STAFF ADVISORY COUNCIL

Aug. 13, 2008 Minutes

Executive Committee:
Stephanie Panion, President, spanion@du.edu, x13464
Kathy Aliaga, Vice President, katherine.aliaga@du.edu, x13284
Grace Fisgus, Secretary, grace.fisgus@du.edu, x14049
Nicky Bruckhart, Treasurer, nbruckha@du.edu , x14241
Karl French, Webmaster, karl.french@du.edu, x12121

Members in attendance:
Kathy Aliaga, Facilities
Craig Bach, University Advancement
Nicky Bruckhart, Athletics & Recreation
Christa Bruning, University Communications
Meaghan Burns, Human Resources
Jennifer Emmett, Bursar’s Office
Grace Fisgus, Denver Research Institute
Karl French, Office of Research & Sponsored Programs
Darrel Hundley, DU Bookstore
Amy Kho, Writing Program
Tonnett Luedtke, Daniels College of Business
Kate Martin, Student Life
Tina Miller, University College
Marty Neary, DU Bookstore
Stephanie Panion, Graduate School of Social Work
Karen Paul-Massaoka, Morgridge College of Education

Guests included:
Chancellor Coombe and incoming SAC members who will begin in September

Lunch was provided and the meeting was called to order.

1. July meeting minutes were approved as written.
2. The meeting was turned over to Chancellor Coombe, who spoke about the University.

The University is in wonderful shape.

 Great year with students and faculty.
 We are financially in very good shape.
 Good year enrollment-wise. Undergraduates enrollments are coming in – 1,120 were
budgeted for but that number has been exceeded. As of today we have 1,160 deposited
students.
 Many students are coming back for the 2nd, 3rd and 4th year, which indicates a successful
university.
 The students are highly credentialed: 46% of the students are in the top 10% of their high
school class.
 We are now competing with top national private schools.
 On the graduate side, all is stable. When the economy is down, there is a decrease in grads
and enrollments, but DU is holding steady. Our endowment has held up well. We have over
$300M with another 20M in endowment pledges. The endowment is about the size of our
operating budget. Our objective is to get to twice the amount of the operating budget. Our last
two years have been the best to date.
 We have been able to recruit excellent faculty and staff. DU is becoming known. In two
weeks there will be about 1,000 people staying on campus for the DNC. TV programs will be
broadcast from DU: “The Washington Review,” John Stewart’s “Daily Show.” Madelaine
Albright is managing a program for international studies.

Capital construction on campus:

 Fundraising is being completed for the Morgridge College of Education, which will start in
the fall, at the corner of High and Evans. It will be a “gateway to campus.” DU owns the
entire block behind it.
 Nagle Hall will open this fall. The dedication will be on the 21 st of August.
 We have three major construction projects coming up:
1. Cherrington Hall
2. Raising money for construction of a new building for School of Computer Science
and Engineering
3. Major renovation of the library/Driscoll Center over the next several years.
 The focus is on using the platform we’ve established. The next phase is absolute quality of
the enterprise – quality people; hiring and holding on to the good ones we have. The
Chancellor’s job is to build resources needed to attract and retain the best people, fuel
programs, fuel new faculty.
 We are now competing with national institutes.
 2/3 of the university community is staff.

We had an extraordinary year in Athletics:

 The National Championship in Skiing; Director’s Cup ranks us as #1 in the country among
colleges without football; #23 in the country ranked by Sports Illustrated; 80% of our student
athletes graduated.

Chancellor Coombe then opened the floor to questions.

Q: How can we all contribute to keeping the momentum going?
A: Focus on results and quality. Maximize and utilize the resources we have. Focus on working
with one another. If people work together, resources flow across boundaries. You drive the
institute forward. Relationships need to click. It’s easy to think of your departments as being self-
contained, but think about the boundaries as not cast in concrete. Pool resources.
Good Communication: Senior staff has discussed communication and gotten student
government involved. Communication among students is not great; among faculty and staff we
are going with the information flow but we are not good at large-scale conversations. We don’t
engage large groups. We do well with making information available but need a mechanism for
people to talk about them. It was noted people need to respond to e-mails and make phone calls.

 Dr. Coombe replied senior staff is addressing communication and information flow in the
community. He requested any ideas to enhance communication be sent to him.
o Jennifer suggested more gatherings – lots of staff members come to the Provost
luncheons.
o The Chancellor responded only 15%-20% of the University community is very
active. How do we engage the bulk of the DU community? This is people at all levels
in the University. SAC should be at the point of that. He suggested we consider how
to get the entire staff involved in participating.
Q: What about the University’s plan for Sustainability?
A: A large number of students got on board with it. There may be other kinds of things like this
we can use as leverage.
  A year ago DU signed a commitment for us to achieve a zero carbon footprint.
 Regarding renewable energy, we will continue to buy wind power for 30% of our energy
needs.
 Photo voltaics: If we covered all flat surfaces, i.e. all parking lots, flat roofs, etc., we would
save only 6% so the University will not use them widely. Cherrington Hall will have photo
voltaics on the flat roof.
 Our energy consumption per square foot has gone down.
 We made a capital investment in lighting and we use gas for heating a lot of our boilers.
We will not buy carbon credits. The University is committed. We will find a plan for
progress. We are among the greener campuses.
 The other side of that is behavior on campus. How can we change people’s behavior to be
more sustainable? We need to educate them to do more than recycling.
 Transportation: Managing the way faculty and staff get to campus. Light Rail: How can we
enhance that? People can manage their lives in ways that minimize their travel.
 Parking dilemma: They are looking at shared parking spots; multiple uses for the same pass;
free parking for hybrids.
 More frequent shuttle service was suggested. What kind of services can the University
provide to encourage people to take Light Rail?
 It was mentioned some departments encourage working from home when possible.

Chancellor Coombe encouraged staff with ideas or thoughts about sustainability to talk to him or
e-mail him. He welcomes information.

The next meeting will be held September 10, 2008 in the DuPont Room, Mary Reed.

Respectfully submitted,

Grace Fisgus, Secretary