Minutes - December 4
Minutes – Governance Restructuring Committee
December 4, 2007
Present: All but Miner
Minutes were approved as corrected.
FTE: Business reports that they have 16 FTE faculty in Business Administration, 9.25 in Accounting for a total of 25.25 FTE faculty in the School of Business. This differs significantly from the official figures.
Rolla: We have requested information from University of Missouri-Rolla (as of January 1, Missouri University of Science and Technology) and they have replied. They have been through a structural change to eliminate Deans (now, it’s just departments reporting directly to the Provost). The general faculty holds the power of the faculty, but delegate certain areas to their Academic Council. There is at least one representative from each department, with additional representatives for every ten members past the minimum. They have about 40 people on their Academic Council. They have a small curriculum committee that does what our UGC does. Their current president is in a 5-year cycle: first serving as parliamentarian, then secretary, then president-elect, then president, then past-president. The Graduate Council reports to the Academic Council at Rolla. Their graduate program is significantly larger than the one at Truman.
Discussion: Our arrangement with UGC allows our current faculty senate to concentrate on broad issues; most of the time is spent in reports and special issues. We seem to be facing three options in terms of the UGC function: a bicameral equal to faculty senate, a situation similar to Rolla with a small committee reporting to faculty senate, or the same arrangement that we have now. Situations can be very political at times, so a check and balance design of some kind may have a significant advantage. We cannot prevent political polarization within each body, but we can provide a platform for representation and accountability that will balance those tendencies.
Additional item: We would like to establish a good relationship with the new provost so that he is aware of what we are doing. It was suggested that James Guffey could write a letter on behalf of all faculty to introduce Dr. Paino to the Faculty Senate website and to offer to keep him abreast of all of the efforts we undertake this year.