ACE Association of College Educators West Valley Mission Community College District Office at West Valley 741-4631 or ace@wvmccd.cc.ca.us Web Site http://wvmccd.cc.ca.us/wvmccd/ace

APPROVED MINUTES

Thursday, March 16th, 2006

West Valley College BU8 at 2:30 pm

I. MEMBERS PRESENT

Present	Member	Present	Member
x	Pat Andrews, WVC, President	x	Ed Kleppinger, MC, FT Rep
x	Carol Beck, MC, FT Rep	x	Louise Lodato, MC, AF Negotiator
x	Roberta Berlani, WVC, FT Rep	x	Ellen McAlister, MC, Negotiator
x	Randy Castello, WVC, Chief Negotiator, Budget Analyst	x	Benjamin Mendelsohn, WVC, FT Rep
x	Donna Frankel, AF Rep At-Large	x	Susanna Pancella, MC, Vice President, Secretary
x	Tom Golbetz, WVC, FT Rep		Rod Pavao, MC, FT Rep, Grievance/FSA Specialist
	Michael Herauf, WVC, Grievance/FSA Specialist	x	Doug Temkin, WVC, Newsletter Editor
x	David Hoekenga, MC, AF Rep		Marge Throndson, WVC, AF Rep

GUESTS:

Ken Colson, Heidi Davis, Tina Golaw, Lenore Harris, Dr. Phil Hartley, Stephen Juarez, Mel Pritchard, Ashley Sousa

II. CALL TO ORDER The President called the meeting to order at 2:35 p.m.

III. ORGANIZATION

IV. AGENDA: No changes

V. MINUTES

VI. REPORTS

A. President:

WTC issue: Program Review issue at West Valley

§ West Valley has enacted a new program review system. The position of the West Valley administration is that it is part of the department chair's responsibility and job description to see that this gets done.

§ We are still working on this matter and the implications of the Senate's action. Once this is clarified then we can recommend an action.

B. Vice President: None

C. Secretary: None

D. Treasurer: None

E. Budget Analyst: None

F. Newsletter Editor: None

G. Associate Faculty: None

VII. CLOSED SESSION

A. Negotiations

VIII. OLD BUSINESS None

IX. NEW BUSINESS

New Associate Faculty Mission College Representative, David Hoekenga, was introduced to the Council.

Guests brought the following issues:

§ ACE Constitutional issue about a faculty member as a Division Chair and serving on the ACE Executive Council.

§ Information about the Sheriff's Department Contract with WVC

§ Maternity Leave article in the contract

Sheriff's Department Contract with WVC:

§ Ken Colson and Dr. Phil Hartley wanted to be available to explain the program and answer questions.

§ The Administration of Justice Department at WVC is about to enter into a service agreement with the County Sheriff's Department and the Probation Department to teach classes. As a result of the agreement we will get a share of the apportionment. This could be a good WSCH generating program. This program will be presented at the Board tonight.

§ Ken Colson pointed out that the modern law enforcement requires a tremendous amount of specialized continuous training. Up to this point this training had taken place in the South Bay Regional Justice Training Consortium but things changed and the Sheriff wanted to use WVC. There are standard contracts that cover this and there are about 37 agencies throughout the State affiliated with colleges. They all follow the same plan and there are State mandates that must be followed. They contain all of the Ed Code citations.

Maternity Leave issue/article: several faculty members came to speak on this topic.

§ There have been emails from faculty members expressing concern about maternity leave in the contract. These faculty members have come to give us input as to what they might like to see in the article.

§ Concerns:

o A workable timeline for negotiations in reference to this matter – if we get started now researching a policy what time frame would be adequate

o Would the Council be involved in soliciting feedback for faculty about their needs in this matter

o How is this done in other places

§ They have done some research and found that there is no standard in the academic world and especially not at the community colleges. Evergreen College has a similar process to ours. Six weeks paid leave is the standard at most universities in the United States; fourteen weeks paid leave is the standard in Canadian universities; twenty-four weeks paid leave is the standard in Australian universities.

§ Since there is no standard they thought the best place to start was to ask families (mothers and fathers) in the District what they would need or what would be an ideal policy. We have to take in the needs of the departments and faculty. We should not be thinking of maternity leave only but also parenting and working.

§ In terms of breast-feeding the State law provides that there should be clean and discrete place for nursing parents to handle this. West Valley has no such location.

§ In terms of childcare we have limited access to this and only when our children are old enough. Is there a potential for subsidized easily accessible childcare for those who need it? It was noted that Mission College has childcare for infants.

§ Questions:

o In the current contract what problems have you run into in implementing your rights within the contract? Under the contract they said they have no rights. Individually each new parent has put together a solution for themselves within their department and division.

§ Suggestions were to be able to take a sick leave and use your sick leave if you want to get paid, use your banked leave (if you had any), or have a childrearing leave of up to six months. What is the process one follows when they find out they are pregnant – who do they go to, who do they talk to, what forms do they complete? There seems to be no regular process.

§ One of the guests thought that they would apply for the Family Medical Leave Act because you can get at least 50% of your pay from this (maximum is $840 per week). After investigating in turns out that WV/MC does not pay into the Family Medical Leave Act. There is also a California leave process that we do not pay into. Shouldn't the District be paying into these? These should be co-existing options.

§ Comments/thoughts from the Council:

o Ed Code says that you must use your sick leave for maternity but it also says that the BOT can grant other paid leaves of absence at their discretion.

o Our contract could create more flexibility for people who need to take time off and how they can maintain an income stream while they do that.

o Could you give us in writing what you would like, this would be very helpful to us? You have immediate knowledge of the situation. Any help you could give us on this matter would be appreciated because we are all teaching faculty – we all need to help each other.

o What about taking a paid leave and then work it off when you return?

o We can do a survey for you (and to help us) if you could please provide the questions or information that you think would be helpful.

§ The Council requested that parameters, bottom-line and ideal be given to us within a month. We can then work with this.

X. FUTURE BUSINESS

Next regular ACE meeting: April 20 at Mission College in W1-602 starting at 2:30pm

XI. ADJOURNMENT The meeting ended at 5:10pm.

Respectfully submitted,

Susanna Pancella, Secretary