President’s report
Trevor Sears
March 11, 2013

Abstract
Summary of some issues discussed recently at Senate Executive Committee meetings and various other issues for March 2013 A&S Senate meeting.

1. General Education Curriculum
The University Senate accepted the revised Stony Brook General Education Curriculum committee report at its meeting earlier this month. There are still some undecided issues, particularly on the question of whether the courses will have to be passed with a C-grade or better. This body voted overwhelmingly for this, but there is some resistance based on possible impacts on 4-year graduation rates. However, the University Senate also voted overwhelmingly for this standard at its last meeting.  Other outstanding issues pertain to Health Sciences courses and the make-up of a committee to vet
and certify courses meeting the new curriculum standards. We will have some discussion of this last issue later in this meeting. The current curriculum proposals are available on the Provost’s web site. http://www.stonybrook.edu/commcms/provost/category/initiatives/gened.html

2. A&S Senate officers, 2013-4
We need nominations for President and Vice-President. There are also openings on several committees and vacancies for several senators. Please consider helping to serve, encourage your colleagues to stand for some of the openings, and don’t hesitate to contact me if you want more information.

3. New Contract
Details have recently been released, make your views known! Do we want to propose a motion on this?

4. Cluster Hires 2013
Final one-page letters of intent were submitted Tuesday March 5th. Full proposals, for those selected, are due April 5th. The Provost’s office in consultation with the University Senate and department chairs, has begun the process of selecting membership of the proposal review committee.

5. MOOCs
The MOOC committee report was submitted to the Provost earlier this month. We await developments