UWPF Chapter 3:
Departments, Centers, and Institutes
3.01 Definitions
3.02 Departmental Faculty: Membership
3.03 Departmental Faculty: Functions
3.04 Departmental Executive Committee: Membership
3.05 Departmental Executive Committee: Functions
3.06 Departmental Chairperson: Method of Appointment
3.07 Departmental Chairperson: Duties
3.08 Exceptions
3.09 Centers and Institutes
3.01 Definitions
(1) A department shall consist of a group of faculty members recognized by the faculty an$ Chancellor of the University of Wisconsin-Parkside, and by the Board of Regents, as dealing with a common field of knowledge or as having a common or closely related disciplinary or interdisciplinary interest.(2) The faculty and chancellor may establish centers or institutes to carry out other academic missions or for interdisciplinary teaching and research. Explicit approval of the faculty and senate is required for interdisciplinary centers to offer courses or exercise other powers normally exercised by departments.
3.02 Departmental Faculty: Membership
All persons holding appointments in a department at the rank of professor, associate professor, assistant professor, or instructor, and as determined by the department executive committee, departmental academic staff member with training, experience and responsibility comparable to those in the faculty ranks shall have the right to vote or participate otherwise in departmental faculty meetings, provided that this rule shall not be construed to withdraw any membership understanding or arrangements in effect at the time this rule was adopted.3.03 Departmental Faculty: Functions
The immediate governance of the department is vested in its departmental faculty (as defined in 3.02), which has jurisdiction over all the interests of the department, with authority to determine all departmental questions of educational and administrative policy, other than those matters which are vested in the Departmental Executive Committee by 3.05. The faculty of the department shall be responsible for teaching, research, and public service and shall carry out academic planning processes on a regular basis, including, but not limited to the preparation of the academic program plans for the department. Each department shall meet at least once each semester, and minutes reflecting all formal actions taken shall be recorded.3.04 Departmental Executive Committee: Membership
(1) Each department has a Departmental Executive Committee, consisting of all members of the department who are tenured professors, tenured associate professors, and with the permission of the committee, tenured assistant professors. *
(2) A department chair who is a member of a departmental executive committee is automatically chair of that committee. If the chair-designate is not a member of the departmental executive committee (either is not tenured or is not a member of the department), the University Committee, in consultation with the chair- designate and the dean, shall make ad hoc arrangements for the operation of the executive committee.
(3) Members of the Departmental Executive Committee who are on leave may participate in its decisions insofar as participation is feasible in the judgment of the Executive Committee.
(4) The Departmental Executive Committee may designate a member of the department to serve as secretary, and determine the duties of the position.
(5) No member of the Executive Committee of a department shall take part in the discussion or vote on any matter which that member will subsequently review or take action on in his/her capacity as Chancellor, Provost/Vice Chancellor, Associate Vice Chancellor, Assistant Chancellor, Dean, Associate Dean, Assistant Dean, Director, or Assistants to such administrative officers. This rule shall not preclude an Executive Committee's electing to confer or consult with any Administrative Officer on any matter, nor shall it preclude an Administrative officer's attending any open meeting of any Executive Committee.
* Revision approved by Faculty Senate 12/2/03
3.05 Departmental Executive Committee: Functions
(1) Written criteria for decisions relating to renewal of appointments, recommendation of promotion to assistant professor, recommendation of promotion to tenure, or promotion to full professor shall be established in accordance with University rules and procedures requiring an evaluation of teaching, research, and professional and public service and contribution to the University. The relative importance of these functions in the evaluation process shall be decided by the Departmental Executive Committee. A statement incorporating the written criteria and the relative importance of the indicated functions shall be distributed to all members of the Department and to the appropriate dean. The Departmental Executive Committee has authority to make recommendations concerning appointments, dismissals, promotions, salaries, and other personnel and budget matters, which are transmitted through the chairperson to the dean.
(2) The Executive Committee may, by annual vote, delegate to a smaller committee, or to the chairperson, the authority to make recommendations with respect to any or all of the following matters:
(a) merit review
(b) posttenure review
(c) salaries
(d) non-tenure appointments
(e) appointment or promotion of classified personnel
(f) appointment of assistants
(g) equipment and supplies
(3) The Departmental Executive Committee shall delegate to the tenured full professors of the department the authority to make recommendations for promotions at the rank of professor.
