The Faculty Senate discussed policy amendments yesterday that would more clearly define which thefts and misuses of university property must be reported to administrators.
If the changes are passed, they will require university employees to report illegal behavior, incidents involving items worth more than $500 and misuse of university property that benefits an employee.
The proposed changes will be up for review at the next meeting in January.
The amendments come one month after two students were arrested for stealing nitrogen from a university lab and using it to make a bomb, which they detonated outside Yavapai Residence Hall. The theft of the liquid nitrogen was not initially reported because those who used the laboratory thought it was misplaced, not stolen.
Andrew Silverman, a clinical professor of law, questioned one part of the amendment that would require employees to report violations of rules or policies that would embarrass the UA or the Arizona Board of Regents if the public found out. He asked for more context for the proposal.
President Peter Likins said the embarrassment part of the policy should be taken out, and that the policy just needed to be clarified.
Senators also said they were concerned about the purpose for the policy update because no particular event was cited to bring about these changes.
"What's broken that needs to be fixed?" said Marlys Witte, a professor of surgery. "After reading the newspaper it made it seem like there was a rash of incidents."
She referred to a story in yesterday's Arizona Daily Star that mentioned the policy along with statistics from the Campus Safety and Security Report about theft, bicycle theft, robbery and burglary in the 2002-2003 school year.
"This report is intended to fix a small problem," Likins said. "It's not a giant issue, just tidying up some university words."
Likins said policies must be updated over time.
In other business, senators discussed the use of mass e-mail listings and whether to add specifics on the use and creation of listservs.
Senators were interested in an item referring to "unsolicited e-mails via listservs," regarding both inappropriate use of listservs, such as using a class list to advertise a garage sale, as well as the creation of listservs without permission from owners of added e-mail addresses.
After much debate, the senate decided to continue discussing changes to the policy's language. The term "unsolicited" will be clarified, and after the policy is redrafted, it will be up for approval at the January Faculty Senate meeting.