Meeting Minutes
March 7, 2025

I. Opening Protocol

1. Mele Honouliuli – Ke`alohi Perry
2. Land Acknowledgement – Sen. Joy Mahiko (Program Review Committee)

II. Approval of Faculty Senate Minutes

February 7 meeting minutes approved with corrections.

III. Administrative Reports

1. Office of the Vice-Chancellor for Administration (Vice-Chancellor David McDonald)
   1.  Photovoltaic Project over the parking lot is underway.
   2. Legislative discussions, especially regarding Creative Media and Cybersecurity seem to be in good shape so far.
2. Office of the Vice-Chancellor for Student Affairs (Vice-Chancellor Dee Uwono)
   1. Applications down by about 10% year over year (mostly first-year down by 10%).
   2. Merit-based Scholarships: Approved for UHWO. First-time freshman from Hawaii high schools Merit Scholarships for GPA 3.5 or higher, $2000 automatic scholarship. OHA Merit Scholarship 3.0-3.49 $1000 from any Hawaii high school if enrolled full time, and continued with 4-year scholarship with GPA above 2.5 for four years full time attendance. UHM already does this. Majority of students are above 3.5 coming out of high school; therefore, targeting with Merit Scholarships should be a good idea
   3.  Outreach Events being planned – encourage faculty participation.
3. Office of the Vice-Chancellor for Academic Affairs (Vice-Chancellor Harald Barkhoff)
   1. Three programs moving from provisional to established, ahead of schedule. BACM – submitted to CACAO for next step, feedback only.
   2. Trying to schedule UHWO items for BOR meetings that occur on O`ahu so that students can participate.
   3. Several hires from faculty and administrative staff. Watch for announcements. Search for AVCAA is ongoing, campus visits will be announced with sufficient notice.
   4. Schedule for Fall is near completion. Also working on full-year academic schedule of classes to make things more predictable
   5. Working on international programs and other programs like CLEAR and Ulu`ulu with each unit submitting something like an annual report. Therefore, we would be able to provide information upon request. Also helpful with preparing for legislative session.

IV. ASUHWO Update (President Sydney Whitley)

1. Student Concern: Student brought up the topic of childcare facilities during the Feb 13th meeting. This student also provided ASUHWO with research she collected (see Action Research Project Slides). ASUHWO is looking into ways to help provide support to this student concern.
2. Ongoing Activities:
   1. Senators fleshing out initiatives for this semester
      1. Junior Class Senator
         Night Owl Nook Tuesday  April 28 8am- 8pm
         Another extension to Cram Jam. Study session open to all students in preparation to finals week
      2. Social Science
         Another Social Science Summit planned with tentative date and time of April 21 from 12pm-3pm
      3. Creative Media
         Improving communications around campus. Survey to be sent out
      4. Math, Natural and Health Science
         MCAT Study Group helping those in preparation for medical school, now meeting every 2nd and 4rd Friday of the month from 11am-1pm.
      5. BUSA Senator
         Cybersecurity Club has been reinstated: now known as Cybersecurity 1. Also working on a UHWO Podcast and maintaining message boxes as a way for students to submit feedback
      6. Freshmen Class Rep.
         Survey sent out to the freshman class regarding engagement.
      7. Recruitment
         Message for application for the 14th Senate sent out and deadline to apply is today March 7
3. Recruitment is ongoing.
4. General Senate Meetings occur twice a month, every 2nd and 4th Thursday 5:00-7:00pm.

