On Thursday 12/2 we had a gripe session. Attendance was a bit low (due no
doubt to the busy time of quarter), but I think we got some good
feedback. 
 
1) There was a long discussion of RPC and the role of the self assessment
form.  There was a brief pole and it appeared that less than half the nth
years students (n>1) had filled out the form. In discussion, many students
said that they considered the task of filling out the form to be very
useful, since it made them ask themselves hard questions about their
progress and facilitated subsequent discussions with their advisors.  A
straw vote was organized and the vast majority of students were in favor of
requiring all students to complete this form and turn it in to RPC, as long
as it wasn't made part of the permanent student record. 
 
 * Action item - RPC should consider this proposal, possibly revising the
   form. 
 
2) Students indicated that they felt divorced from faculty decision making,
for example in faculty recruiting, new building plans, remodeling, and
similar issues. Poor communication concerning the faculty recuiting process
was an emphasis. Students felt that they hadn't heard quickly about job
offers or acceptances, and were sometimes mystified by the process. Were
their opinions even taken into account?  Why, when the majority of students
who met with a candidate didn't like him/her, did the candidate still
receive an offer? Why was no explanation offered?  Perhaps having a student
on the faculty recruiting committee (FRC) would help?
 
* Action item: Ed Lazowska has documented that, in fact, students have been
  notified promptly on acceptances in recent years.
 
I'd like to reemphasize the point that student opinions *are* valued highly
in recruiting decisions. But the recruiting process tries to compensate for
the fact that one only learns so much about an individual in a 36 hour
interview, and track record, letters of recommendation, and other factors
also play a significant role. I've seen the complete faculty of ~30 people
spend 6 hours discussing a specific case, not to mention the considerable
time that smaller groups discuss the issues bteween group meetings, or that
goes into preparation by the FRC. We hire by consensus, and the process
which yields it is lengthy. It's very difficult to summarize such a complex
decision, especially since many facets are confidential. Never-the-less, we
must do better. 
 
* Action item: The FRC should seek to improve feedback to students
  regarding the rationale for decisions. I understand Susan Eggers (FRC
  chair for this year) plans a meeting during which she will explain FRC
  plans and operations to students and will answer questions. 
 
* Action item - the FRC should consider the question of a student member.
  (Confidentiality of rec. letters concerning the student's peers is a
  concern, however.) Similarly, they should consider if it is practical 
  to notify students immediately upon issuing job offers. 
 
The plans for the new building were another issue. Only a small number of
students present felt like they had been consulted / informed on the new
building plans in the past six months. The concern was topical since the
faculty has just that hour received its first briefing in six months!

* Action item: the Building Committee should repeat their briefing for the
  students (Actually, I'm told this was already planned). 
 
There was a request for more regular "lunch with the chair" meetings, which
was tempered by the observation that attendance had dwindled at recent
incarnations. 
 
The meeting ended with a request that future grievance meetings start with
an "old grievance" summary, followed by recap to see which (if any) past
complaints had been fixed. 
 
* Action item: let it be so.
 
Warren Jessup contributes the following CS lab support-related issues:
 
1. Question about why Office2000 was installed on some machines in
   231 without prior notice.  This seems to be upsetting the flow of some
   classwork. 
 
2. Questions about the Microsoft orders.  Those giving feedback said
   there have been no orders since last June; they thought the practice
   was to cut an order every quarter.  It was also suggested that an
   email confirmation for orders was needed.
 
3. Question about Y2K readiness.  Perhaps a general announcement is
   needed on this topic.
 
4. Question about why multicasting on subnets 1 and 4 seems to be
   flaky.
 
5. Suggestion that all machines in the dept. be behind a firewall.
   This would make it easier for some projects/people to run ftp/web
   services on their NT boxes.
 
6. Request to install ssh client on the lab NT boxes.
 
Please let me know if we forgot anything, or if your recollection differs
from mine. 
 
Dan