The Academic Senate discussed a plan put together by the College Council for new hiring for the upcoming year, which ranks departments in need of new faculty members.

The list posted has eight new available positions.

Three positions in the nursing department are available, but are being treated separately from the eight new positions.

The rankings, put together by the Instructional Planning & Budget Team board and Mary Pape, co-chair of IPBT, have three entries for math, two entries for automotive technology, as well as one position each for psychology, accounting, and film/TV departments. All positions listed are replacement positions.

“Each member of the IPBT, including our student representatives sent in a ranking from 1-22 of the positions,” said Pape. “The departments put whether they wanted a position or not, and that list was approximately 40. 40 is very difficult to put into ranking.”

After the board worked in groups, they concluded with 22 total programs ranked for new positions. Math A, B and automotive technology A were in the top three rankings for replacements.

On the ranking sheet, categories are listed, such as success rate and the equity gap. Bob Kalpin, a representative for the biology, health and environmental sciences questioned these categories within the rankings.

“I’m just curious what was looked for there, just because I see three math and two autotech,” he said. “They’re diametrically opposed in terms of success rate.”

Pape explained the justification behind the categories and the rankings.

“Like I tell people when they do their slow assessments, when you reflect and say how things went, you don’t have to say everything is wonderful,” she said. “Rather, everything is the way it is, and if it’s not wonderful, then you need resources to make it wonderful.”

Revised mandates on reporting child abuse

De Anza College’s Academic Senate discussed revised mandations on suspected child abuse, which included being guilty of a misdemeanor and facing a $1,000 fine or up to six months in jail for failing to report suspected abuse.

AP 3518 requires faculty and members of the senate to report their suspicions of potential victims and instances of child abuse, but mandated officials are not required to disclose their identity.

Non-mandated personnel under this code are not subject to its contents, unless a reported instance is proven false and the person reporting knows it is false. Karen Chow, president of Academic Senate, explained a tool that faculty has to help mandate this code.

“As faculty, when you look at your class roster, if you see a little asterisk next to a students name, that is identifying a student who is under the age of 18,” she said.

Indicators such as this are in place for faculty to monitor students in order to raise red flags whenever they are needed.