• • Decline
    in the number of first-time full-time Latino students warrants careful
    analyses and immediate action lest the College suffers further declines
    

• • College’s
    aspiration with respect to quality education and responsiveness will
    be compromised if the College allows the continued decline in the number
    of full-time faculty lines and the concomitant increase in the use of
    adjuncts

• • Attracting
    and retaining faculty of color continues to be a significant challenge
    for the college. Although not unique to Baruch, the team believes this
    is an issue that requires greater focus, attention, and creativity given
    the College’s stated commitment to diversity of the student body

• • College’s
    long-term success could be compromised unless the positions of president,
    provost, vice president for college advancement, and treasurer and special
    assistant to the president are filled on a more permanent basis

• • The
    team perceived a level of miscommunication and distrust between College
    officials on the one hand and CUNY officials on the other. The team
    believes that this gap must be closed if Baruch is to receive the support
    it needs to achieve its aspiration.

• • Although
    the College has appointed a vice president of student development since
    the last comprehensive visit, there is a great deal of diffusion, fragmentation,
    and duplication in services for students, accompanied by unevenness
    in staffing and funding. The team found that the self-study did not
    fully address issues related to student development.

• • The
    constraints imposed by CUNY and the current collective bargaining agreement
    will impede the College’s ability to achieve its desired academic aspirations
    unless acknowledged and addressed by trustees and CUNY administration
    

Organization,
Administration, and Governance

• • The trustees should appoint
    a president as soon as possible. The president should fill the provost
    and college advancement positions as soon after her/his appointment
    as possible.

DONE

The
positions of President, Provost, and VP for College Advancement have been
filled [dates?]

Financial
Resources

• • The college should develop an
    “all-funds budget” that can be shared with the President’s Council and
    the University Board of Trustees. This would provide the president with
    the information required to effectively and efficiently manage the College
    and to establish a stronger link between planning and budget

Budget
& Planning Subcommittee

• • The team strongly encourages
    Baruch to continue its efforts to persuade CUNY to permit the College
    to charge tuition that is closer to the market rate for graduate programs
    in the Zicklin School of Business and the School of Public Affairs.
    Those schools are able to collect significant fees Executive Degree
    participants. There is ample justification for greater increases in
    the full-time MBA programs, even for the part-time students for whom
    a Baruch advanced degree is, at present, a bargain.

DONE
for ZSB

[dates/amounts?]

• • The team also strongly encourages
    CUNY to modify its tuition policy for certain graduate programs and
    to permit Baruch to retain the resulting increased tuition revenue as
    a supplement to its base budget allocation

DONE

[dates/amounts?]

• • The new president is encouraged
    to review the organizational structure to determine if the planning
    and budget functions are best served by concentrating the responsibilities
    for fiscal affairs under a single individual

DONE

Organizational structure is under
review college-wide; one of the five new committees will be looking at
financial issues.

• • The Baruch College Fund should
    leverage the success already achieved through the campaign and consider
    allocating resources to expand the size of the development operation.
    

Gallagher

• • The College should consider
    modifying its current budget and planning process to ensure that the
    priorities identified in the planning process are accompanied by a realistic
    financial plan and a time-line for achieving the desired results.

IN
PROCESS

This
is the charge of the new AVP for Planning and Budget.

• • The College should continue
    its efforts to seek a change in the PSC-CUNY collective bargaining agreement
    that would add faculty in business management, information systems,
    public administration, etc. to the disciplines of law and medicine as
    disciplines with salary scales above those for other disciplines

DONE

We
have gained the ability to pay at 165% of scale.

• • A greater effort needs to be
    made by both the College administration and CUNY administrators to improve
    the flow of information and the level of communication between the College
    and CUNY. The recommendations of the Mayor’s Task Force in this area
    should be strongly considered

 Dannenbring

Faculty

• • Recognizing that diversity of
    faculty is likely to be an issue on other CUNY campuses, the team recommends
    that CUNY make this a special initiative and define a supportive role
    for itself in partnership with Baruch and its sister colleges in their
    recruitment efforts without dictating selections or otherwise unreasonably
    intruding into the recruitment process. On campus, the provost and deans
    should actively participate in the search process to ensure the diversity
    of candidate pools and define diversity as a selection criterion. Finally,
    the administration, with the departments, should establish programs
    (perhaps linked to graduate programs in neighboring universities) designed
    to attract minority faculty to Baruch College. There should be college-wide
    programs not limited to a particular school.

Remains
a significant issue. Provost and deans do actively participte. Additional?

Dannenbring

• • The appointment of more visiting
    scholars and the use of clinical appointments are also approaches the
    College should utilize in diversifying the faculty.

IN
PROCESS

Although
the diversity of the faculty remains an issue, the use of visiting and
clinical appointments has made inroads in achieving diversity. Numbers,
info from Dannenbring (Altman?)

• • The team recommends that a faculty
    handbook be produced, kept current, and made available to all faculty
    either in print or on-line.

