Spectrum - Volume 18 Issue 29 April 25, 1996 - Staff Senate discusses governance

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Staff Senate discusses governance

By Netta S. Smith

Spectrum Volume 18 Issue 29 - April 25, 1996

Tom Sherman and Charles Goodsell of the Faculty Senate met with the Staff Senate last month to talk about the Faculty Senate's proposed "white paper" for reorganization of the governance system.

Staff senators expressed misgivings about the proposed system. They also expressed concern about the proposed numbers of representatives, noting that the majority of the representatives called for in the plan were from the faculty, despite the fact that the university employs more staff than faculty members. Sherman said "clearly the proportions are unfair," and Goodsell said he believed that the numbers need to be changed.

In response to a question as to whether or not faculty and staff members have common interests, Sherman said that our common interest is to educate students, to discover new information and ideas and to communicate this information, and to serve. He said that the faculty and staff need "to speak as one voice on issues that affect either the faculty or staff."

(Editor's note: For a detailed discussion of this governance issue, please see page 3.)

President Wyatt Sasser announced that the original white paper proposed by the Faculty Senate "has been done away with." The assembly idea has been discarded, he said. A new paper, which grew out of a joint work group of Faculty and Staff Senate officers, proposes eliminating some committees and commissions.