Repository: UIHistories Project: Board of Trustees Minutes - 1990 [PAGE 277]

EXTRACTED TEXT FROM PAGE:

1991]

UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS

265

and head of the Department of Pathology and physician surgeon in the College of Medicine, as the first Frances B. Geever Professor of Pathology. T h e vice president for academic affairs concurs. I recommend approval.

On motion of Ms. Reese, these recommendations were approved.

Establishment of a Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures, College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, Urbana

(11) T h e Urbana-Champaign Senate recommends the establishment of a Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences. T h e new department will be the academic and administrative home for Asian Studies courses and degree programs currently sponsored by the Center for East Asian and Pacific Studies. T h e department faculty will consist initially of all faculty members now holding a budgeted position within the center. T h e undergraduate major in Asian Studies and the master's degree program in Asian Studies will therefore be transferred to the new Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures. T h e new unit will be administered by an executive officer who will be chosen in accord with the University Statutes and the approved departmental bylaws, and who will report to the dean of the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences. T h e Center for East Asian and Pacific Studies will remain in existence with the mission of promoting and coordinating research, study, and instruction in this area. For many cultural, historical, political, and economic reasons, the study of East Asia and the Pacific rim has been critical for the nation and for Illinois. T h e Center for Asian Studies (renamed in 1985 the Center for East Asian and Pacific Studies) was created in 1964 to promote research and to coordinate teaching about Asia, but early in its history the center was given the additional responsibility for teaching East Asian courses, particularly in languages. On this campus, no other area studies center has this dual role; instruction in all other major languages is administered through traditional language and literature departments. Among all major institutions, only the University of Illinois offers East Asian language instruction within an administrative unit that is not a department; and the center has lost its status as a comprehensive National Resource Center in Foreign Languages and Area Studies in the national Title VI competition in large part because the absence of a department of East Asian languages is viewed as less than full commitment by the University of Illinois to this important area. T h e present proposal will not only redress these weaknesses, but will advance East Asian studies by reestablishing and promoting instruction within a department with an instructional mission, and by restoring to the center its proper role and mission. T h e establishment of the new department will be accompanied by the permanent transfer of faculty and teaching assistantship lines now within the budget of the Center for East Asian and Pacific Studies. A portion of nonacademic, wage, expense, and equipment funds will also be separated out from the budget of the center and transferred to the department. No new funds are requested. T h e chancellor and vice president for academic affairs concur with the senate recommendation. I recommend approval, subject to further action by the Illinois Board of Higher Education.

On motion of Ms. Reese, this recommendation was approved. Naming of the International Studies Building, Urbana

(12) On January 11, 1990, the Board of Trustees approved the selection of an architect/engineer for the construction of a new building on the Urbana campus to house the Center for African Studies, Center for East Asian and Pacific Studies, Center for Latin American and Caribbean Studies, Russian and East European Center,