Senate Goals
Three main and long-standing goals, including some objectives to complete these goals are:

I. To safeguard the academic freedom of faculty.
  1. Reinstitute the Faculty Seminar, designed around teaching and learning issues, with possible union support so it can be an overnight and faculty can determine the agenda.

  2. Clarify copyright issues and concerns.

  3. Conduct a “Climate Survey” of faculty.
II. To uphold the contract.
  1. Prepare for negotiations.

    1. Appoint a Negotiations Subcommittee to design a questionnaire for faculty re: negotiation items and most to least in importance.
    2. Appoint a Negotiation’s Team, which includes tenured faculty who are experienced negotiators.

    3. Separate personal and departmental issues from Faculty Senate contractual issues. In this way the Senate isn’t involved inappropriately in these matters.
III. Be familiar with and uphold the traditions and philosophy of Shared Governance.
  1. Educate faculty in the roles of the Senate.

    1. Ask retired faculty to share historical traditions by means of our Senate WEB site.

    2. Clearly delineate the roles of the Faculty Senate officers and representatives and post on the Faculty Senate website.

  2. Educate faculty on the contract in preparation for negotiations.

  3. Follow lines of communication, both within the Senate, the larger faculty constituency, and with the Administration.

  4. Define, so as to replace important terms, such as “reassigned time” (preferred) vs. “release time” (not preferred) and articulate these to the Harper community.

  5. Find ways to build collegiality amongst faculty and amongst faculty and other campus constituents.

    1. Have end-of-semester celebrations and invite other constituents.

    2. Encourage faculty to attend athletic events and other Harper extra-curricular activities.