutional resources to support sustainability efforts.
  • Policy Change: Establishing or revising UCSF policies to support sustainability efforts.
  • Assessment: Evaluating the progress of ongoing projects or efforts.

Towards this end, SUST is excited to embark on a number of policy initiatives and activities – continuing to advocate for the electrification of the campus; changing the culture of academic travel; reducing medical waste; supporting bicycle infrastructure and sustainable commuting; enabling learning and communication regarding sustainability; co-coordinating the NorCal Symposium on Climate Health and Equity; and organizing speaker events on campus. SUST will be leading a special Division meeting in spring 2023 on the progress made on these initiatives.

Campus Events. Over the past year, the Senate has also been very active in sponsoring and hosting events of interest to faculty:

  • Electrification: In November 2021, the Senate hosted Norman Bay, the former Chairman of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to discuss the benefits, challenges & opportunities of large-scale electrification. Gail Lee, UCSF’s Sustainability Director, & Paul Landry, Interim Director of Utilities and Engineering, UCSF Facilities Services, provided the local context.
  • Gender Equity: In April 2022, the Senate hosted UC Regent Emerita Sherry L. Lansing and UC Davis EVCP Mary Croughan for a special Division meeting on gender equity. Issues addressed included ARO, salary and living costs, invisible work and career advancement, and discrimination. Emanating from this discussion, EQOP and CFW have drafted recommendations, which will be delivered to VPAA Alldredge and the new EVCP.
  • Faculty Research Lectures: The Committee on Research (COR) hosted three Faculty Research Lectures (FRLs) in 2021-22, which included two FRLs in Basic Science to Esteban G. Burchard, MD, MPH in November 2021; Jim Wells, PhD in April 2022; and an FRL in Translational Science in May 2022.

Diversity. Diversity and equity issues are of core importance at UCSF and will remain a Senate focus this year. Some of you may be aware of the Chancellor’s UCSF Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) initiative, which aims to have all committees3 comprise 50% women, nonbinary/gender nonconforming individuals, and underrepresented minorities (URMs). I am delighted to report that in 2022-23 academic year, we have met that goal with 53.2% of our standing committee members being URM or women. That said, I am hopeful that we will increase the percentage of URM committee members, which currently stands at 13.3%. The Senate’s Committee on Committees (CoC), which is responsible for appointing faculty to our standing committees, has made increasing the diversity of our standing committees an important priority. Our call to service takes place in November/December every year, but faculty are invited to state their interests in serving at any time here.4 In addition, the Senate’s Executive Council is looking forward to reviewing the Committee on Courses of Instruction’s DEI initiative over the next couple of months. Indeed, the Senate regards the thoughtful application of the concepts of DEI, Anti-Oppression and Anti-Racism (DEI-AO-AR) to courses as both necessary for creating an inclusive learning environment that supports equity in the experiences of diverse leaners and as essential to the institution’s responsibility to the broader society that students who take these courses will eventually serve.

Open Access. I would be remiss if I did not recognize the pioneering role that both our Committee on Library and Scholarly Communication (COLASC) and the UCSF Library have played in the Open Access (OA) movement. While it may be hard to believe, we are rapidly approaching the ten-year anniversary of UCSF OA Policy, passed in 2012. As the first policy of its kind within the entire UC system, it ensures that faculty can post their final accepted article manuscripts without paying a cent to the publisher, so that their work can be freely accessed by all. UCSF's policy influenced the passing of a UC-wide policy for faculty in 2013, and for all other scholarly authors in 2015.5 Please join us for a hybrid zoom/in-person Mission Bay (MH-1400) celebration on Friday, October 21, from 3:00-4:00 pm. You can register for the event here.

Looking Ahead. The Senate hopes to capitalize on growing momentum and good will from the past year to deepen shared governance and move our wonderful University forward. The new EVCP will soon be announced, and the Senate stands ready to work with Dan Lowenstein’s successor. Thank you for your support and engagement.

1 All of these programs successfully passed a thorough review by the systemwide Senate’s Coordinating Committee on Graduate Affairs (CCGA).
2 See Academic Senate Memorial on Reducing Fossil Fuel Combustion. “The University of California Academic Senate petitions the Regents for investments in UC’s infrastructure that will reduce on-campus fossil fuel combustion by at least 60% of current levels by 2030 and by 95% of current levels by 2035.”
3 The guidance pertains to all committees appointed by the Chancellor or members of the Chancellor’s Cabinet.
4 CoC begins to consider self-nominations in late January/February, making appointments for three-year committee term of service by mid-May, with committee service beginning on September 1, 2023.
5 On October 23, 2015, a Presidential Open Access Policy expanded open access rights and responsibilities to all other authors who write scholarly articles while employed at UC, including non-senate researchers, lecturers, post-doctoral scholars, administrative staff, librarians, and graduate students.

