Spring 2014 - The 50th Anniversary of Faculty Governance at Sonoma State University
To commemorate the 50th Anniversary of Faculty Governance at SSU, we decided to make a short film of current faculty talking to faculty in the future about governance.
View Faculty to Faculty in the Future on YouTube
Fifty years ago, on March 4, 1964, the Senate Constitution stated that the purpose of the Senate was:
The purpose of this organization shall be to formulate, evaluate, and recommend policies to the President of the College regarding the development, improvement, and maintenance of the entire College program; to facilitate coordination of he several parts of the College organization; and to provide opportunities for members of the Faculty to express their opinions on matters of College policy.
On our 50th Anniversary, the current (2014) version of the Senate Constitution states that the purpose of the Senate is:
The purposes of this organization shall be (1) to exercise the rights and authority specifically delegated to the Faculty by the Board of Trustees as well as the Chancellor of the California State University, including the legislating of policy governing the awarding of grades and granting of degrees; (2) to serve as the primary consultative body in the University in formulating, evaluating and recommending to the president policies concerning (a) curriculum and instruction, (b) appointments, promotion, evaluation and granting of tenure to members of the faculty, and (c) academic administrative matters of the institution; and (3) to serve as the primary body through which members of the faculty may express opinions on matters affecting the welfare of the University.
An infographic was created to give a snapshot of faculty governance in 2014.
We held an event in the Sonoma Valley room of the Student Center on April 10th and invited all past and present members of faculty governance to join in the celebration. Many Past Chairs of the Faculty attended. We showed the film, had a historical display of the Senate's 50 years, and socialized while eating great food and drinking wine. A good time was had by all.
Remarks about the event, "I do want to say that everything about it was wonderfully well done---from the invitations (to who knows how many people), to the fantastic array of hors d'oeuvres, to the film of "those who have followed," to arranging the room........" Arthur Hills, Past Chair of the Faculty
". . .such a wonderful job of collecting and presenting visuals of our past. We were all knee-deep in a flood of memories: . . . (which) enabled a roomful of dear old friends, some of whom hadn't seen one another in years, to give themselves up happily to vivid, unmushy nostalgia." Yvette Fallanday, Past Chair of the Faculty