Back in December madradprof read with some consternation the November 23 minutes of the Committee on Faculty Affairs. One of the guests was Dean McQuaid of the Office of International Programs (OIP). Effective January 1, 2001, OIP was renamed the Global Programs and Strategy Alliance (GPS Alliance). The plan the Dean proposed sounded too ridiculous and I figured it would go nowhere. But a grad student in CLA was recently denied permission to do research in Nigeria because these folks decided it was too dangerous. For some years OIP has limited travel destinations for undergraduate study abroad, but it has not restricted graduate student travel. And they have plans for monitoring faculty as well. So it's time to shed a bit of light on what's going on with the transformation of OIP because something must be done to STOP them!
The concern about "risks and liabilities" when faculty travel abroad is driving the conversation. To avoid risk, faculty (and grad students) must be tracked. Right now faculty apparently go dashing off to all sorts of dangerous places and nobody knows about it. They must be protected by university bureaucrats! Texas A&M is held up as a model--there they deny reimbursement to faculty who do not report their international travel ahead of time. According to the Dean, the policy being developed will require reporting overseas travel but not require faculty to obtain permission. Sanctions for not complying are still under discussion. Apparently grad students are being required to obtain permission, as evidenced by the experience of the CLA student.
What is missing in the Dean's narrative is any evidence whatsoever that faculty have needed rescuing by the U. In other words, there is not really a problem, but there might be one, so the U should erect a vast monitoring (the Dean says it's not monitoring but methinks she doth protest too much) system and require yet more reporting from faculty--on top of the already onerous reporting and permission seeking that we already do. (How many hours did you spend on IRB applications last year?) It will be costly to monitor faculty travel and the benefits of doing so are minimal, so this seems like a ridiculous plan at a time when the U is facing huge budget cuts.
Even if we had loads of money, the plan is paternalistic and just plain dumb. The bureaucrats themselves admit that the liability issues associated with international travel are the same as for domestic travel. Even if we do report our travel, how will they know something bad has happened to us--will we be required to check in every day? Maybe they should just microchip us (GPS-Alliance could GPS us!) so that they know where we are all the time. Perhaps faculty could also be mounted with distress buttons so that we could call out for help. What are they gonna' do if we do get in trouble...send in a private military corporation to save us from the dangerous natives? No, they'd probably just do what our families and friends would do, which is call the State Department.
But the most important issue is that of academic freedom. Will grad students (and perhaps faculty) be barred from doing research in large swathes of the world?
**
EXCERPT from the 11/23/2010 minutes of the Faculty Affairs Committee
1. Faculty Travel Abroad and Possible Policy
Professor Sheets convened the meeting at 2:30 and welcomed Dean McQuaid to discuss issues associated with faculty travel abroad and a possible proposal about registering for such travel.
Dean McQuaid began by noting that she is both Associate Vice President and Dean of the Office of International Programs, a central office that provides service to all campuses. As she had noted earlier for the Senate Research Committee:
OIP is a system office that serves all five campuses; OIP has about 100 employees and a budget of about $22 million (approximately $17 million of which is funding from students studying abroad, which is then redistributed to the providers of the study abroad opportunities). Dean McQuaid talked about the unique nature of her particular decanal role. Much like Wendy Lougee (Dean, University Libraries), her responsibilities reach across the academic units, requiring cooperative, supportive efforts to accomplish goals. She has been in the position for four years and has seen interest in internationalization grow dramatically, particularly with respect to the types and amount of international research by faculty and among graduate students. She has been in a number of meetings with Vice President Mulcahy about what is occurring with respect to international research funding, the risk and liabilities associated with those projects, and which central offices have responsibility for which aspects of this emerging phenomena. This is an evolving and growing field, particularly with respect to the kinds of funding available from around the world, and the types of issues/questions being addressed by the research. OIP has always been responsible for oversight and coordination of international undergraduate student experiences, but over the past 4-5 years there has been more demand on OIP for assistance, support, funding, advice, and coordination from faculty and staff as well. In light of this change, OIP has finalized and adopted a new five-year strategic plan, to better align resources and expectations.
