CWU Trustees Board Retreat | July, 2023

Central Washington University Board of Trustees July 21, 2023 ACTION – Faculty Code Updates Background:

During the 1946-1947 academic year, the CWU faculty created a “Faculty Code of Personnel and Policy,” which was subsequently approved by the faculty, president and Board of Trustees. This Code established an 11-member Faculty Council, which, in 1962, became the Faculty Senate. Section IV(A)1 of the Faculty code provides that the Senate shall have the right to submit recommendations to the BOT through the president. The Faculty Senate resides organizationally within the President’s Division; the Faculty Senate Chair reports directly to the president. Upon a comprehensive review by the Faculty Senate Bylaws and Code Committee and the full Senate, the Faculty Senate shares recommendations with the President, for transmission to the Board of Trustees. Code Changes: The Faculty Senate asks for approval of changes to the Faculty Code which were approved May 31, 2023: • Removal of the following sentence from the Budget and Planning Committee description, “If the motion passes, the original recommendation shall be considered rejected or amended, and shall not be proposed by the BPC to the PBAC.”. Sentence is procedural and based on previous sentence, is redundant. • Aligning the Faculty Code with the CBA was required to ensure that Code reflects the most current version of the CBA. • In an effort to clarify who is eligible for department senator alternates, a new section has been added. • Many areas of the Faculty Code require updating with more neutral and inclusive terminology (e.g. replacement of the titles/terms ‘Emerita/Emeritus’ with ‘E/emerit’ and ‘his/her’ with ‘they’). The Latin term emeritus was originally used to refer to soldiers who had completed their military duty. The term was later used for those retiring from professional positions and emerita to refer to female retirees. Freyd (Professor Emerit: It is Time to Reject Gendered Titles for Retired Faculty; 2021) points out a few issues with the use of the masculine 'Emeritus'; 1) "The common usage makes gender salient in situations where it need not be made salient." (para 2) and 2) "[the terms Emeritus/Emerita] force a binary distinction that may be particularly oppressive to some individuals." (para 3). The following universities have formally adopted the gender-neutral term Emerit; University of Wisconsin-Madison (2022), University of Oregon (2022). • Additional identified errors, typos, and inconsistencies throughout the Code that were identified at the time as being potentially more than just clerical changes.

We recommend the following motion:

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