1.4 Faculty Executive Committee

The Faculty Executive Committee (FEC) is the principal instrument of faculty participation in the governance of Scripps College, responsible for policy in matters of curriculum, budget, faculty welfare, institutional planning, and student affairs including admissions and financial aid. Faculty participation in individual personnel decisions is the separate responsibility of the Appointments, Promotions and Tenure Committee (APT).

Composition

The Faculty Executive Committee shall consist of eight faculty members, each of whom is elected to a two-year term, plus the Dean of the Faculty, ex-officio. If the normal two-year term is interrupted by a leave the next eligible faculty member will be selected to serve as a replacement on the basis of the last ballot.

Members whose service is suspended will be expected to complete their four semesters of service in the first year after their leave in which there is an opening. The three-year exemption from further service will date from the end of the second year of service.

Terms will begin on June 1 of the year of election. The Dean of Faculty shall be a voting member of the committee.

Eligibility for Election to FEC

All full-time faculty members of Scripps College who will be in residence for the following year are eligible for election to the two-year terms on the FEC. The maximum term of consecutive service on FEC and/or APT shall be two years. Faculty who complete four semesters of service on the FEC or the Appointments, Promotions and Tenure Committee (APT) are released from eligibility for service on the FEC or APT for three years.

An untenured faculty member will not be expected to serve on FEC more than two years total during the period prior to tenure consideration. Junior faculty members would not serve on the Faculty Executive Committee before their first review.

Election of the FEC Committee

Elections to both the FEC and the APT will be held as follows: The Dean of Faculty will initiate the election process on the first Monday of classes of the spring semester. To ensure an accurate ballot, a draft list of eligible candidates normally will be distributed to the faculty by the last day of classes of the previous, fall semester. Untenured assistant professors before their first APT review are not eligible to serve on FEC. Voting members of the faculty will be able to vote for the number of candidates equal to two-thirds of the number of open positions. All fractional values will be rounded up. Faculty members eligible for election to both committees, but not elected to the first committee voted on, shall automatically be placed on the slate for the second committee. The committees shall alternate as to which is elected first. Only continuing full-time faculty, the librarian, the director of the Williamson Gallery, and adjunct faculty in and after their fourteenth year of service shall be voting members of the Scripps Faculty.

All members of the faculty who are eligible are expected to stand for election. One year or one semester leaves approved for the second year of FEC service will disqualify members for the whole of that year. Members whose service is suspended will be expected to complete their four semesters of service in the year after their leave. The three-year exemption from further service will date from the end of the second year of service. When a replacement is required, the next eligible faculty member will be selected on the basis of the last ballot.

Election of the FEC Chair

After the election of the FEC Committee, a single election by the voting members of the faculty shall be held for the Chair from among the eligible members of the Committee (i.e. tenured members who have not previously served the maximum number of terms allowable as Chair.)

1. Faculty will receive a ballot with the names of the eligible members who may be new or continuing members of the Committee. Each faculty member will mark his or her preferences in the order 1,2,3 etc. It is not necessary to rank all candidates but whatever ranking is done must be done in the sequence from 1 onward with no gaps. If there are five candidates it is possible to rank only 3, but they must be ranked 1,2,3–not, 1,2,5.)
2. If a candidate receives a majority of first place votes, he or she becomes the Chair.
3. If no candidates receive a majority, the candidate with the fewest number of first place votes is eliminated and the votes cast for second place on those ballots on which the eliminated candidate was first are reallocated as first place votes. This procedure is repeated until a candidate receives a majority. The candidate with the second highest vote total will serve as Vice Chair.

No person may serve more than two terms as Chair of FEC within any eight year period, and faculty are eligible for election to FEC chair only once during a two-year term of elected service. Anyone who has been Chair a total of three times may decline to serve again as Chair.

Duties of the Chair

The Chair will call and preside over the meetings of FEC. She or he will appoint members of FEC to areas of responsibility within the committee, form and appoint subcommittees as needed, organize the work of FEC, and maintain liaison on a regular basis with the President and administration of the College. If the Chair is temporarily unable to fulfill his or her duties, the Vice Chair will serve as Chair.

Course Release for FEC Service

Each FEC member will receive 1 course release for every 2 years of service. FEC Chairs will receive one additional course release. Course releases must be used within 4 years from first year of service. Course replacement for FEC course release will follow the same process as sabbatical course replacements and will be granted when crucial for the integrity of the curriculum.

Organization of FEC

The Chair is responsible for organizing the work of the Committee and appointing members to appropriate FEC standing or ad hoc subcommittees which may vary from year to year according to the projects undertaken by FEC, but will normally include academic policy, faculty welfare committee (see below), budget, institutional planning, and student affairs, including admissions, financial aid and academic review. The Committee shall delegate to these subcommittees responsibility for routine duties and such other functions as it deems desirable. These subcommittees shall make regular reports to the full committee on their activities, shall keep FEC adequately informed on questions of policy, and shall prepare documentary material for the Committee on matters involving their areas of responsibility. Members of these sub-committees will meet with appropriate members of the Administration, and from time to time, the full Committee may meet with the President and other senior members of the Administration.

Faculty representatives on appropriate Trustee committees are selected annually from the FEC membership. At the request of the President, the members of the FEC, two students selected by Scripps Associated Students, and the senior administrative staff may be convened to act as the President’s Advisory Council.

The Chair may at his or her discretion convene an executive meeting of the Committee consisting only of the faculty members of the Committee.

