Approval of Previous Minutes —

Poppy presents the minutes from previous meeting on January 29, 2026. Evann motions to approve. Jari seconds. Minutes approved by unanimous consent without objection.

Guest Speaker Presentation —

Chancellor Doug Girod provides an overview of:  

New Provost and Leadership:

• Arash Mafi was appointed as the new Provost. 
• Jen Roberts will become the new Executive Dean of the College of Liberal Arts & Sciences. 
• The provost search had high participation and engagement from KU colleagues. There were over 970 messages from the community.
• Chancellor thanked outgoing Provost Bichelmeyer for service and looks forward to keeping the momentum going. 

State Legislature: 

• KU is reframing how it presents itself to legislators: KU is essential to the state of Kansas’s economy and workforce. 
• $7.8 billion annual economic impact on the state of Kansas. 
• KU graduates are major contributors to KU workforce such as engineering, business, law enforcement, emergency training, agriculture, and healthcare across all 105 counties. 

Financial Challenges:

• Increasing challenges due to inflation. State funding not able to keep up with inflation, along with rising operational costs and uncertain federal research funding. 
• Significant budget cuts

KU’s Response to Challenges: 

• “One KU” initiative to merge several administrative functions and reduce duplication. 
• Record high enrollment.
• Fundraising and corporate partnerships
• Expansion of online programs and alternative education 
• Faculty voluntary separation programs 
   

Student Senate Report

Student Senate leadership went to Topeka a couple of weeks ago to lobby on behalf of post-secondary education and are planning to travel to Washington DC early next week. The Student Senate Fee package did not pass last night. 

Staff Senate Report

Have our meeting with the provost tomorrow and plan to present the recommendations from the Docking Institute Survey which was completed by USS and UPS staff last year.

Faculty Senate Report

Faculty Senate is following along with KBOR to look at what’s happening with the tenure policy and we’re facilitating some improvements to some of the Faculty Senate policies to streamline work to make our committees more efficient.

New Business —

Casey Wallace, University Registrar, follows Chancellor Girod to provide guidance and insight into a potential grade replacement policy amendment that Student Senate has brought forth regarding honors and non-honors courses. 

• Casey has reviewed the proposed amendment and shares some operational concerns. The system can’t process honors versus non-honors course replacement in the same manner as other grade replacements. 
• While they are similar courses, they have different requirements, which is why they have different course numbers. Therefore, this wouldn’t be considered a traditional repeat course. There are many different regulatory bodies that review repeats and determine how we can aid repeat courses. This is across the board, not just KU.
• VA benefits and potentially NCAA athletic compliance also would need to review requirements and how this would be viewed.
• Therefore, Casey has operational and regulatory concerns from a University Registrar perspective. Casey is going to an AAU conference and will ask for feedback from AAU partners. 
• Casey and University Senate leadership appreciate that feedback from Student Senate and are happy to have future discussions. Casey mentions she is happy to come to Student Senate. 
• Sasha makes motion to forward this legislation to the AP&P Committee. Motion passes. 

University Senate Code Article X. Section II: Membership on AP&P Committee 

• The information surrounding this amendment was sent ahead of time. It allows an ex-officio member from Academic Affairs to be on the AP&P Committee. 
• Motion to suspend the rules to vote and talk about this in the same meeting -- this was previously discussed and voted on at SenEx, but first time discussing in University Senate. Motion made by Jessica Chilcoat. Motion seconded. A poll goes to suspend the rules -- passes with 13/16 in favor and 3/16 not in favor. 
• Motion to vote on this amendment: Caty Movich motions to vote on the amendment. Tanya Singh seconds. A request for discussion is made prior to voting on this regarding the rationale for a representative from Academic Affairs being on AP&P and a request to get additional AP&P feedback and approval on this. A motion is made to counter this to move the voting forward. No longer had quorum so no vote was taken. 

Meeting adjourned.