One result of the strategic plan is that the office will change its name, effective January 1, 2011, to Global Programs and Strategy Alliance ("GPS Alliance"). The unit is not really an office, a center, or an institute; it really is an alliance. In order to achieve "comprehensive internationalization," (a term of art in the field), University units, colleges, and campuses must work together, through an alliance of interests and efforts.
When she took this job, she was asked to assess the University's international programs, so she worked with a small committee of key faculty and administrators to consider the range and type of risks and liabilities inherent in this kind of work. One resulting product of that work was a "heat map" charting the risks and liabilities and how well the institution was prepared for harm. For student mobility, the University is well prepared. The question before this Committee today is that of the level of risks and liabilities that arise when faculty travel overseas, Dean McQuaid said. The University often has no idea where faculty members are; faculty MIGHT tell their department head or dean that they are traveling abroad, but the practice varies by department and college. From conversations Dean McQuaid has had with faculty, deans, and administrators and staff around the system, it seems that both policy and enforcement varies widely.
A valid concern, she said, on behalf of the University, is for the safety of faculty members who travel abroad.
The reaction of some faculty to the idea that they need to report international travel is "what do you mean, I have to tell you where I'm going? Mind your own business." With more and more faculty members traveling overseas, however, the risks are increasing. For example, when there were bombings in Uganda, there was good reason to believe that University faculty and students were likely there—but the University had no idea precisely who. There have been incidents in India, Brazil, and Mexico as well (e.g., during the H1N1 outbreak) that put faculty members at risk.
The impact of not knowing ranges from public embarrassment for the University when it does not know who is where (something that also tends to irritate some in the legislature) to a lack of ability to help faculty members who may be in trouble. Things happen; the University wants to be able to help, not monitor. This is NOT "tracking," Dean McQuaid emphasized, because they are not particularly interested in what the individual may be doing or with whom they are meeting when they are overseas. But, she said, their whereabouts are critical to any effort to assist with getting someone home.
One step she has taken in response to the issues raised by assessment of the risks and liabilities is to appoint an international Health, Safety, and Compliance Coordinator, Stacey Tsantir. Ms. Tsantir is doing a lot of work to provide resources to faculty so they can educate themselves about international travel, prior to leaving the country.
The Proposal Routing Form (PRF) has recently been modified for several reasons, and among the modifications is a question that asks whether any of the research work associated with the funding will be conducted over seas, Dean McQuaid said. Her office is apprised of that situation, and can reach out to ask whether OIP can assist with visas, bank accounts, hiring employees, etc.
With respect to purchasing, Cliqbook [http://travel.umn.edu/onlineres.php] is currently the University's only travel-booking site and people can obtain deep discounts if they use it. In the future, Purchasing could be able to assist with identifying who was scheduled to have been in a place that is experiencing crisis because of travel arrangements made through Cliqbook. Texas A&M, for example, plans to require use of a single travel agency beginning early in 2011; currently, the University is only encouraging use of Cliqbook.
The question remains whether the University should require more reporting. Texas A&M has adopted a policy which denies reimbursement to faculty who did not report international travel in advance of the travel. That is a discussion that is being held here and it was an issue when Dean McQuaid visited this Committee a year ago. What happens to the information that is collected? That is a good question. Their thought is that only the travel site collects the information, it is not necessarily distributed to the department—and is later purged.
This is an issue for all major research universities, Dean McQuaid related. None of them have any clear idea where the faculty go or what they are doing, so they cannot effectively tell the broader community what their institution is doing around the world—and it cannot help faculty who encounter problems. The University of Michigan, Michigan State, Duke, and the California system are each at different points in considering policies and enforcement. At some universities, these conversations are non-starters, at others there is more compulsory enforcement of policies, and others (like the University) are still finding their way. But, international crises of all kinds are not waiting for higher education institutions to develop a response.
Professor Kulacki asked whether there is a liability issue; if a faculty member is injured abroad, what is the University's liability? The same as it is for domestic travel, Dean McQuaid said. Ms. Tsantir said that there are employee benefits that cover people who are injured. So there is no downside to receiving support from OIP, Professor Kulacki concluded.
There is also the travel-assistance program Medex, Mr. Chapman reminded the Committee—but that is only helpful if the faculty member can get in touch with it. If they are being held incommunicado, it can't help. And if someone does not show up when expected, it may be only the spouse or partner who knows that a person is in trouble somewhere, Dean McQuaid added, and the University would be unable to help.
