Marie Diener-West, our department's representative to the Committee on Academic Standards (CAS), reported on a proposal under consideration to change the name of the School's professional MHS degrees to "MSPH."  Although our department does not offer a professional MHS (our MHS degrees are considered "academic" in nature), Marie requested feedback from us so that she can pass that along at the next CAS meeting.  In a discussion of the proposal, there was agreement that the "MSPH" name would be too confusing with the MPH and that, from our perspective, professional MHS programs should remain under the "MHS" name.

Standing Reports

• Biostatistics Center
  
  Mike Griswold announced two new hires by the Center: Thelma Hardy, who will provide staff support to Debra Moffitt and who will be sitting in the outer office part of the E3523 suite; and Carol Thompson, a master's-level research associate who will be joining us on January 22.  In addition to general Center activities, Carol will also be helping out with the Center's participation in the School of Medicine's new biostatistics core for clinical grant administration.

  The Center hopes to have its quarterly report available shortly.

  The Center is also soliciting proposals for new short courses to be offered at Johnson and Johnson in 2007.  Mike will be following up with an email to all faculty.
   

• BIT
  
  Fernando Pineda reported that the BIT is in the process of changing the way we think about our computing environment and is moving towards a model of customized nodes.  This is proving to be a more efficient upgrade path. 
  
  The Department now has a SAS license and dedicated SAS machine. 
  
  Cindy Hockett is working with the BIT to prepare a computing budget for the upcoming year.

NRC rankings

The National Research Council (NRC) does periodical rankings of statistics and biostatistics departments based on various criteria.  They are now in the process of doing another ranking and have contacted the Provost's Office (which in turn contacted us) for a listing of all our faculty as well as various kinds of data on faculty activities and publications.  Scott Zeger will try to find out more from the Provost's Office as to what the NRC's criteria are so that we can shape our responses accordingly (ie, it may be possible to define our "primary" faculty more broadly).  He will update the faculty as needed.

2007 financial status update

Scott Zeger reported that due to staff shortages over the summer, we were unable to do our regular monitoring of grant fall-offs and expiry dates.  As a result, monies that formerly were charged to specific grants or projects are now being charged to general funds, resulting in a higher deficit than anticipated (roughly $400,000).  Now that our financial staffing needs are being met, we are examining all faculty support to determine which monies may be changed from general funds charges to charges to specific grants.  We anticipate that our deficit will be reduced some.  In addition, our general funds allocation is expected to increase next year so that, combined with the corrected grant charges, our financial outlook is likely better than previously expected.  Cindy Hockett will also implement a system whereby faculty are provided with funding statements at regular intervals (ie, every three months) so that we can stay on top of grant charges and fall-offs. 

In a more general discussion of salary support, there was also enthusiasm for revisiting, at a later date, our method of monitoring faculty support to see if there are other models that might be more useful (ie, International Health's point system).  There was also enthusiasm for revisiting the issue of how to spend our surplus (once the current deficit is resolved).