Local
Senates Handbook: Part II.
Your Duties as a Local Senate President
The following job description
is not intended to be all-inclusive or wholly
reflective of your particular college culture,
nor does it reflect additional responsibilities
of local senate presidents who are also part of
a district senate structure. These general responsibilities
have been compiled over the years as a reflection
of the collective experiences of other local academic
senate presidents; they recognize that their experiences--their
courage under pressures, their collaboration,
their omissions, their vigilance (or lack thereof)
have implications not only for the local presidents
who follow them but for other senate presidents
across the state who later encounter similar circumstances.
This list, then, offers you a starting place from
which to shape questions about your new responsibilities;
it should not be taken as an official job description
against which you should be measured, but rather
as a checklist of responsibilities others have
encountered. This list is not intended to overwhelm
you; indeed, many of these responsibilities may
be justly delegated to others. They are, however,
responsibilities that must be completed.
A. Job Description for a Local
Academic Senate President General Duties
As local senate president your
duties include:
Being Familiar with the Statutory
Context in which the Senate Operates
Protect and honor the governance responsibilities
that include but are not limited to providing
representation on all college and district committees
related to Ed Code and Title 5 mandates:
a. degree and certificate requirements
b. curriculum including establishing pre-requisites
and placing courses in disciplines
c. grading policies
d. faculty roles and involvement in accreditation
processing including self study and annual
reports
e. educational program development
f. standards or policies regarding students
success
g. district and college governance structures
as related to faculty roles
h. policies for faculty professional development
activities
i. processes for program review
j. process for institutional planning and
budget development
k. others as mutually agreed upon
Observe the letter and spirit of all applicable
laws, especially the Open Meetings Acts.
Ensure the effective participation of faculty
in the joint development of institutional policy,
e.g., minimum qualifications and equivalencies,
faculty hiring procedures, tenure review, faculty
service areas, and faculty evaluation procedures.
Identify and address regulatory issues, e.g.,
Education Code, Title 5, etc. as they relate
to academic and professional matters and organize
a faculty response in a collegial and timely
manner.
Adhere to the specific institutional responsibilities
outlined in local constitution and by-laws.
Ensure the timely publication of the senate
agenda to comply with the Open Meetings Acts.
Disseminate other documents (minutes, reports,
supportive evidence, etc.) pertinent to committee
or senate discussion and action.
Implement college and district governance
policies, ensuring the effective participation
of other governance groups and the primacy of
faculty on academic and professional matters.
Advocating for Faculty Interests
Serve as the official spokesperson and advocate
for the faculty in academic and professional
matters.
Work to resolve concerns of individual faculty
members or to refer faculty members to the bargaining
unit on matters of wages or working conditions.
Provide initiative in identifying and pursuing
important institutional issues.
Meet regularly with the Superintendent/President
and the Vice Presidents and with other administrative
staff as needed.
Advocate for appropriate staff development
funding, and ask to have such funding called
out and earmarked in appropriate grants calling
for your signature.
Archive the senate's historical records.
Register senate endorsement of certain important
documents sent to relevant authorities, e.g.,
Matriculation Plan, Accreditation Self-study
and Annual Report.
Promoting an Effective Relationship
with the Board of Trustees
Attend and participate in meetings and retreats
of the Governing Board or college administration.
Serve as the primary source of recommendations
to the Governing Board on academic and professional
matters.
Develop recommendations relating to academic
and professional matters for presentation to
the Board.
Maintaining Contact with the
Academic Senate for California Community Colleges
Attend and participate in the fall and spring
Academic Senate Plenary Sessions, and the Area
Pre-session meetings, providing for an official
voting delegate.
Interact with the Academic Senate for California
Community Colleges and senates of other California
community colleges.
Attend institutes of the Academic Senate
for California Community Colleges, e. g. Summer
Institute for Academic Senate Leadership, and
ensure that senate representatives attend other
such institutes, e.g., Curriculum, Technology.
Seek information about the deliberations
of systemwide organizations that may impact
California community colleges.
Remain vigilant about legislation affecting
the California community colleges.
Ensure good relations with the bargaining
agent.
Ensure the effective participation of faculty
in the joint development of institutional policy,
e.g., minimum qualifications and equivalencies,
faculty hiring procedures, tenure review, faculty
service areas, and faculty evaluation procedures.
Maintaining Effective Relationships
with Other Governance Groups
Ensure good relations with the bargaining
agent.
Work with the bargaining agent in the joint
development of institutional policy, e.g., minimum
qualifications and equivalencies, faculty hiring
procedures, tenure review, faculty service areas,
and faculty evaluation procedures.
Work to ensure the effective participation
of staff and students in the areas that have
substantial effect on them.
Developing Senate Participation
and Leadership
Conduct orientations of new faculty to explain
the functions of the local senate.
Meet with new senate members once a semester
for the first year to discuss any problems and
to further familiarize them with collegial governance.
Encourage other faculty to participate in
the events sponsored by the Academic Senate.
Provide leadership to senate, college, and
district-wide committees to ensure productive
and efficient completion of tasks and regular
reporting to the senate as a whole.