DONE

An online faculty handbook has
been in place since fall 2002 and is kept current. The PDF version is
nearly 400 pages.

• • The team recommends that the
    College, in cooperation with schools and departments, explore different
    faculty development models, including the centralization of the faculty
    development function. In doing so, the distinction should be made between
    faculty development efforts in teaching and learning, use of technology,
    and research.

DONE

Independent efforts continue,
but faculty development in each of these areas has been coordinated centrally
since summer 2002. Each of the designated areas (teaching & learning,
technology, and research) receives attention.

• • The College’s new administrative
    team should consult (for the purpose of reaching an agreement for future
    action) with CUNY officials as soon as possible about the shortage of
    faculty lines, especially as it relates to any specialized accreditation
    issues

 Cluster
hires?

Larwence
& Dannenbring

• • The team recommends that a handbook
    for adjunct faculty be updated providing them with information necessary
    for doing their jobs and for becoming more integrated with the College
    community.

DONE

An online adjunct handbook has
been in place since December 2003. We now send regular emails with announcements
of interest to adjuncts.

Arts
and Sciences

• • The College should develop and
    implement a plan that clearly defines the role of Arts and Sciences
    within the College and maps a strategy for increasing the percentage
    of courses that is taught by full-time, tenure-track faculty

Chase

Student
Support Services

• • The College should carefully
    review how it currently provides student support services and ascertain
    how best to organize those services to maximize effectiveness, efficiency,
    and responsiveness. Moreover, a decision should be made about which
    services will be offered in a centralized mode and which should be decentralized.
    At any rate, there should be a standard of service that all students
    can expect to receive. The College should draw heavily on the expertise
    of its staff in student development in establishing objectives, strategies,
    and quality benchmarks

 
Johnson and Dannenbring

Library

• • It will be a challenge to keep
    the library staff proficient as new electronic resources and the new
    library online catalog is implemented. The library administration should
    develop a plan as soon as possible to address technology proficiency
    and training requirements for the entire staff

DONE

The
library faculty established a training committee to ensure proficiency
in the use of new databases. All library staff were provided with technology
training in preparation for the implementation of the new library system.
Ongoing training is offered via the BCTC.

• • The College should consider
    ways to increase the library’s materials budget to allow for additional
    electronic resources without jeopardizing the development of print collections.
    

DONE

The
acquisition of electronic resources is now supported by an annual allocation
of $200,000 from the student technology fee.   The library still
needs to augment its print acquisitions budget through endowment.

Fulfilling
a Focused Mission in the Context of a multidimensional System

• • We recommend that the Presidential
    Commission, or a newly established group, be charged with crafting a
    vision statement for the institution and that in turn this vision statement
    be linked to a strategic plan for the evolution of the institution.
    The strategic plan should spell out underlying assumptions regarding
    enrollments, funding sources, evolution of teaching, support, and physical
    resources, and how the interaction among these factors will move the
    institution along a path consistent with its mission, vision, and objectives.
    

DONE
BY MAY 05?

A process that began in spring
2002 that was to lead to a mission statement and strategic plan failed.
The college’s new President has
announced that a strategic plan will be developed in spring 2005.

Teaching
and Learning

• • We recommend at the Joint Curriculum
    Review Committee level a commitment by all constituent units to engage
    in a process of a rolling curriculum review for courses affecting all
    divisions of the College. This generally means those courses in arts
    and sciences that meet the general education requirements and serve
    as the foundation for specialization in business and public administration.
    

Potash

• • Previous visits and the current
    self-study note the gap between FTE students and full-time faculty lines.
    We restate the need for Baruch College to restore the number of full-time
    lines consistent with norms elsewhere with the CUNY senior institutions
    

The
senior college allocation model supports this–to no avail. Dannenbring

Responsiveness

• • The college should perform a
    careful analysis of the decline in first-time, full-time Hispanic student
    enrollment and take the appropriate action to not only halt the decline
    but to increase Hispanic enrollment

Analysis by Choonoo

• • Institutionalize faculty development
    in curriculum redesign and the use of technology

Downing

• • Institutionalize technology
    renewal budgets

Downing

• • Maintain a student to computer
    ratio as close to 10 to 1 as possible

Downing

• • Investigate and implement a
    means of making computers available to students. They may take the form
    of discount programs, leasing, loans, or other means.

Downing

• • Investigate and implement a
    means of making laptop computers available to faculty as they undertake
    to develop and use technology in teaching

Downing

• • Implement the CUNY Transfer
    and Information Program and Planning System (TIPS) as quickly as possible,
    and use preliminary transfer transcript evaluations prior to students’
    first enrollment at the College

Replaced
by DegreeWorks

Potash?

• • Conduct surveys of both undergraduate
    and graduate students’ interests and needs to assure that services are
    matching those needs

CUNY
satisfaction survey & NSSE also card swipe system 

Choonoo & Potash

• • Implement web-based services
    for students, including course registration, as quickly as possible
    

Downing