Gender Equity Division Meeting with UC Regent Emerita Sherry L. Lansing & UC Davis EVCP Mary Croughan

The COVID-19 pandemic, over the past two years, has spotlighted a number of concerns relating to gender equity. Indeed, as noted by the systemwide Joint Senate-Administration Mitigating COVID-19 Impacts on Faculty Working Group Final Report, the pandemic has impacted faculty in a negative way, including stalled research and scholarship, fewer opportunities for collaboration, pivot to remote instruction, lowered morale, increased anxiety due to work-life balance challenges, health concerns, and dependent care responsibilities, among others. Many of these place a disparate burden on women, especially those with dependents. That said, many of these conditions existed before the pandemic, and will continue long after.

Given this, The Spring 2022 Division Meeting for the UCSF Academic Senate focused a special panel discussion on Gender Equity. Guests included: Sherry Lansing, a University of California (UC) Regent Emerita and CEO of the Sherry Lansing Foundation, and Mary Croughan, the Executive Vice Chancellor and Provost (EVCP) of UC Davis. UCSF moderators were: Andreea Seritan, a Geriatric Psychiatrist and Professor of Clinical Psychiatry, and Lindsay Hampson, a Reconstructive Urologist and Assistant Professor in Residence of Urology.

The pandemic deepened long-standing equity issues affecting women and people of color, prompting academic success inflection points to emerge. The Academic Senate attended to some of these issues around gender equity through its Spring 2022 Division Meeting. Key highlights from that panel discussion were:

Achievement Relative to Opportunity (ARO)
This concept emerged during the pandemic as caregivers, in many cases women, both nationally and at UCSF realized the asperities of providing such care while trying to maintain their professional lives. Achievement Relative to Opportunity (ARO) aims to do a better job of recognizing how faculty are performing in evaluative areas within the context of barriers and opportunities they face. The Academic Council advised that ARO principles:

“Enable merit and promotion reviews to evaluate candidates fairly based on their individual review-period professional accomplishments by taking into account unexpected or disruptive circumstances during that period that may have curtailed the candidate’s normal ability to achieve expected outcomes.”

To reiterate, ARO principles assume employees have put forth good faith effort in their work and acknowledge that uncontrollable circumstances may alter productivity. Panelist Croughan highlighted the Final Report of the Systemwide Mitigating COVID-19 Impact on Faculty Task Force, which supported putting ARO in place for a minimum of five years. There is momentum to extend ARO indefinitely on campuses, because not only will COVID have a lingering impact on all aspects of academia, but also it is not conceivable to predict what those varied impacts will be at this time.

To provide context for what ARO recommends, UCD EVCP Croughan offered the following examples: a clinical researcher who, during COVID, had to forgo research to devote efforts solely to clinical care. Similarly, an educator had to convert all in-person didactic lectures into an online format. In both cases, faculty should be recognized for their outstanding efforts in different and new fields COVID forced them into, and not be penalized for the ones they had no choice but to devote less time toward. Both panelists supported ARO principles being continued after the more immediate impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic have passed. Indeed, panelists emphasized that ARO has particular relevance because of other obstacles faculty may experience, including gender-related issues, which pre-dated the pandemic.

Regent Emerita Lansing noted that a baseline of high-level achievement for faculty should be used, as has been similarly used for student admissions during the course of the pandemic. Doing so will dispel concerns that ARO lowers faculty standards, as some UC campuses have proffered. Implementation of ARO principles did not require approval by the Regents and was adopted immediately.

Salary & Living Costs
Panelists suggested speaking up about salary inequity issues by forming campus-specific working groups to implement changes and they abetted quantifying gender and URM salary inequities, which the Faculty Salary Equity Review Committee has done. The committee has found disturbing data that point to pay imbalances to women and URM faculty members. As a result of the committee’s efforts to mitigate salary inequities, a list of recommendations has been made available on the FSER Report 2022 Executive Summary as well as listed below:

  • Development of school- and department-level initiatives that broadly promote opportunities for additional or higher compensation equally among eligible faculty (i.e., raising awareness, transparency).
  • Compensation plans should codify how negotiated Y salaries and incentive payments are determined.
  • Ongoing examination of recruitment strategy to ensure equitable appointment of women and URM faculty members across all ranks. New male faculty appointments at the full professor outsize new women faculty appointments, though the reverse is true for new assistant rank appointments.
  • Development of school- or department-level initiatives to develop compensation plan incentives for teaching and mentoring activities.
  • Development of school- or department-level initiatives to similarly incentivize service related activities.
  • Departments within individual schools consider similarly sharing their reports or their participation in the recurring Faculty Salary Equity Review to ensure that all faculty are aware of the deliberate intention to improve compensation equity and have the opportunity to participate or contribute.

