Board of Regents meets to discuss program requests, free speech
The Iowa Board of Regents will meet with the Academic Affairs Committee requesting additional Iowa State programs and the Free Speech Committee reviewing all three universities’ free speech trainings and survey updates.
June 1, 2021
The Board of Regents’ June 1 through 3 meeting commenced with the reelection of Pro Tem Sherry Bates and closed session performance evaluations of the institutional heads and executive director.
The Property and Facilities Committee, Academic Affairs Committee, Free Speech Committee and Investment and Finance Committee will meet at 1 p.m. Wednesday in the Levitt Center at the University of Iowa. This meeting will be held in person but can be watched live here for those who cannot attend physically.
In the Board of Regents’ meeting agenda, it is stated that the Academic Affairs Committee will be addressing new program requests from Iowa State. These programs include a Master of Science in artificial intelligence, Bachelor of Business Administration, Bachelor of Science in human resource management, Bachelor of Science in education as a second major, Master of Arts in teaching for secondary education and Master of Arts in teaching for math education.
The committee will also be requesting a department change at Iowa State that would merge the department of entomology and the department of plant pathology and microbiology. Both the Council of Provosts and Board Office support the approval of this request, according to the meeting agenda.
The Free Speech Committee will be reviewing the free expression syllabus statements from each major Iowa public university, along with receiving an oral update about university websites and the new free speech campus training. The largest point of discussion will be regarding the free speech survey update.
The Board of Regents approved nine of the free speech recommendations Feb. 24 and have since had all three universities collect and review data from the most recent campus climate surveys and national surveys regarding free speech. During the meeting, the committee will decide if an additional survey will need to be conducted in the fall to collect enough free speech data, according to the agenda.
Public comment will be allowed for up to 30 minutes after all four committees have spoken.
