After the announcement that Interim President Ray Kieft has agreed to stay on until a new president is found, the Board of Trustees continued with the scheduled agenda items for its Nov. 10 meeting, including reports on Intercollegiate Athletics, funding for controlled maintenance, and the College Opportunity Fund (COF).

Trustee Alex Cranberg, chair of the BOT Finance Committee, reported that the committee wants to move forward on hiring an internal auditor who will report to the board through the president. Cranberg said that there will be a net cost savings to the college once the position begins its work of reviewing expenditures. He also suggested that it may be possible to approach AHEC for some reimbursement once those savings are proven, an idea that Ann Rice, who serves on AHEC’s Board of Directors, felt needed to be thoroughly vetted before any requests to AHEC were made.

Faculty Senate President Hal Nees reported that two Excellence in Teaching awards have been funded by Kieft. The $200 awards will be given to a tenure-track and a non-tenure-track faculty member. And John Schmidt, representing the Council of Chairs, reported that the Council continues to work on changes to the Handbook for Professional Personnel.

Intercollegiate Athletics
Intercollegiate Athletics Director Joan McDermott was given high marks by the trustees for what they believe is significant progress toward reaching the four goals of Athletics’ five-year plan. The plan is the upshot of the trustees’ request last fall that Athletics focus more on recruiting in-state athletes and relying less on college funds

For each of the plan’s goals: better integration with the campus community, increasing the percentage of in-state student-athletes, decreasing institutional funding, and increasing academic success -- McDermott laid out the gains that have been made. Of particular note is the increase in fund-raising from $40,000 last year to $100,000 so far this year. And while the current ratio of out-of-state-student athletes to in-state student-athletes is 37 percent to 63 percent, the ratio in this year’s freshman class is 13 percent to 87 percent.

McDermott also cited the overall 3.0 GPA of Metro’s student-athletes and the approximate 90 percent four-year graduation rate for those who remain on their team all four years.

Controlled maintenance funding
Auraria Executive Vice President of Administration Dean Wolf followed McDermott’s report with a discussion regarding the lack of funding for controlled maintenance. Wolf said that the state’s recent budget crisis and subsequent cuts to AHEC’s budget are to blame for the shortfall.

Calling most of AHEC’s buildings “middle-aged,” Wolf said that the situation is critical. He said the most immediate problems are the campus fire and security monitoring system, the Plaza Building roof, and renovation of the Art, Science and South classrooms buildings.

“We can’t continue a band-aid approach,” Wolf said, and asked the trustees to consider raising tuition or putting a $40 per semester student fee to a vote, a prospect which student trustee Stephen Hay said students will reject and which the board seemed very hesitant about.

BOT Chair Bruce Benson suggested that a committee with two representatives from each of the three colleges and AHEC be formed to work out a solution. He offered to sit on the committee, which Wolf said he will put together.

College Opportunity Fund
Interim Administration and Finance Vice President Natalie Lutes reported on Metro’s progress in preparing for the stipends for 145 credit hours that will be given to all state residents through the College Opportunity Fund (COF).

The COF task force, which Lutes chairs, is trying to nail down the process for handling the stipends, anticipating all potential questions and problems before they arise. The timeline is tight, with the testing of systems for processing the stipends to occur January-March 2005 and registration for the 2005 fall semester using stipends starting April 4.

Watch for a fact sheet about COF in an upcoming edition of This Week @Metro.