Faculty Ombudsperson and Faculty Welfare Committee (FWC)

A tenured, full professor of the Faculty shall be elected by the Faculty-at-large to serve as Faculty Ombudsperson for a three-year term, which shall be renewable indefinitely by election. In addition, two members of each year’s FEC shall be appointed by the Chair of FEC to constitute, along with the Ombudsperson, a Faculty Welfare Committee (FWC). The Ombudsperson shall not be eligible for service on APT or FEC during his or her term of service. The Ombudsperson shall chair the FWC, and shall attend FEC as an ex-officio (voting) member on any issue which he or she deems to fall within the area of faculty welfare.

The establishment of the FWC and the office of the Ombudsperson is made on the following understandings:

1. The FWC and Ombudsperson will act only in any advisory capacity on any matter. No final responsibility or authority of the FEC or APT is transferred to the FWC. Any recommendations of the FWC or Ombudsperson that entail action by the FEC or APT must be acted upon by those committees under the usual rules to take effect. If the FWC or Ombudsperson makes recommendations concerning the case of an individual faculty member to the Dean of Faculty or President, those recommendations shall be purely advisory.
2. The FWC and Ombudsperson shall have no legal responsibility for advice or counsel given to an individual faculty member.
3. The FWC and Ombudsperson will not enter into APT reviews except on such procedural matters as are subject to the regular faculty grievance proceedings.
4. Apart from the provisions of (1)-(3), the role of the Ombudsperson in faculty welfare issues, individual or collective, shall be as the Ombudsperson defines it, including but not limited to faculty benefits, faculty regulations, issues of academic freedom, and fair treatment of individual faculty in any institutional context. The Ombudsperson shall convene, or consult with, the other members of the FWC as he or she sees fit.
5. The Ombudsperson shall be chosen as follows: FEC will nominate at least two members of the faculty who in its judgment can best fulfill the duties of the office and who give their consent to being nominated. Balloting for the Ombudsperson shall then take precedence over any other ballot and the result will be announced before nominations for the faculty committees begin. The method of election shall be the same as for the FEC Chair.
6. In the absence of an ombudsperson, or if the ombudsperson feels the need to recuse her/himself, a faculty member filing a grievance may request the formation of an ad hoc advisory committee, consisting of three tenured faculty members, one of whom must be a member of FEC. The Office of the Dean of the Faculty will draw two names by lot from the names of tenured faculty (excluding members of FEC) then available to serve (i.e., not on sabbatical or other leave of absence) and one name by lot from the names of tenured faculty serving on the FEC. The faculty member filing the grievance may strike any one member of the ad hoc committee, in which case a new name will be drawn from the appropriate category. A faculty member whose name has been drawn may recuse her/himself for good cause. The ad hoc committee thus formed shall have the same responsibilities as an ombudsperson and the Faculty Welfare Committee with respect to the particular grievance for which the committee was formed, and shall be dissolved after it has fulfilled its responsibilities as to the grievance for which it was formed.

Relationship of FEC to the Faculty-at-Large

The FEC is the representative body of the Scripps College faculty. As such, it is empowered to act for the faculty. It is expected that FEC will consult with the faculty both formally and informally as it performs its duties, but it is not required to obtain prior consent from the faculty before taking action. Nevertheless it is the obligation of FEC to act in general within the informed consent of the faculty. FEC will, therefore: (1) provide the faculty with minutes and documentation of its deliberations and actions, (2) be available for questions at regular meetings of the faculty, and (3) provide means by which the faculty at large can amend or rescind FEC decisions. This may be done in the following ways: (1) FEC may vote to refer a matter to the faculty at a regular or specially scheduled faculty meeting, (2) any individual faculty member may move to amend or rescind any FEC action at a regular faculty meeting provided that member has filed in a timely manner a motion for the agenda of the regularly scheduled meeting with the Dean of Faculty, (3) on petition of any five members of the faculty submitting one or more written motions to amend or rescind a specific action of the FEC, the Dean shall call a special meeting of the faculty, or (4) on the motion of any member of FEC any decision of the Committee may be deferred from taking effect for fourteen days. Deferred actions shall be reported promptly to the faculty at large who may request clarification from members of the Committee or ask the Committee to consider amendments or objections. FEC will review such faculty response before making its decision final.

Relationship of FEC to Scripps Associated Students (SAS)

One student shall be elected or appointed by the Scripps Associated Students (SAS) to serve as a voting member of the Academic Policy Subcommittee (APS) of FEC. In addition, the SAS Judicial and Academic Review Chair shall serve as a voting member of the Committee on Academic Review.

SAS shall appoint an FEC liaison and FEC shall appoint a SAS liaison. Normally, relations between SAS and FEC shall be conducted by these liaisons. In extraordinary circumstances, a formal meeting between additional representatives of SAS and FEC may be requested by either the SAS President or the Chair of FEC. The format and agenda for such a meeting shall be agreed in advance by the SAS President and the Chair of FEC. (Revised 10-9-14)

Changes in Major Policy and By-Laws Amendments

No change in policy or By-Laws may be voted at the same meeting of the faculty at which it is proposed, except for legislation proposed by FEC or APT, provided such legislation and explanatory materials are submitted in writing to the voting members of the faculty one week in advance of a scheduled meeting.

The faculty By-Laws may be amended by a simple majority of the voting members of the faculty. A written ballot is required unless such a majority can be obtained by a vote of those present.