McMaster University Senate met on Wednesday, April 13 in the Council Chambers of Gilmour Hall. The following are some of the items addressed at this meeting.

New name for Psychology

Senate approved a name change for the Department of Psychology to the Department of Psychology, Neuroscience & Behaviour, to reflect the nature of teaching and research in the department.

According to a letter from Ron Racine, chair of the department, there are two reasons for the name change. First, for several years the department has focused on experimental psychology, and second, the Ontario high school curriculum has no specific psychology component, and the psychology students are exposed to emphasizes clinical and interpersonal fields of psychology.

'Neuroscience' was added to the name as 15 of the departments 26 faculty members conduct neuroscience research. 'Behaviour' was added as it reflects the fact that all faculty are interested in behavioural research.

“McMaster has great strength in behaviour and neuroscience research, and it is to the Universitys advantage to advertise that fact by enabling us to change our name to Psychology, Neuroscience & Behaviour,” says Racine. “This name change will provide students and the community-at-large with a better idea of who we are.”

Faculty and students voted on the new name last November.

Proposed School of Computational Engineering and Science

Senate approved the establishment of the McMaster School of Computation Engineering and Science.

The school will connect areas of engineering, science, mathematics and computer science. It will be an equal partnership between he faculties of engineering and science. The creation of the school is in response to recent revolutionary developments in cyber-infrastructure and computational methodology revolutionizing science and engineering.

Pending final approvals, the program will be located in the Information Technology Building and fully operational by September 2006. The proposal is pending Board of Governors approval.

New scholarships

Two new scholarships were approved: the Dr. Malcolm Baird Ontario Graduate Scholarship and the Colin James Lyne Lock Ontario Graduate Scholarship. The former was established in 2004 by Stanley Yip 86 in honour of Malcolm Baird, professor of chemical engineering. The later was established in 2005 by Helen Howard-Lock in memory of Collin James Lyne Lock, professor of chemistry and pathology.

Japanese studies program closed

A combined honours program in Japanese studies will be closed, effective August 31, 2006. There will be no new admission into the program after the 2005-06 academic session. The decision to close the program, made jointly by the deans of humanities and social science, was made on the basis of low enrolment and a determination that adequate resources could no longer be provided to the program following the departure of two tenured faculty members.