V. Faculty Senate Chair Report

1. Info about our WSCUC Interim Report from Jessica Miranda, Director of Strategic Directions, Assessment and Accreditation.
   UH West Oʻahu completed its WSCUC Reaffirmation Review in June 2022 and was granted eight-year accreditation (next reaffirmation in AY 2029-30). As part of this process, the WSCUC Commission Action Letter identified nine key issues that we must address in the 2025 Interim Report. This is the final draft of our Interim Report that was sent out for feedback from faculty and staff:
   1. Currently waiting for WASC review, followed by a review phone call to determine next steps. Anticipate a positive review. Worse case scenario is a campus visit, but not expecting that outcome or, might be asked to submit another interim report.
2. ACCFSC
   Pres. Hensel joined the last meeting to discuss things that are going on with university websites and policies; briefed on her work; created an advisory council with an ACCFSC voted onto that body; she will be holding a town hall. UHWO Chancellor will be holding a town hall meeting
3. Consultation Memo for proposed Executive Policy on Sustainability in Curriculum, Research, and Scholarship with request for comment, due Mar 31, 2025. Please review and comment.
4. Proposed EP on microcredentials from David San Jose and Michael Furuto.
   1. Per existing policy, CLEAR receives and facilitates continuing education units for UHWO as a whole. This was therefore sent to CLEAR; however, microcredentials don’t seem to fall in this category.
   2. Note that the memo is for “interim” approval, so that it can move forward but also be reviewed
5. “University of Hawai’i West Oʻahu Non-Credit Micro-Credentials (Pilot)  Interim Approval”
   Proposed EP on microcredentials from David San Jose and Michael Furuto.
   1. Per existing policy, CLEAR receives and facilitates continuing education units for UHWO as a whole. This was therefore sent to CLEAR; however, microcredentials don’t seem to fall in this category.
   2. Note that the memo is for “interim” approval, so that it can move forward during revisions to review process.
6. Lamaku Inquiries directed to Faculty Senate.
   1. FSC discussed various with Chair of DE Committee (Katherine Aumer). Requested additional scheduled in-person or hybrid sessions because of faculty desires to have an in-person session.
   2. David San Jose, ODEL, answered questions and concerns. There are training sessions Tues, Wed, Thurs from 11-11:30, 11:30-12, and by appointment. Signup here  for 30 Minute sessions on Zoom.
7. Robert’s Rules of Order Excerpt (Decorum). Faculty are encouraged to review.

VI. UBAC Update (Sen. Thomas Scheiding and Aldayne Adlam)

No report

VII. Committee Reports

1. Academic Affairs and Planning – (Sen. Katie Landgraf): No Report
2. Budget and Resources – (Brenda Machosky) – approved
3. Charter Review – (Sen. Monique Mironesco)
   1. Charter Resolution Part 1 Passed Unanimously.
4. Curriculum Committee – (Sen. Carina Chernisky) – approved
5. Distance Education – (Sen. Katherine Aumer) – approved
6. Executive Committee – (VC Brenda Machosky)
   1. VC Election Resolution – already approved within Charter Review
7. General Education – (Sen. Megan Ross) – approved
8. Program Review – (Sen. Joy Mahiko)
9. Student Affairs – (Sen. Keʻalohi Perry) – no report (agenda report was retracted)
10. Sustainability – (Sen. Rouel Velasco): No Report

VIII. New Business

1. Website Content Review request from administration about various websites and microsites, to look for words the federal government has flagged as words not to be used any more. Concerns have been expressed to FSC Orr, and how this is a step towards censoring and erasing of these words through the university. Received word from administration that custodians of websites and microsites can stand down from this request.
   1. Administration may look at these websites and takes notes for future reference.
   2. Question of what other Faculty Senates at UH are doing to push back on this, perhaps doing this under protests. FSC Orr will bring up at next ACCFSC meeting.
   3. FSC Orr did start to review the UHWO Faculty Senate website.
      1. Historical documents cannot be changed. May consider putting them behind a protected site.
      2. Suggestion: Can faculty say something to push back or resist? We will return to this.
      3. At this point, the UH administration just wants to be aware of what is in these outward-facing documents so that they are not blindsided by some sort of intervention by the federal government.
      4. FSC Orr will continue to pursue this issue through his various engagement as FSC.

IX. Adjourned:

1:37 pm