The Faculty Senate held a meeting on Wednesday, September 5 to discuss the most recent events regarding faculty governance. Although the Faculty Senate has been suspended—according to the new plan for review of faculty governance proposed by Provost Robert Palazzo—members of key faculty advisory groups who served during the 2006-2007 academic year, such as the Faculty Committee on Promotion and Tenure, may have their terms of office extended for the duration of such transition. Also, they may have replacements to such committees as nominated from the faculty by the provost with presidential approval.
In its meeting, however, the Faculty Senate passed a resolution, stating that “The Faculty Senate will not authorize the operation of any Faculty Senate Committees while it is under suspension.” According to President of the Faculty Senate Larry Kagan, this situation raises the question as to who controls faculty governance.
According to the provost’s most recent letter, “The Faculty Senate is clearly not synonymous with faculty governance.” In addition, the provost lists as one of the reasons for recommending a temporary suspension of the Faculty Senate during the faculty governance review process as being the “concern that the Faculty Senate would interfere with a faculty governance review process ... ” He states that this concern is based on previous actions of the Faculty Senate that he believes demonstrate that it had lost credibility as a representative of the will of the faculty at Rensselaer. In his closing remarks, the provost urged faculty to “not yield to misguided peer pressure now being applied under the semblance of an operational Faculty Senate.”
In addition, the faculty governance review process has reached the next phase of development, according to a letter from the provost sent to the faculty on September 10. This next phase is the establishment of the Faculty Governance Review Committee, which will be tasked with performing a broad review of faculty governance and bringing forward recommendations to modify governance within the broad directives of the Board of Trustees. School deans should be receiving the names of faculty members nominated by their departments to serve on the FGRC. This is one of many steps in the approval process leading to the selection of an 11 person committee, including a chairperson.
In an electronic response sent to the faculty, Kagan directly responded to points the provost made with regard to the Faculty Senate’s actions over the past year. Kagan specifically addressed Palazzo’s statement about how the Faculty Senate would want to interfere in faculty governance. He asserted that Palazzo neglected to mention key details as to why the Faculty Senate directly contacted the Board of Trustees about changing the definition of faculty in fall of 2006.
In his letter, Palazzo states the Faculty Senate violated its own constitution during the fall of 2006 when the senate requested Board approval to modify the Faculty Senate Constitution to extend voting privileges to include clinical faculty. He holds that the correct procedures are for the Faculty Senate to make recommendations to the provost, who then considers them and passes them along with recommendations to the president, who is then in immediate contact with the Board of Trustees. The Faculty Senate Constitution, as approved by the Board of Trustees in its May 2004 meeting, does not specify that amendments only require the endorsement of the president and the Board of Trustees after being passed by the faculty with a two-thirds majority of those voting. Amendments require only the subsequent endorsement by the President and the Board of Trustees, in no particular order.
According to Kagan, the Faculty Senate’s request was made during the transition time between provosts, when Palazzo was acting provost; it was Palazzo’s inaction that prompted the Faculty Senate to directly contact the Board of Trustees. Along with his statement on the Faculty Senate violating its own constitution, Palazzo also states that the Faculty Senate compromised its credibility by voting to disregard the Board’s directives to change the definition of faculty to only tenure and tenure-track professors, as well as by holding elections in Spring 2007 that included the vote of all faculty that are enfranchised by the current version of the Faculty Constitution: professor, associate professor, research professors, research associate professors, research assistant professors, librarians, archivists and assistant archivists, and those retired from these positions.
In addition, Kagan stated that he presented a compromise solution to Palazzo on August 31, but has not received an official response since they had met. He would not provide the details of this compromise. Kagan remarked on the enthusiasm shown by the faculty evidenced by the remarkable turnout at the August 29 Faculty Senate meeting, and hopes that the general faculty meeting this Wednesday will provide a good opportunity for faculty to discuss the issues at hand and to decide whether they should engage the full faculty’s opinion in a faculty-wide referendum.
More recently, Professor Jim Napolitano resigned from his position as chair of the Faculty Senate on September 11 in response to the letter sent out by the Provost the day before. Napolitano served as president of the Faculty Senate during the Summer 2006–Spring 2007 academic year. In an e-mail addressed to the faculty, Napolitano stated, “I don’t have the strength for this anymore, and wish to devote all my energies instead to my students, my research, and my department.”
The Faculty Senate will be holding a general faculty meeting Wednesday, September 12 from 2-4 pm in DCC 318 to inform the faculty about governance issues and gather the faculty response.
The provost’s office has created a new website to update and inform members of the RPI community of the faculty governance review process. In addition to providing the timeline of events over the past year, there are letters detailing the methods with which members of the FGRC will be chosen, communication from the Board of Trustees, and the most recent letter from the Provost. The web site can be reached at: http://www.rpi.edu/dept/provost/main.html.
