graduate council meeting minutes

February 4, 2025

Present:       Bhuiyan Alam, Marcelo Alvarado-Vargas, Saad Andalib (GSA), Brian Ashburner, Tomer Avidor-Reiss, Dan Boden, Qian Chen,
                      Mai Dao, Jennifer DeVries, Bashar Gammoh, Rafael Garcia-Mata, David Giovannucci, Dan Hammel, Noela Haughton,
                      Ed Janak, Ahmad Javaid, Andrea Kalinoski, Kristen Keith, John Laux, Patrick Lawrence, Nagalakshmi Nadiminty,
                      Megan Petra, Srinivas Saladi, Barbara Saltzman, Youssef Sari, Beth Schlemper, Connie Schall, Joseph Schmidt, Zahoor Shah,
                      Snejana Slantcheva-Durst, Hossein Sojoudi, Kuo-hui Su, Varun Vaiyda, Jerry Van Hoy, Eileen Walsh, Kandace Williams, 
                      Qiuying Zhao. 

Absent:  

Excused:      Patricia Relue. 

Guests:        COGS – Teri Green, Tara Hanna.

 

Call to Order, Roll Call, and Approval of Minutes 
The meeting was called to order and roll called.  

Executive Reports  
Report of the Executive Committee of the Graduate Council 
On behalf of Graduate Council, Chair, Dr. Barbara Saltzman reported: 

• Interim President Schroeder will visit Graduate Council this spring, date tbd. 
• Policies (4) under review were shared for reference and input
  Three are undergraduate and one is pertaining to Emeritus Faculty 

3364-xx-xx Transfer Credit Policy 
3364-xx-xx Transfer Credit Procedure 
3364-71-14 Missed Class Policy 
3364-72-08 Emeritus Faculty 

Report of the Vice Provost for Graduate Affairs 
Dr. Dan Hammel, Interim Vice Provost for Academic Affairs provided the following updates: 

• New Policies under development
  COGS is working on developing some graduate policies that will be shared with the GC Executive Committee followed by the full Graduate Council. These policies will also be included in the catalog. There is a need for clarification. 

• • Graduate Transfer Policy
  • Graduate Grading Policy 

Graduate Faculty volunteers needed for: 

• Fellowships and Scholarships Committee
  Which reviews the University Fellowship applications (two to award) and graduate scholarships administered by the COGS.  Graduate Faculty reps from these colleges are needed: Arts and Letters, Engineering, Medicine and Life Sciences, Nursing, and Pharmacy. This is a one-year term to review applications for 2025-2026.  University Fellowship application numbers are lower since the new Scholarship Management system requires a Rocket Number, thus admittance. This requires admittance, even without funding, which may be difficult for some programs. Questions may be addressed to Dr. Dan Hammel or Terri Hayes. without funding. Dan will send an email to Graduate Council. 

• Responsible Conduct in Research (RCR) Training – Saturday, April 5, 2025
  Expanding training has been expanded by 1.5 hours to include an additional set of break-out sessions including mentoring and authorship of professional papers. The sessions are popular, and faculty facilitators have enjoyed participating. Although most students are from the colleges of Engineering, Natural Sciences and Mathematics, and Pharmacy, facilitators may be from all disciplines. An additional email soliciting volunteers will be sent to graduate program directors. Volunteer via Gradstudies@utoledo.edu. 

• Midwest Graduate Research Symposium - Saturday, April 12, 2025
  Need Volunteer judges from all disciplines. https://www.utoledo.edu/graduate/success-center/midwest-grad-research-symposium.html. 

Report of the Vice President for Research 
Dr. Connie Schall, Interim Vice President for Research reported the following: 

• Research Mixer - Thursday, February 6, 2025 
  4-5 pm, Phoenicia Restaurant, Student Union 
  “Creating Visually Striking Research” with Eric Zeigler, Associate Professor of Art
  Food and Beverage provided. 

• Scholars Institute Program – March 3 -7, 2025
  Led by proposal development group, Eva English and Kim Lammers. Beneficial to new faculty and new to preparing and submitting proposals. Addresses these learning objectives:
  • Preparing Grant Submissions
  • Identifying Funding
  • Proposal Writing
  • Budget
  • Submission Process 

• Faculty Colleague Letter – January 28, 2025
  • The Office of Research and Sponsored Programs (ORSP) is working with the university’s leadership, the Inter-University Council of Ohio, legal counsel, various university stakeholders, as well as our Washington government relations consultants, peer institutions, and others to understand the evolving situation and determine the appropriate University response.
  • Pauses on public communications including publication of documents, regulations, guidance, notices, grant announcements, website updates, press releases, social media, and participating in public speaking engagements for federal employees.
  • Cancellations of study sections and reviewer panelist meetings.
  • Significant changes or stop work communications re: allowable grant expenditures particularly for grants that may include defined DEIA activities.
  • Principal investigators who receive orders or directives are asked to work directly with ORSP on the appropriate operational response to those orders.
  • Forward any questions you may have or communications from the funding agencies to the Office of Research & Sponsored Programs at DirSponsProgs@utoledo.edu.  

