Dear Faculty of Western Washington University,
The Faculty Senate met October 7th for its first session of the 2019-20 academic year. I’d like to bring your attention to two important topics.
Faculty governance in Research and Sponsored Programs is undergoing restructure. Senators will review and vote on proposed Mission, Bylaws, Policies and Procedures at the October 21st Senate meeting. These documents are available here (PDF). Please forward questions or concerns to your Senator or to me.
The Senate also discussed the revision to the Faculty Code of Ethics passed by Senate on June 3rd. The Faculty Code of Ethics is referenced in the Collective Bargaining Agreement and thus any changes to the code must be bargained by the UFWW and WWU Administration. As written, the June 3rd revision (available here in the meeting minutes) cannot be bargained due to imprecise legal language. To address this the Senate passed a resolution to form a task-force comprised of three students and three faculty. The task-force is charged with drafting an actionable, legal document, that adheres to the spirit of the paragraph of section 2 of the Faculty Code of Ethics that was voted on in June 2019. The work of the task-force will be reported to Senate no later than November 4th.
- Call for nominations for faculty to participate on the Code of Ethics task-force. Questions, self-nominations, and nominations of faculty (that have agreed to serve) should be directed to jeff.young@wwu.edu. Nominations will be accepted until Noon, October 14th.
I also want to remind you of the Senate web page (html) where you can learn more about the Senate and faculty governance.
Good luck with the new quarter…
Jeff Young