Dear Chair Thompson and Board of Trustees Members:
I appreciate this opportunity to submit a brief overview of the activities of the Faculty Senate this Spring and Summer.
Changes to the Faculty Code:
CWU faculty view the Faculty Code as our agreement with the Board of Trustees about how shared governance should function at CWU. Senate passed two Code revisions at the last full senate meeting of the academic year on May 30, 2018. These changes to the Code will improve clarity around faculty consultation regarding reorganization and distinguished faculty awards processes. These proposed changes were slated to come forward for your approval this Summer. However, the Provost Council has raised concerns about the changes, and in the spirit of shared governance, we have decided to delay these items until the Board’s October meeting. In the meantime, we plan to work with the Provost Council to address the concerns if possible. We wish to keep the Board updated on the progress of these Code changes as we expect they will be ready to present to the Board for approval at the Fall meeting. This change provides additional detail needed in order for the faculty senate to conduct meaningful consultation when faced with reorganization changes. Over the past few years, there have been several proposals for reorganization of academic units which have been inefficient and ultimately unsuccessful due to the acute lack of information about the reorganization provided during the consultation process. Frankly, these reorganization attempts have negatively impacted faculty trust in the administration and overall faculty morale. We conducted a survey about the most recent reorganization conversation, and the most common response indicated that faculty did not feel they were presented with enough information to engage in the consultation process fully and, due to the lack of information, were unable to provide meaningful feedback. The intent of this new Code language is to make future reorganization conversations more productive for all parties involved. The intent is not to make the process more difficult or time- consuming for administrators. In fact, we hope that by following the consultation process outlined in the new Code language, consultation with faculty around reorganization will happen more efficiently and quickly. We are hopeful we can come to an agreement with the Provost Council, and plan to move forward this important change at the next Board meeting. Consultation in Cases of Reorganization
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