Professor Miksch reported that she has to fill out a form indicating when and where she will travel. That practice varies by college, Dean McQuaid said, as does the disposition of the form once it is filled out. It may end up in a paper file in an office and it could be that no one knows where it is; the information may be inaccessible to the office or unit that could help someone. Professor Hanna asked if there are units that provide a good model that could be adopted more broadly. Dean McQuaid said that she understands that the School of Nursing ties reimbursement to completion of a travel form. Her concept is that of a travel registry; the college would not own the data, and when the traveler returns, the data would be purged. Some faculty members are unwilling to have their department or chair know of their travel—something it is difficult to cannot understand—and may make arrangements for their classes and so on, and just go.
Professor Sheets said he was puzzled why this would be controversial. If that could be ascertained, the problem could be overcome. Several Committee members expressed incredulity that faculty members would travel without notifying their department. Professor Sirc commented that perhaps if one is traveling to interview for another job, one might not want the department to know, but otherwise he was flabbergasted that faculty members would travel without letting anyone know. Mr. Orlic said that there could be a problem if the faculty member skips class, but perhaps has the TA teach. That would also be doing something wrong, Professor Sheets responded.
What reasons do faculty members give for not indicating travel plans, Ms. Stenhjem asked? It is not the University's business, they are fulfilling job responsibilities, and the like, Dean McQuaid said. They are doing so on the University's dime, Professor Sirc commented. Dean McQuaid reported that some faculty members said they would not report unless required to do so, but the tenor of the times is more persuasive than a worry about academic jealousy or some such reaction, because more faculty members now know about others who were sick or stuck abroad. A central repository of information would take the matter out of college hands.
Professor Sheets asked if it would be helpful for the Committee to take a position on the issue. Dean McQuaid said that the University must decide what it wants. It is a big issue and the University needs to figure out its response. She has been invited to talk to the senior executives about oversight; she will draft a policy and see if the institution feels strongly enough to take a position. There could be multiple responses: the institution should not adopt a policy, it must adopt a policy, it should further investigate such a policy. But for the four years she's been in this position, the question she is asked most often is "how come you don't know where people are?"
Dean McQuaid said that any policy proposed would go through the normal process, which would include review by appropriate Senate committees. The proposal being developed provides that faculty and staff travel overseas must be reported in advance; she said that no decision had been made regarding repercussions for not following the policy, including but not limited to denying reimbursement if the reporting does not occur. She emphasized that the policy would not call for obtaining permission, only for reporting.
Professor Cline said he supported the idea of a policy but noted that there is a great deal of reimbursement that comes from outside the University. He suggested that people should notify both their college and Dean McQuaid's office. What about when traveling on University and personal business, Professor Bornsztein asked? Dean McQuaid said the policy would cover travel on University business.
The sanction need not be either/or, Professor Sheets suggested. If one is negligent in reporting the first time, expenses could still be covered.
Professor Sirc asked about the 35% figure for UMTC students who have a study-abroad experience. Is that between the time they come to the University and the time they graduate? Or is it per year? In any given academic year 35% of students will be outside the U.S., Dean McQuaid said. Many go without earning credit; the number would be higher if those students were counted. That would be useful information for the University to project, Professor Sheets said; does University Relations know that our study abroad numbers are this high? They do, Dean McQuaid said, as do the President and vice presidents, and they often use the fact in public remarks. Dean McQuaid reported that her office also has great websites that her staff has developed that are known nationally, and they are asked to provide training nationally on both study abroad procedures and programs, as well as on international recruitment, orientation, enrollment and support. OIP websites can be accessed throughwww.international.umn.edu.
Professor Bornsztein asked what the policies at other Big Ten schools are. Dean McQuaid said that Michigan State has a voluntary registry (which her counterpart said does not work very well; there generally needs to be either a carrot or a stick approach). The University of Michigan also requires reporting and, for the first year of the policy, there will be no repercussions for failing to report, though that may be added later. She said she does not favor unnecessary or ineffective policies and forms, which is why she wants to keep it simple and clean and have the data destroyed after the travel is complete.
Professor Sheets thanked Dean McQuaid for her report and for bringing the proposal up for discussion
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