(4) Each executive committee shall meet at least once each semester. Except as otherwise provided, minutes reflecting all formal actions taken shall be recorded.
3.06 Departmental Chairperson: Method of Appointment
(1) All members of a department faculty including those who are designated, in accordance with 3.02, as being eligible to vote by the Departmental Executive Committee, shall be given the opportunity to register an individual preference for departmental chairperson. Departments may authorize a preliminary procedure of nominating a limited number of candidates for departmental chairperson. Such individual preferences shall be communicated to the dean in due course following the request of the respective deans for same.
(2) The method of expression of individual preferences must include the use of a written preference ballot, which may be a mail ballot.
(3) In all cases, the individual preference ballots shall be received by the Secretary of the Faculty, who shall forward all individual preference ballots to the dean.
(4) A departmental faculty member on leave may express a preference provided the expression is not accomplished through a substitute person.
(5) The dean shall exercise the authority to appoint a chairperson from among the members of the department holding professorial rank provided:
(a) The dean has received and examined the individual preference ballots noted by the eligible members of the department.
(b) The dean has consulted with the Vice Chancellor.
(c) The dean has consulted the departmental faculty when the dean plans to decline the preference recommendations of the faculty members of a department.
(d) The dean has consulted both the departmental faculty and the University Committee when he/she contemplates appointment of an individual who is not a member of the faculty of the department or is not tenured.
(6) The term of office of a departmental chairperson is three (3) years, but there is no limit upon the number of terms he/she may serve.
3.07 Departmental Chairperson: Duties
The Chairperson of the department has the following roles:(1) Serves as the official channel of communications for all matters affecting the department as a whole between the department and the President, the Chancellor, the dean, other University officials or departments.
(2) Calls meetings of the departmental faculty and of the executive committee at his/her own initiative or at the request of any two (2) members of the respective bodies, presides over the meetings, transmits minutes of the departmental and executive committee meetings to the appropriate dean, to the Secretary of the Faculty, and to the departmental or executive committee members and maintains such minutes in the departmental files.
(3) Has charge of all official correspondence of the department, and of all departmental announcements in the catalogue or other University publications.
(4) Determines that all necessary records of meetings, teaching, research and public service of the department are properly kept and are always accessible to the proper authorities.
(5) Reports to the dean regarding the activities and needs of the department.
(6) Has responsibility for all departmental supplies.
(7) Submits new courses, major revisions of existing courses, and deletion of courses proposed by the department for action by the appropriate course committee and by the dean.
(8) Takes action, in case of emergency, pending a meeting of the Departmental Executive Committee.
(9) In general, acts as the executive of the department.
3.08 Exceptions
(1) If a departmental executive committee consists of fewer than three tenured faculty, augmented members shall be appointed to bring its membership to at least three.
(a) Augmented members are appointed annually by the dean of the school, in consultation with the departmental faculty, and with the advice and consent of the University Committee,
(b) For matters other than consideration of cases of promotion to full professor, augmented members are appointed from tenured faculty members holding the rank of professor or associate professor in other departments of the university.
(c) For consideration of a candidate for promotion to full professor, the membership of the subcommittee of full professors must number at least three. If this requirement is not met, the membership of the subcommittee of full professors shall be augmented by the appointment of tenured faculty members holding the rank of professor in other departments of the university to bring its membership to three. Such augmentation is done following the procedure set forth in (a), above, and is solely for purposes of dealing with candidacies for promotion to full professor.
(2) The need for an augmented Executive Committee shall be reviewed annually by the departmental faculty and the dean.
RESOLVED, that the faculty senate approves the addition of a new UWPF 3.09 to read as follows:3.09 Centers and Institutes
(1) The director of a center or institute shall be appointed by the dean of the school or college in consultation with any faculty or staff associated with the center or with the University Committee. The director shall serve at the pleasure of the appointing authority. (2) Centers or institutes which exercise the curricular powers of departments shall have a steering committee consisting of the director and other faculty and staff appointed by the dean of the school or college for staggered three-year terms with no bar to reappointment. Other centers and institutes may have such steering committees as seems appropriate and useful.Approved by the Faculty Senate, February 14, 1989. Revised by the Faculty Senate January 28, 1992. Last revised September 26, 1996 to incorporate new chapter title, revised 3.01 and new 3.09 from PSF 30-9596(a) The director shall chair the steering committee
(b) Students and staff may be members of the steering committee, but a majority of its members must be faculty members.
