coordinates Council activities between the T-FSC and the Full-Time Non-Tenure Track/Contract Faculty Senators Council.

2014-2015

Chair: Allen Mincer
Members: Awam Amkpa (fall), Katherine Hurbis-Cherrier (spring), Warren Jelinek, Jim Martin (spring), Victoria Stanhope (fall)

Report: January 2015

The Joint T-FSC (Awam Amkpa, Warren Jelinek, Allen Mincer {co-chair}, Victoria Stanhope) and N/C-FSC (Fred Carl, Mary Killilea, Randolph Mowry {co-chair}, Patrick Ying) Coordination Committee, has been tasked with developing a model of collaboration between the committees of the two faculty senate councils. The primary benefit of the two faculty councils’ standing committees working together is a more comprehensive understanding of faculty views and concerns. This will potentially build a stronger faculty voice. Additionally, coordination of committees helps ensure that we do not duplicate each other’s work and that we efficiently share information. The university administration has also indicated that joint sharing of information and consensus building will make decisions on policies and their implementation run more smoothly.

In light of these benefits, the committee defined its goal as making collaboration as close as possible, while respecting the autonomy of the individual councils. While the two Councils have many shared concerns, there will be issues on which the interests of the two Councils are not aligned. For some of these, it would be best for the two councils’ respective committees to meet separately from the outset; for others early discussion of differences could be the most productive approach.

Currently, the N/C-FSC does not have a standing committee structure. In the interim, the T-FSC has invited members of the N/C-FSC to join their committees as observers. In the future it is likely that there will be parallel committee structures in the two Councils where collaboration would be beneficial.

Assuming the N/C-FSC decides to have similar committees, we list below the committees that would likely benefit from joint meetings. The chairs of the parallel committees in the T-FSC and N/C-FSC would be responsible for determining which meetings should be joint (presumably based on the particular topics to be discussed) and for coordinating joint meetings. Joint meetings would be co-chaired by the chairs of the parallel committees. Any voting in joint committees would be tallied and reported separately by council membership.

• Administration and Technology
• Educational Policies and Faculty/Student Relations
• Faculty Benefits and Housing
• Finance and Policy Planning
• Global Network University
• Governance

We suggest that the Executive Committee of the T-FSC and the Steering Committee of the N/C-FSC facilitate initial communication between the chairs of ad-hoc committees when they are formed. We also suggest that the Executive Committee of the T-FSC and the Steering Committee of the N/C-FSC meet at the beginning of each academic year and also during the year as needed, in order to facilitate and foster continued coordination of the various committees.