Notes from May 1998 Regents Meeting

SOCORRO -- The New Mexico Tech Board of Regents during a meeting this past Saturday gave its approval to a graduation list of nearly 260 Tech students who received their degrees later that morning at the university's annual commencement exercises.

In other official actions taken during the meeting, the governing board of the state-supported research university also approved raises for Tech faculty and staff, as well as the implementation of a salary adjustment plan formulated by an internal compensation committee after a yearlong study.

An overall 4.5-percent increase in staff salaries at New Mexico Tech will take effect in the next fiscal year which begins July 1, with additional adjustments made for gender equity and staff who are not at their beginning salary levels specified by the salary adjustment plan.

In other business conducted at Saturday's meeting, the Board of Regents received notice that:

• Osman T. Inal, professor of materials and metallurgical engineering, had been re-appointed to another three-year term as department chair of Tech's department of materials and metallurgical engineering; and
• sabbatical leave had been granted to Geir Hareland, associate professor of petroleum and chemical engineering, who will be working on the deep-sea drilling project near Norway.

In other personnel related matters, the New Mexico Tech Board of Re gents also granted research tenure to David S. Schechter, senio r scientist at Tech's Petroleum Recovery Research Center and assoc iate professor of petroleum and chemical engineering.

Du ring the board meeting, Herbert M. Fernandez, Tech's vice presi dent for institutional development, also presented an overv iew of the progress made with the university's strategic plan, noting that " . . . about 80 percent of the recommendations put f orth by the strategic plan have already been implemented, other s are in progress, and the remainder will soon be addre ssed."

Th e regents also were given a detailed financial summary of the r ecommended annual budget for fiscal year 1998-99 at the unive rsity by W. Dennis "Denny" Peterson, Tech's vice president for a dministration and finance, a budget of more than $81 million which they voted to approve.

Th e regents also approved a Budget Adjustment Request for the curre nt fiscal year which would permit expenditures by Tech depar tments that had unexpended balances from the previous year.

In addition, the New Mexico Tech Board of Regents awarded a contr act to Telstar Construction Company, Inc. for the const ruction of the IRIS/PASCALL Instrument Center. The Albuq uerque company was awarded the contract for the facility, which will be built near the university's Energetic Materials Resea rch and Testing Center (EMRTC), after presenting a low bid of $1 ,840,514 for the project.