Members discuss further action over ad-hoc committee
By KATE WALTER
News Writer
Campus Life Council members expressed concern Monday about the composition of the Academic Council's ad hoc committee dealing with academics and student life.
The discussion centered around a letter from vice president for Student Affairs Father Mark Poorman responding to the Council's request for more representation on the committee. Poorman's letter referred to University president Father Edward Malloy, who formed the ad hoc committee. Malloy is "satisfied with the composition of the committee," Poorman wrote, and "did not believe it necessary to add members from the Campus Life Council."
Sister Patricia Thomas, rector of Walsh Hall, was invited to serve on the committee independent of the CLC request.
Members were split about what, if any, further action should be taken.
"The letter is inadequate in my eyes," said Matthew Mamak, chief of staff for the office of the student body president. Asking for clarification of this letter would not be considered out of line."
Some members complained that the letter does not explain why CLC members are not part of a committee that deals with student life.
"The CLC deals with student life. This is an issue that deals with academic life and student life," said Ava Preacher, assistant dean of the College of Arts and Letters. "The question is, doesn't the CLC deserve to be a part of this discussion?"
Coalition Council representative Michael Fierro shared this opinion.
"If this is a committee dealing with student issues, why aren't there students on it?" he asked.
Other members believed that no further action was necessary, noting that Thomas and student body vice president Michael Palumbo both sit on the committee. Others said the CLC does not have the right to insist on being included on the committee.
"When an ad hoc committee is formed, there is nothing that says that we have a right to be there," said Father David Scheidler, rector of St. Edward's Hall.
Palumbo and Thomas said that it is too late to add new members to the ad hoc committee.
"The committee is already broken down into subcommittees and adding new members is highly unlikely at this point," Thomas said.
Only six members voted in favor of discussing a resolution on this issue. Ten votes were needed create a resolution.
In other CLC news:
u The Academic Committee discussed Notre Dame's rankings in the U.S. News and World Report.
The idea that the rankings are not comparable to Notre Dame because many other universities have much higher ratios of graduate students to undergraduate students was decided to be invalid, because the magazine states that the data applies only to undergraduates.
"My reaction is to suggest that we need to construct a sample of comparable schools and identify the information that we want to be compared by," Faculty Senate representative Edward Manier said.
u The Diversity Committee discussed that only half of all minorities accepted to Notre Dame decide to attend.
"We want to find out why this is so," Fierro said.
The committee also discussed issues of recruitment including Spring Visitation.
"We want to find out what the University is doing for recruitment, and what the University should be doing for recruitment," Fierro said.
u The Gender Issues Committee continued the discussion concerning a pamphlet to be sent home to all incoming freshmen, and hopes to have a first copy by Christmas.
The committee also discussed the possibility of cleaning up biased language on campus.
"We want to make people think about words they use in everyday language," said Student Union Board manager Ross Kerr, "and what the effects of certain words are."
All News Stories for Tuesday, October 12, 1999