• Awards
  • The University of Toledo will continue to assess guidance from federal agencies. Broad directives from select agencies in relation to grant-funded work that have defined diversity, equity and inclusive (DEI) and Justice40 components, Community Benefits and Promoting Inclusive and Equitable Research (PIER) plans may impede the ability to invoice and receive reimbursement from federal sponsors.
  • Most terms and conditions of your active grants are expected to remain enforceable for the current funding period as long as the award is in good standing. Prioritize the submission of any technical reports or deliverables that are due or past due. If there is a change to your award, ORSP will notify the principal investigator. It is the responsibility of the PI to respond to any changes in a timely manner. 
  • Progress in research or outreach work is expected. Continue current sponsored projects and activities unless otherwise directed by the ORSP.
  • Federal contracts or award activities may be paused by a stop work order.  In these cases, further expenditure would not be allowable, including for work performed or expenses incurred while the stop work order is in place.
  • Closely monitor obligated budget balances to avoid deficits while awaiting future obligations. Anticipated future funding remains subject to the availability of funds and should not be considered guaranteed, including no cost extensions.
  • Issuance of subawards by ORSP from federal funding sources will be paused until the federal agency has completed their analysis of their federal financial assistance programs. 

Discussion: 
We do initial review and contact PIs where there may be a problem with reimbursement. This is a significant undertaking and will take some time. As an example, STEMM curriculum development and teacher training. Products are distributed materials. They could be from school districts that have a large proportion of under-represented groups. That is not specifically DEI. There has been little communication on specifics. We do not want to go overboard, and folks shut down activities.

Dr. Sari questioned the T32 grant (The Graduate Research Training Initiative for Student Enhancement (G-RISE) at The University of Toledo which aims to increase the number of Ph.D. degrees in translational and biomedical science research awarded to students from traditionally underserved communities.) He also expressed concern over grants that have already been submitted.

Dr. Schall responded that there has not been direct communication from NIH on this. However, OSRP will assess whether this may be affected in the near future. You should not be worried about grants submitted. Once awarded, if there are any restrictions, we expect they will be clearly stated. There may be a delay in review at the federal level.

Dr. Qian Chen questioned continuance of current NSF grant which requires community participation. For example, UToledo hosts high school students for research over the summer and also allows remote access to our lab equipment by some community members. Language includes increasing participation of under-represented populations. Promises were already made with approved grants.

Dr. Schall responded that in general, yes, to continue, since you are reaching out to community at large. Reaching out to community is our mission and we reside in Toledo so that includes Toledo city and area schools. We have only received general, not specific direction from NSF. NSF often uses the phrase "broadening participation." Broad community outreach should not be restricted under DEI. While we are cautious, the expectation is that we should be making progress with proposals to remain competitive for future proposals and renewals. 

• Proposals
  • ORSP will continue to submit proposals as federal agencies’ submission systems are operational. There may be changes to proposal deadlines. Reconfirm those. 
  • Prior to submission, reconfirm that the funding announcement has not been revised, postponed or has expired (e.g. NIH Supplements to Promote Diversity).
  • If available, consider signing up for alerts from the federal agencies or sponsors. 
  • Sponsor proposal reviews have been delayed, and timelines are expected to be extended.
  • Program managers may not be as prompt in responding as they are experiencing changes from Executive Orders.  

Discussion: 
Dr. Tomer Avidor-Reiss inquired how the OSRP can assist in notifying faculty of any missing element/document so as not to result in grant not being submitted.

Dr. Schall urged that faculty work as far ahead as possible with grants coordinators to ensure all elements are submitted. This can be challenging, particularly with last-minute submissions, during high submission deadlines. As an example, between February 1 and 7, there were over 44 submissions that had to be processed through the research office. If PIs and Co-Is work ahead, there is time to notify faculty.

Dr. Saladi Srinivas expressed appreciation to grants coordinators for their fantastic work. He asked whether they might provide a shareable checklist to ensure complete documentation.  

Dr. Schall agreed this is a good point that she will share with her colleagues. Again, she encouraged participation in the Scholars Institute Program during spring break week, March 3-7, 2025.

Report of the Graduate Student Association 
Saad Andalib, Vice President of the Graduate Student Association (GSA) reported: 

• GSA Graduate Research Award Deadline extended to February 9, 2025, at 11:59 pm. 

• Midwest Graduate Research Symposium l Saturday, April 12, 2025
     - Call for Abstracts/Proposals had been sent out on 23rd January with a priority deadline of February 16th and a final deadline of
        Friday, February 28th. We will send the call for proposal for other Midwest schools by this week. 
     - A call for judges and volunteers’ forms are forthcoming. 

• General Assembly Meetings l Spring Semester 2025 
    - We had our in-person meeting with all the college representatives on 27th January at 5:30 pm. 
       we had our 1st General Assembly meeting for spring semester on 29th January, Wednesday at 5:30 pm (online) via teams. Other
       General assembly dates will be as follows:  
       2nd General Assembly meeting- February 12th (In-person)- Health Science Campus
       3rd General Assembly meeting- March 26th (Online)
       4th General Assembly meeting- April 23rd (online)

Information and Discussion Items  

GC Vice Chair, Dr. Dan Boden, reported that a few seats on committees remain vacant, asking Council members to consider serving if contacted. He thanked the members who are serving. Additionally, he acknowledged that with re-organization taking place among several colleges, their Council representation will update accordingly, and Council notified. 

Standing Committee Reports 
Report of the Curriculum Committee 
GC Chair Barbara Saltzman report on behalf of the GC Curriculum Committee: 
The proposals listed below were reviewed by the members of the GCCC with recommendations to approve. [Council approved unanimously]

Report of the Membership Committee 
None.

Old Business 
None. 

New Business 
Announcement for Graduate Student Recognition will be forthcoming in March with recognition of the students at an upcoming Graduate Council meeting in April.  

Adjournment 
There being no further business, the Council adjourned at 1:40 pm.