In addition to salary inequities, UCSF’s base pay has disadvantaged its faculty. Despite annual salary increases and the recent rise in government funding, the base pay at UC is not competitive enough for San Francisco’s high living costs, which was suggested as one of the primary reasons for faculty attrition. The panelists’ discussion claimed that, unfortunately, the relatively low base pay is due to divergence between UC's financial needs and funding allocation by the state government. This may be accurate for the UC system generally; however, UCSF has never received a significant portion of State revenues. Regent Emerita Lansing noted that not just Ivy League universities, but west coast private universities have lists of UC faculty they would like to recruit. Panelist Lansing suggests involving leadership in proactively showing their appreciation through bonuses and raises, instead of waiting for people to leave to negotiate for higher pay. Moreover, while many faculty have stated they prefer to stay with the rich intellectual environment at UC, the practicalities of salary and cost of living cannot be ignored.

Invisible Work & Career Advancement
Panelists advocated for leaders to get involved with and support women and underrepresented minorities (URMs). First, ideas suggested making invisible work visible, such as by modifying the Academic Personnel Manual (APM) 210 to acknowledge mentoring in addition to teaching. Second, developing leadership skills is key to improving gender equity, such as by encouraging individuals to take on mentoring and leadership roles. Mary Croughan cited, as an example, women faculty getting involved with the Academic Senate as a key way to develop leadership skills through service as Committee Chairs or leading targeted Task Forces. There are numerous opportunities at UCSF for women to develop leadership skills, i.e., the UCSF Women Physician/Scientist, and the Muriel Steele Society, among others. Third, another way to improve diversity in leadership, as suggested by the panelists, is by increasing the percentage of women and URM faculty receiving endowed chairs at UCSF. This can be accomplished by directing endowments towards areas that have more women and URMs and through fundraising – such as steering philanthropist interest..

Provost Croughan did acknowledge that UCSF’s efforts around the creation of new endowed chairs, and designating women and URMs to those roles were visionary in comparison to other UC campuses. However, more can be done, which has prompted UC efforts to be very intentional in the future to create new endowed chairs in fields where there is a preponderance of women and URM faculty. The Committee on Academic Planning and Budget (APB) is reaching out to each school to discuss the endowed and distinguished professorship process. The purpose is to ensure that the process is done in a transparent and equitable manner.

Discrimination
Panelists noted that bullying and microaggressions remain prominent contributing factors to gender inequity. They suggested that people speak up, even if it is against faculty or department leaders who are more senior than themselves. Panelists encouraged department chairs to ask women faculty how they can assist them and to inquire as to whether they are experiencing bullying or microaggressions. It is vital for women faculty and URMs to feel welcomed and supported. Chancellor Hawgood and moderator Seritan informed attendees that in the event there is a gender inequity in a department, the issue can be mitigated by initially raising concerns with the department chair. If this does not resolve the problem, faculty are encouraged to reach out to Academic Affairs (VPAA Brian Alldredge), Diversity and Outreach (Renee Navarro), or the Office for the Prevention of Harassment and Discrimination.

Recommendations
As a follow-up to the Division meeting, two Academic Senate Committees (Committee on Faculty Welfare and Equal Opportunity) developed Gender Equity Recommendations for campus leadership, which were forwarded to UCSF Chancellor Sam Hawgood, Executive Vice Chancellor and Provost Dan Lowenstein, Vice Provost for Academic Affairs Brian Alldredge, and Vice Chancellor of Diversity and Outreach Renee Navarro to request that changes be made to benefit women and URMs at UCSF. The formal suggestions are as follows:

  1. Improve Equity in Advancement. Advocate for the Achievement Relative to Opportunity (ARO) or "holistic" approach to be consistently used in merits and promotions actions. The final report on Mitigating the Impact of COVID just came out and has a section on this, which may be useful for providing specific guidance.
  2. Recognize Invisible Work. Consider using optional Candidate Statements, similar to the COVID Impact statements in Advance, to capture the invisible work. Develop a rubric or another way to capture and quantify these contributions - it may be worth forming a task force to work on this.
  3. Improve Retention/Reward Loyalty. Find ways to express appreciation for faculty. Be explicit in using racial equity and intersectionality lenses in this regard. Suggest including the question, "What can I do for you this year (i.e., how can I help advance your career)?" in all annual faculty meetings with their Chair/Vice Chair/Division Chief.
  4. Improve Equity of Endowed Chairs. Suggest considering changes to endowed chairs to improve equity – forming a task force may help. Potential suggestions include (1) creating smaller endowed chairs from mature endowments, (2) targeting endowed professorships to more junior/mid-career faculty, (3) awarding endowed professorships through an open competitive process, (4) launching fundraising efforts to specifically support endowed chairs for women/URM faculty, and/or (5) imposing term limits on endowed chairs, so the benefits are passed on.
  5. Improve Gender Equity within Leadership. Provide protected time and compensation for important leadership roles to improve gender equity among leadership. Develop a culture of sponsoring women and URM faculty. Sponsor more faculty to attend the AAMC Early Career/Mid-Career Women Faculty Leadership Development Seminar or Minority Faculty Leadership Development Seminar or similar programs for nursing, pharmacy, or dentistry faculty.
  6. Improve Gender Equity in Faculty Recruitment. Gather data on start-up funding by gender, race, and rank, and convene a task force to review these data and develop equitable practices for faculty recruitment.
  7. Improve Understanding of Inequities Based on Non-Binary, Transgender, and Intersectionality Status. Improve efforts to collect and analyze data (including qualitative data, data from focus groups, listening sessions, etc.) regarding the specific needs of faculty who are non-binary, transgender, or belong to more than one protected category.