Coordinate and cause to be conducted the
election of local senate officers.
Fostering Communication
Engage in ongoing discussions with faculty
on the issues of the day.
Facilitate in developing and airing faculty
views.
Facilitate communication among the Faculty
and with Administration and the Governing Board.
Ensure that minutes of the local senate meetings,
its Executive Council meetings, if applicable,
and other meetings of the body are published
in a timely manner.
Engage in and keep record of local senate
correspondence, including electronic communications.
Encourage the maintenance of a local senate
website, if possible.
Communicate with and responding promptly
to requests for information from the Academic
Senate for California Community Colleges.
Securing Resources to Ensure
Senate Success
Assure adequate resources for the Senate
and manage them.
Develop agendas for and conduct meetings
of the academic senate.
Allocate the use of staff support of the
senate.
Archive senate and college materials, using,
perhaps both a "chron file" (listed
chronically by date of receipt or action) and
a topic file; compile a master list of senate
files, and employ a check-out system for faculty
who wish to "borrow" documents or
files. [Too often, the college's institutional
memory would be lost were it not for the archival
content of the senate files.]
Assist in the orderly transfer of authority
to the senate president-elect.
Furthering Efforts to Appoint
and Retain Qualified Personnel
Participate in the search and selection of
candidates to fill administrative positions.
Appoint faculty representatives to college
and district-wide committees.
Participate, as permitted by law, in the
evaluation of staff, including administrators
with whom you work, as well as staff serving
the local senate.
Assure effective faculty participation on
various institutional groups, e.g., Matriculation
Committee, Department Chairs, Staff development.
Your Responsibilities Within
a Multi-college District
In addition to the responsibilities
noted above, if the various campuses of your district
have agreed to create a District Senate, as local
senate president you will have these additional
duties:
Serve as the representative of your campus.
Serve or appoint others to serve on district
committees as requested by the chancellor or
district-level administrators.
Be responsible to see that board rules, particularly
those governing curriculum and hiring processes,
are adhered to both at the district and campus
level.
Be the major conduit for district-wide information
that must reach your faculty--and sometimes
other constituencies--in a timely manner.
Advise the district on your senate's position
on present and emergent policy matters.
B. College/District Reports
Requiring Senate Sign-off, Review or Vigilance
Appendix D contains listings of
reports or documents calling for the local senate
president's signature and/or senate approval,
as well as materials requiring senate vigilance
as they move through administrative channels,
often without required, local senate review. While
we have provided tentative due dates as of this
publication, these reports are often fluid and
districts may sometimes apply for reporting extensions.
Further, new action by the legislature or the
Board of Governors may eliminate or increase the
reporting obligations of your college. Use Appendix
D as a starting point to inquire about the responsibilities
you may share with the offices of financial aid,
matriculation, transfer centers, economic development,
research and grants, and elsewhere across the
campus.
Grant applications often require
your signature to attest that the faculty has
considered the academic implications. In practice,
many local senate presidents report that administrators
or grant-seeking faculty solicit needed signatures
only days or hours before the document is due;
other applicants may submit reports or forms without
documentation, necessary budget information, or
other essential information. To avoid these pressing
circumstances, the Academic Senate recommends
the following techniques:
Inform the college faculty and administrators
that materials calling for your signature and/or
approval must be submitted in their entirety
at least 5-7 days in advance of the intended
mailing or submission date.
Refuse to sign materials that are incomplete
or are proffered in circumvention of your established
process. It's professional to just say, "No."
Insofar as possible, inform the faculty or
administrators that such materials will be taken
to the next senate meeting or officers' cabinet
meeting as stipulated by your particular bylaws
or standing rules. "I'll have to get back
to you," is an acceptable and responsible
statement.
Remember and invoke the clichéd expression
of resistance: "Failure to plan adequately
on your part does not constitute an emergency
on my part."
C. Committee Appointments
All faculty appointments, other
than those specifically called out as being appointed
by the bargaining unit, are to be appointed by
the local senate president; appointments to nonsenate
committees are made by the academic senate after
consultation between the local senate president
and the college president or chancellor. Commonly
among such committees and task forces to which
faculty are appointed are these:
College Level
Accreditation
Affirmative Action Committee
Budget Committee
Campus Safety
College Bookstore/Cafeteria Committees
College District Planning
College Foundation
Curriculum Committee
Distance Education Committee
Facilities Committee
Faculty Hiring Committees
Faculty Hiring Prioritization
Committee
Faculty and Administrative Evaluation
Committee
Institutional Planning Committee
Master Plan Committees (Facilities,
Education)
Matriculation Committee
Program Review Committee
President's Cabinet/Council
Research Committee
Staff Development Committee
Technology Committee
District Level
Calendar Committee
Chancellor's Council Committee
District Budget Committee
District Curriculum Committee
District Faculty Priorities and
Hiring Procedures Committee
District Facilities
District Foundation Committee
District Marketing
District Planning Committees
District Student Services
Equivalencies [Note: may be a
college-level committee as well]
Technology (and District Distance
Education) Committees
Other ad hoc committees
as needed on policy changes recommended by the
board or chancellor, or individual issues forwarded
by a college within the district.
