Several key issues including approving the budget for the next fiscal year are on the agenda for the annual spring meeting of the University's Board of Trustees, which will be held today and tomorrow at the Inn at Penn.
In addition to passing the budget, the University's top governing board is expected to authorize several resolutions , including the formal appointments of Richard Gelles as Dean of the School of Social Work School, Marjorie Jeffcoat as Dean of the School of Dental Medicine and Michael Delli Carpini as the Dean of the Annenberg School for Communications.
Other resolutions coming before the trustees include changing the name of the Graduate School of Fine arts to the School of Design and the creation of a criminology department in the School of Arts and Sciences.
Top administrators, including University President Judith Rodin, Provost Robert Barchi and Executive Vice President Clifford Stanley, as well as the entire board, led by Board of Trustees Chairman James Riepe, will gather at Friday's Stated Meeting to vote on these measures, as well as hear reports from the board's various committees scheduled to meet over the course of today and Friday.
At the Facilities and Campus Planning Committee meeting today, plans for future retail development will be discussed.
"They are looking at... the retail area around the Inn at Penn.... There a have been studies of what sort of retailing activities we'd like to attract to the campus would do best at campus," University Secretary Leslie Kruhly said.
The Neighborhood Initiatives Committee will also meet today to hear reports about the Nursing School's programs in West Philadelphia, while the External Affairs Committee will reviewing current legislative activities.
In the Budget and Finance Committee's meeting, the operating budgets for both the University and the Health System for the upcoming year will be discussed.
At the Development Committee meeting Friday morning, a new computerized system to help maintain information about alumni and prospect identification will be reviewed.
Other committees meeting include the Student Life Committee, the Academic Policy Committee, the Ad Hoc Committee on Diversity and the Audit and Compliance Committee.
"We will have a presentation on the most current thinking of the strategic plan," Kruhly said.
A final draft of the strategic plan was approved last June by the trustees, following a semester of discussion. This week's presentation will include more specifics on the plan's implementation.
The plan, based on the 1995 Agenda for Excellence is nearing "the culmination of planning process," according to Kruhly.
Additionally, she noted that the deans of the University's 12 schools will be asked to present strategic plans for each individual school at the trustees' meeting this November.
The trustees meet in full each fall, winter and spring each year. Approximately 60 of the University's 80 trustees are expected to attend this week's meetings, according to Kruhly.
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