Acknowledgements
The Senate thanks its Spring 2022 Division Meeting special panel guests (Sherry Lansing and Mary Croughan) and the moderators (Andreea Seritan and Lindsay Hampson) for the fruitful discussion. We look forward to continuing to work with campus leaders toward concrete and measurable efforts to mitigate gender inequity and develop and maintain a diverse institution.

The Senate wants to acknowledge its data sources which generated the roundtable’s questions. These included the 2020 survey from the Committee on the Status of Women, the 2018-2019 UCSF Faculty Exit Survey, the 2019 UCSF Salary Equity Report, the 2022 Status of Women Report from the UCSF Department of Medicine, the Net Promoter Score 2019-2021 results, the UCSF Women Physician-Scientists Supergroup, the Academic Senate’s SOM Faculty Council, Committee on Faculty Welfare, and Committee on Equal Opportunity.

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Chancellor’s Funds 2021-2022

The Academic Senate redirected one award category supported by the Chancellor’s Funds to mitigate pandemic impact on the faculty. Each year the Senate offers four different awards: Conference Travel Awards (research-related or education-related), Faculty Learning & Development Awards, and Enrichment Awards.

For the past two academic years, the Senate’s Committee on Faculty Welfare has advocated for the Enrichment Awards to be replaced by the $500 COVID Relief Award. Requiring minimal explanation for its use, the award is intended to supplant any home-office needs, or any other need related to faculty life.

The Academic Senate is happy to report that the entire $146K allocation for this award was fully used in 2021-2022 academic year. The Senate also anticipates having this same award available to faculty in the 2022-2023 academic year.

Other highlights from this year’s Chancellor’s Funds include:

  • Conference Registration Grants in both Education Curriculum and Research. Designed for presenters, these grants were offered on an ongoing basis until funds were expended fully. They can be used for both in-person and remote conference attendance, i.e. registration costs only. For calendar year 2022, we have remaining funds for Education-related conferences.
    • These travel grants are sourced by our Committee on Educational Policy and Committee on Research.
  • The Clinical Affairs Committee sponsored a Zoom workshop on Faculty Training on Effective Communication Methods led by SpeechSkills. As remote delivery of education, research, and other work-life content continues, new skills acquisition or basic skills enhancement for the online world must now be part of faculty development. This workshop aimed to highlight key tools for faculty use in a Zoom environment.
  • For the eighth consecutive year, the Senate Office partnered with the Office of Diversity and Outreach and sponsored faculty to participate in the national Faculty Success Bootcamp. This program helps develop skills necessary to increase research and writing productivity while maintaining a healthy work-life balance.
  • Increased support for the Backup Care Program (BCP) sponsored by Campus Life Services. The Academic Senate Chancellor’s Funds have long supported the BCP. In the lockdown era, we expanded BCP to assist more faculty.
  • In partnership with the Mentoring Office, the Academic Senate continues to sponsor a Faculty Mini-CORO program. CORO leadership training emphasizes culturally competent, collaborative and results-oriented leadership skills.
  • Sponsorship of the UCSF Library’s Oral Histories Project.
  • Support of Anti-racism Research Grants through the Committee on Research.

The next cycle of awards will open up for applications in January 2023.

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Academic Senate Move Announcement

Academic Senate Move Announcement

 

 

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Created by UC Board of Regents Standing Order 105, the UC San Francisco (UCSF) Academic Senate is empowered to exercise direct control over such academic matters as admissions for degrees and curricula, which are of central importance to the University. The UCSF Division of Academic Senate provides an independent forum to discuss faculty-related campus wide academic concerns. In other areas, the Senate exercises an active advisory role. The Academic Senate works within the larger body of UCSF, a leading university dedicated to promoting health worldwide through advanced biomedical research, graduate-level education in the life sciences and health professions, and excellence in patient care.

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