Dear Colleagues:

The Faculty Senate welcomes you to the ’08-09 academic year and invites you to help us as we work with the administration to shape the direction of the university. We expect this year to be unusually full of challenges, some of which will require legislation and others extensive monitoring and discussion:

• Legislation will be proposed to amend procedures for reorganization, consolidation, and elimination of programs (RCEP);
There will also be a proposal to restructure the faculty senate by reducing the numbers of senators, adding chairs of the school and college faculty councils, and streamlining the election process;
• The organization of a College of the Environment will occupy much of our energy. Although the Faculty Senate takes no official position on this development, we have been working to promote constructive discussions among all parties concerned and this year will be forming RCEP committees to review proposed movements of departments, schools, and colleges into a College of the Environment.

These specific tasks, by themselves, will provide plenty for us to do. They are best understood, however, against the backdrop of a longer-term effort to strengthen the role of faculty governance in addressing the issues and opportunities facing us. For example, we have now come to the end of several years of relative prosperity in the State of Washington, and struggles over the allocation of tighter resources are likely. What role will the mechanisms of faculty governance play in decisions about what to pursue and how to allocate what we get?

• The Senate Committee on Planning and Budgeting (SCPB) has engaged in a year-long effort to understand the complex budget and budgetary process at the university. With the appointment of a new Vice Provost for Planning and Budgeting, and the continuing cooperation of the Provost’s office, we expect to continue this work. Especially critical is the need to clarify principles and procedures for allocation of salary funds.
• We are a three-campus university in which the distinctive missions and governance structures of the branches have continued to evolve. Last year there was Class B legislation on cross-campus course enrollment, and we hope to work across all campuses to maintain the faculty’s role in determining how to meet the needs of students.

In this effort we are standing on the shoulders of our past chair, Dan Luchtel, and Gail Stygall who chaired the SCPB last year after serving as Senate chair the previous year. Recognizing that most resource and educational quality concerns are recognized by faculty at the school level, and that schools vary markedly in mission and methods, last year we began working informally with the chairs of college faculty councils to understand these diverse concerns and integrate them into university-wide faculty governance. This is one of the reasons for the changes in Senate structure to be considered in the coming year. Other efforts to sharpen and strengthen the instruments of faculty governance included the following:

• Class A legislation was passed to define procedures for removal of Faculty Senate Officers and the Secretary of the Faculty;

• The Senate Execute Committee conducted the first election of a Secretary of the Faculty, formerly a Presidential appointment.

Finally, our work with the state legislature has provided insights into political and economic trends influencing the development of higher education. We are being pushed to develop a new “business model” that documents results, responds to a changing economy, and meets demands for training and services. Little of this language sits easily with those of us who thought we went to college to acquire a broadly informed understanding of the natural order and the human prospect. Your participation in faculty governance will help us ensure that your values as well as your interests are consequential in this conversation.