Info key for senate leader

By Perry Swanson
The Metropolitan

Better communication between faculty and the administration might help end conflicts between the two.

Monys Hagen, Metroâs Faculty Senate president, said she thinks the two are finally ready to work together.
Better communication is key to the new partnership, Hagen said.

ãThere has been a perception at the school in the last couple years that decisions are being made about peopleâs careers and they arenât being given the information,ä Hagen said. ãWe want to make sure that the faculty is going to be informed about the decisions prior to (the college) issuing an official statement.ä

In one incident last year, the administration changed the requirements for reports that professors must maintain to help make their cases for tenure. Professors were not notified of the changes until a week before school started.

ãWithout any discussion, the guidelines for a dossier had been changed,ä Hagen said. ãWe didnât have any input in the process.ä

A similar situation is less likely to occur because the administration is more open to discuss such issues, and the faculty is more willing to speak out, Hagen said.

Hagen wants to help improve communications between the faculty and administration in several ways.
First, she plans to send the faculty frequent e-mail reports on Senate Presidentâs Council meetings.

Hagen said while not everyone will actually read these reports, the important thing is that they are available.

The council, made up of the Senate president, vice president, secretary and representatives from each school at
Metro, meets regularly with Metro President Sheila Kaplan.

Making this information available will give faculty advance notice of change, Hagen said.

She added that faculty should use the updates to keep informed on issues which affect them professionally.

Hagen also pointed to several recent agreements between faculty and administration as an early sign of the better communication. The two bodies reached at least partial agreement on issues such as the faculty handbook, post tenure review, and a solution for lower-than-average faculty salaries.

Other hope for improved communication came this summer when Cheryl Norton was appointed as provost of the college, she said, adding Norton will be a connection to the administration and an advocate for faculty concerns.

ãWeâre excited about her,ä Hagen said. ã(Norton) is very good at finding a common ground between parties..ä

The Faculty Senateâs annual budget of about $5,000 comes from the presidentâs office. It has 80 members this year, about one for every six full-time professors.