The following is published in accordance with the Faculty Senate Rules. Among other purposes, the publication of SEC actions is intended to stimulate discussion among the constituencies and their representatives. Please communicate your comments to Patrick Walsh, executive assistant to the Senate Office, either by telephone at (215) 898-6943 or by email at senate@pobox.upenn.edu

Faculty Senate Executive Committee (SEC) Actions

Wednesday, April 15, 2020

Chair’s Report. Faculty Senate Chair Steven Kimbrough informed SEC of the establishment of the Faculty Senate Ad Hoc Committee on Planning for Post-Pandemic Penn (PPPP). Professor Kimbrough provided a rationale for the establishment of PPPP and enumerated its initial membership roster.  

“The ongoing pandemic immediately puts universities, Penn not excepted, into difficult circumstances. Beyond the exigencies of the moment, we can expect deep uncertainty, difficult tradeoffs, and the risk of wrenching consequences in both the near- and longer-term future. For these reasons, now is the time to bring our faculty’s intellectual resources to discussions, planning and decisions for the near- and longer-term future of post-pandemic Penn.  

“In consequence, the Faculty Senate will create an ad hoc committee on Planning for Post-Pandemic Penn. Initial core members of PPPP, all of whom have agreed to serve, have had significant faculty leadership roles. This affords legitimacy and draws upon a wide scope of pertinent experience. The committee will begin exploratory discussions immediately and ramp up its work over the summer and fall. In doing so, the committee will—as the main part of its mission—reach out across Penn to the faculty, and indeed to all of Penn, searching for ideas, insights, information and knowledge from all available perspectives.  

“I would anticipate that the committee will follow the successful example of CIRCE [Senate Ad Hoc Committee on the Institutional Response to the Climate Emergency], expanding its membership and forming subcommittees that can work in parallel. Everyone who has been invited to serve on PPPP has accepted the invitation. I imagine that hundreds of Penn faculty would be willing and eager to serve, and would have invaluable contributions to make. We must all acknowledge that this presents a formidable management problem. At the top of PPPP’s agenda will be to develop approaches for soliciting ideas from the larger community.  

“We have informed President Gutmann and Provost Pritchett of this plan. I believe that they see this as we see it:  activating the PPPP committee is a profoundly constructive and uniting event. May SEC’s goal of fostering exemplary deliberations be reaffirmed and taken to an even higher level of excellence.”

The initial membership roster of PPPP includes:

• Jennifer Pinto-Martin, Viola MacInnes/Independence Professor of Nursing, Chair
• Anita Allen, Henry R. Silverman Professor of Law and Professor of Philosophy
• William Braham, Professor of Architecture
• Peter Cappelli, George W. Taylor Professor and Professor of Management
• Chenoa Flippen, Associate Professor of Sociology
• Kathleen Hall Jamieson, Elizabeth Ware Packard Professor of Communication
• Steven Kimbrough, Professor of Operations, Information and Decisions
• Howard Kunreuther, James G. Dinan Professor Emeritus of Operations, Information and Decisions
• Harvey Rubin, Professor of Medicine
• Santosh Venkatesh, Professor of Electrical and Systems Engineering
• Bethany Wiggin, Associate Professor of German

Past Chair’s Report. Faculty Senate Past Chair Jennifer Pinto-Martin, in her capacity as a member of the Faculty Senate Nominating Committee, informed SEC that the Faculty Senate Nominating Committee has appointed William Braham, Professor of Architecture, as Chair-Elect of the Faculty Senate (see From the Senate Office: Senate Nominations 2020-2021 article).

Get Out the Vote Update. SEC member and Professor of Communication, Psychology and Marketing Emily Falk reported on progress made on the Get Out the Vote initiative since the previous SEC meeting.  

Update from the Senate Ad Hoc Committee on the Institutional Response to the Climate Emergency (“CIRCE”). CIRCE Chair and its Subcommittee on Operations Chair William Braham, chair of CIRCE Subcommittee on Community and Policy Chair Simon Richter, and CIRCE Subcommittee on Research and Education Chair Michael Weisberg each offered interim reports in turn on the work of CIRCE to-date.

Update from the Senate Ad Hoc Committee on Scholarly Communication (“ScholComm”). ScholComm Chair Daniel Raff, along with Associate Vice Provost and Deputy University Librarian Jon Shaw and Associate University Librarian for Collections Brigitte Weinsteiger, each offered interim reports in turn on the work of ScholComm to-date.