May

"Individual commitment to a group effort-that is what makes a team work, a company work, a society work, a civilization work." - Vince Lombardi

Have you noticed expanding roles for consultants at your college, growing ranks of administrators, the adoption of questionable memoranda of understanding and a board so fixated on a business model that you feel as though your college has been overwhelmed by foreign occupiers? If so, there is one overriding maxim:

Local senates must maintain a strong and persistent academic and professional presence.

In 1982, I was forced to take a workshop in "appleworks for teachers." I didn't look forward to spending a week with computer geeks, and went along nearly kicking and screaming. It turned out to be the most important week of my teaching career! The instructor started the workshop with three important pieces of advice worth sharing:

Back up your work. There are only two kinds of computer users; those who have lost data and those who will.

In february 2006, the Relations with Local Senates Committee conducted a survey of academic senate presidents, asking about the effects of compressed calendars on participatory governance at their college. What prompted the survey was a resolution in Fall 2004:

13.04 F '04 Shared Governance:

Barriers to Participation

When it comes to examining equity and other inclusive initiatives introduced in higher education, the conversation of assessment arises early, as well as it should. Whenever such an initiative is implemented there should be a system of evaluation in place to measure the effectiveness of the institution's efforts.

One sunday morning, in San Diego under a cool morning marine layer, over 300 students gathered to make history. The debates had been going on for over a year, and really for longer than that, without going too deeply into the history of our statewide student representation for California Community Colleges. Twenty-five odd souls had worked feverishly over the past year developing several structural models of which Model E had been selected by the existing ten regions as the one most likely to meet their needs.

It has been my honor to serve on the 2005-2006 Executive Committee for the Academic Senate for California Community Colleges. We have dealt with many thorny issues, but none more difficult than the question of whether to support raising the adjunct teaching limit from 60 to 80 percent of a full-time teaching load. The true strength and health of the Academic Senate was demonstrated in the deliberations-both in the Executive Committee and at Session-regarding this issue.

As with most things, a lack of formality is fine until there is disagreement or discontent. When controversy arises and relationships are not clearly delineated, the manure hits the fan. While we can consider this quandary with respect to many things, I'll take on the relationship between your curriculum, your senate, and your board. Do you know what your "power" structure is? Does anyone? Perhaps "power" is not the right word-but you get the idea.

Politics is an interesting endeavor-full of opportunities and traps. In his first year in office Governor Schwarzenegger achieved considerable success by breaking the mold of the traditional process and crafting flamboyant personal deals. but it all fell spectacularly apart when he encountered the immovable "special interests" of teachers, nurses and firefighters. When the public perception is that you've broken your word it becomes very difficult to broker any new deals.

The Standards and Practices breakout on appreciative inquiry introduced its five generic processes. We then had an opportunity to view the Academic Senate mission within that framework. Subsequently, the plenary body adopted a new mission statement as follows:

Random: These are not random musings. They may be disorganized, and perhaps incoherent, but they are not random. They are subject to whatever forces and patterns govern anything else I say or do. I suspect my microwave.

The word "random" seems to be evolving. I notice my students using it more often, and less accurately. One student described her roommate, saying she was dating "some random guy." She seemed to be suggesting that perhaps her friend could have selected her date more carefully. Still, despite his faults, the date was not random.