Jacksonville State University Board of Trustees to vote on alternate faculty senate board

The Jacksonvile State University Board of Trustees is expected to vote Tuesday on creating a replacement for the university’s now-dissolved faculty senate as public universities continue to wrestle with the application of a new state law.

Christie Shelton, provost and executive vice president of academic affairs, said after the board of trustees meeting Monday the board will vote on the Presidential Faculty Academic Roundtable at Tuesday’s meeting. The newly established roundtable is expected to meet Wednesday afternoon.

“And the president and I are really eager to meet with them first thing Wednesday afternoon,” Shelton said. “We do feel like there may be better opportunities for problem solving because we’re all in the room. We weren’t that way before. We were infrequently in the room together, but never all at the same time. So we feel like this may be a tremendous opportunity for problem solving, just in a new way.”

The JSU Board of Trustees dissolved the school’s faculty senate in August, citing HB 580, sponsored by Rep. Troy Stubbs, R-Wetumpka, and signed by Gov. Kay Ivey in April. 

The bill, which went into effect Oct. 1, limits faculty senate bodies to advisory roles; requires periodic reviews for tenured professors and gives boards of trustees at colleges and universities the final say in developing curricula.

Higher education institutions across the state have been interpreting the law differently. Auburn University also dissolved its faculty senate in June, but other universities, including Troy University and the University of Alabama, opted to keep their faculty senates to varying degrees.

According to the Chanticleer, JSU’s student newspaper, the new JSU board will be composed of six elected and seven appointed faculty members. Shelton said all of the faculty members who will be a part of the Presidential Faculty Academic Roundtable were notified. She did not say which faculty members were on the new board.

Lance Ingwersen, a history professor at JSU, said in an interview Monday afternoon that details about what the alternative board will be doing are still hazy to faculty members.

“There are a lot of things under the academic affairs committee-wise that the state of which are … just kind of unknown right now,” he said. “ I would say there’s a lot that we really just don’t know. That is very clear.”

Ingwersen also said in a text message Monday evening while he understands Shelton’s perspective “the reality is, as a faculty member, the PFAR (Presidential Faculty Academic Roundtable) is less representative” and called it a “step backward for Jax State faculty and for decision-making at the university.”

“The PFAR has 13 members from a handful of departments, and more than half (7) are appointed directly by the president,” he said. “The PFAR will meet half as much as the Faculty Senate did. And PFAR members likely won’t be able to deliberate as openly and candidly as they did in Senate about issues of importance since administrators will share the room with them and because they can be removed at any time per the new law.”