- My name is Dave Price
and I'm president of the Santa Fe College Senate.
I like to talk to you today
about Shared Governance at Santa Fe.
Several SACS requirements mandate the employees
of institutions of higher learning
have involvement in decision making
and this is especially true of faculty members.
Santa Fe complies with this
by having three Shared Governance bodies.
First of the three Shared Governance bodies
is the College Senate.
All faculty, administrative, professional employees
and those are generally defined as salaried,
non-faculty employees
have representation in the college...
Next Shared Governance body is the Career Service Council
and this represents all hourly wage employees.
Last leg of Shared Governance is student government
which represents all students taking any course
that you actually get college credit for.
Community members taking continuing ed
or community education courses
aren't represented in student government.
College Senate is organized in the 27 constituencies.
Academic departments are a constituency,
those are easy to figure out.
The other constituencies
are generally kind of grouped by functional area
depending upon which vice presidency
of the college people report to.
Each constituency sends at least one representative
to what's called the Executive Council of the College Senate
which meets twice a month during fall and spring semesters
and once a month during summer terms.
Once a constituency reaches the number of 23 members
it gets a second representative.
Representatives are the voice of their constituency
in the College Senate.
Representatives should pull constituents
when their issues with great importance
before the Executive Council
and they'll come back and give what your feedback is.
We also have three spots for adjunct representatives
on the Executive Council.
One for adjuncts teaching liberal arts and science classes,
one for adjuncts teaching career
and technical education classes,
and a third adjunct representative
that can be by an adjunct from any teaching area.
Each adjunct representative also has an alternate.
If you are an adjunct I do encourage you
to participate in College Senate.
It's a wonderful opportunity to gain valuable experience
that might help you move from adjunct to full-time status.
We elect adjunct representatives every fall.
The College Senate has three standing committees.
The Curriculum Committee makes recommendations
on new degree programs, new courses,
modifications to existing courses,
the general education package and its assessment,
the syllabus checklist and a whole bunch of other stuff.
Only faculty can be voting members
of the Curriculum Committee
because of it's role in determining course work
and that's the SACS mandate.
Salary and Benefits Committee
is probably the most sought after committee to be on
because it makes recommendations
on those vital issues of salary and benefits,
leave rules and other employee benefits.
The Professional Committee makes recommendations on issues
that deal with assessing professional responsibilities
and defining those responsibilities of Senate members
and guidelines for professional development activities
that will enhance the college's mission.
Currently there are vacancies
on all three of those committees.
If you really want to read the nuts and bolts
of how all this works.
Go to the College Rules Manual
and read College Rule 2.4 and its associated procedure.
I have a couple of examples to illustrate
this independent of the jargon in College Rule 2.4.
These are of course totally hypothetical scenarios.
In the first one the administration is making a change.
The administration might someday want to change
how many overloads a faculty member can teach
or the maximum number of classes that an adjunct can teach
and the process for overriding those limits.
Since this is clearly a change
that affects multiple Senate Constituencies,
which is kind of the threshold for whether or not
something warrants consideration by the College Senate.
The administration would bring forth a proposal
and a rationale for it to the Executive Council.
Executive Council would discuss this,
make a recommendation on it.
The administration could accept or reject
our recommendation of any changes
that we would like to see to their initiative.
The second hypothetical scenario
involves kind of a grassroots desire for change
coming from Senate members.
A representative or more than one representative
in the Executive Council
gets feedback from their constituents
and discusses the issue
in one of the bimonthly Executive Council meetings.
Executive Council then might assign it
to a standing committee for review or modification.
If so the Executive Council
would deliberate on the committee's work,
make a recommendation on the proposed changes
to the administration.
The administration is of course as always
free to accept or reject the recommendation.
If it does choose to reject the recommendation,
the administration sends a representative
to the Executive Council's next meeting to explain why.
That's pretty much how the Executive Council
of the College Senate works.
I encourage you when your reps ask for feedback
to please give it.
And also if you have an interest
in a particular committee or a topic please email me
david.price@sfcollege.edu.
Thank you very much and have a great semester.