Report of Chair (Alvin Wolfe) to CAS Advisory Council on January 3, 2003.

Board of Trustees’ Rules Changes. At the November meeting of the College Advisory Council, the Council voted unanimously a resolution declaring that we found “extremely disturbing” the Board of Trustees’ failure to consult faculty and staff before approving new personnel rules at their meeting of November 21.

Both the USF Faculty Senate (at a meeting on Wednesday, November 20), and the USF Chapter of United Faculty of Florida (at a meeting on Friday, November 15) have denounced the failure of the BOT to seek faculty consultation on issues so crucial to academic life as academic freedom, due process, fair compensation, protection of intellectual property rights, fair determination of appropriate outside activities, and other rights.

Unfortunately, we were unable to discuss these matters openly at the Faculty Assembly that was held on December 6. Chairing that Assembly, I presumed that since it was an all-university matter, not just an Arts and Sciences matter, the Faculty Senate would be calling an all-university meeting to inform the faculty and to let faculty express their views. The Faculty Senate did not do so. Being a strong believer in openness, government in the sunshine, and faculty governance, I decided to call an open meeting where such matters can be presented and discussed.

I received on December 27 (although it was dated December 19) a response from President Genshaft and Provost Stamps to our resolution regarding the Board of Trustees promulgating new rules without consulting faculty. They said “We both accept this resolution in good faith and agree that the faculty and staff should be consulted when rules are changed.” They went on to assure us that “a process is being put into place” for this, a committee of the senate to meet with a “Human Resources Workgroup” for developing “permanent” rules.

Before going on, I have three comments: (1) We did not have to put into place a new process, we already have both the faculty governance process and the collective bargaining process. (2) We did not need temporary rules, we already had rules that had been developed over several decades. (3) If, indeed, the rules the BOT calls temporary do go into effect on January 7, rules are rules, and those will be the rules no matter whether they are ‘temporary’ or not. If the BOT wanted ‘temporary’ rules, the polite thing would have been to consider the rules we now have as ‘temporary’.

About the same time as the President and Provost were trying to assuage the feelings of the College Advisory Council -- remember, we said we were “extremely disturbed” about lack of faculty consultation -- they were canceling the release of faculty time for the UFF faculty members assigned to processing faculty grievances and to negotiating the contract that determines the terms and conditions of faculty employment.

Roy Weatherford, the president of the United Faculty of Florida announced that latest action at a public news conference just before Christmas, but I suspect most of you don’t know about it because it was not widely reported. Professor Weatherford’s take on it was that the Board of Trustees “intend to use the reorganization (dissolution of the BOR, establishment of the BOT, and now the BOG) as a pretext to try to break the faculty union and end our contractual protections of academic freedom, tenure, sabbaticals, and equal pay for summer teaching.”

It may well be that using reorganization to abrogate the collective bargaining agreement contravenes federal labor regulations stating that a company cannot escape from a contract by reorganizing itself. But does the USF faculty have the resources to fight that legal battle against the State of Florida in federal court?

It is hard to prove the intentions of this or any board. This particular one, the Board of Trustees, is supposed to be subject to Government in the Sunshine but they never engage in public discussion. Even the most rigidly scientific faculty members would have to agree that there is almost no evidence that refutes the hypothesis that the Board of Trustees really don’t want to consult, much less bargain, with faculty.

I have just one more point I would like to make. Faculty Governance, like academic freedom, is an important principle that is traditional in higher education. One has to be steeped in history and long in experience to appreciate its importance to a university and to a university system. Only rarely is the principle enshrined in the law. In Wisconsin, their state statute reads:

Wisconsin Statutes

Chapter 36. University of Wisconsin System

36.09

(L)

(4) FACULTY. The faculty of each institution, subject to the

responsibilities and powers of the board, the president and the

chancellor of such institution, shall be vested with responsibility

for the immediate governance of such institution and shall

actively participate in institutional policy development. As such,

the faculty shall have the primary responsibility for academic and

educational activities and faculty personnel matters. The faculty

of each institution shall have the right to determine their own faculty

organizational structure and to select representatives to participate

in institutional governance.

I know Florida is not Wisconsin, and Wisconsin law is not Florida law. Still, faculty members in both states and in the other United States share the same general academic tradition, the American tradition. We become “extremely disturbed” when boards and administrators show evidence of believing that they can run a university without the intensive and enthusiastic participation of faculty members.

--Alvin W. Wolfe