Present: R. Osgood, J. Brand, B. Grey, D. Kaiser, K. Kamp, J. Mohan, M. Montgomery, J. Mutti, B.Voyles.

The meeting convened at 4:20 in the Nollen House conference room.

The minutes and excerpts of May 1 were approved.

President's Remarks

The President noted that the College had received a gift of $5 million from Ann Bowers for the Science Phase II building project.

He talked about several visions of what to do about relocating Information Technology Services (ITS) once Darby is scheduled for demolition. He stated that the committee looking into this issue has considered moving the operation off-campus in an interim period. The committee has begun looking at the Forum as the ITS facility and perhaps merging it with an expansion of Burling Library. With the movement of several academic departments into Mears, the advantage of this vision is in the fact that the information facilities are surrounded by academic buildings. A second vision would involve a major expansion of Burling Library and housing ITS in it. This is an example of how a relatively small issue becomes complicated as you begin to think about it in more depth.

D. Kaiser asked the President, in the context of what he had just said, how he viewed the faculty motion directing Council to create a mechanism for more faculty input in the campus planning process. For example, now that most functions of the Forum were to be transferred to the new campus center, might it not be a good time to revisit with faculty the future role of the Forum? Likewise, now that the future of the library was less settled than it had seemed, might not some old questions--like off-site storage, for example--be revisited before any firm decisions for the future are made? The President stated that he was not in favor of storing library materials off site in the situation of a small liberal arts college. In responding to the question of facilities planning he stated that in his view Council members have the breadth of perspective that is extremely useful when talking about facilities planning and that Council needs to provide the faculty input to the discussions. He also reminded Council members that the Campus Center planners were to present several sets of proposals at 7 p.m. tonight and urged them to attend.

Discussion of Staffing Proposals

The remainder of the meeting was taken up discussing staffing proposals.
The meeting adjourned at 6:10 p.m.

Secretary
Karen Wiese