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Faculty Handbook revision process overview (draft 2.0)
In the spring of 2005, the CRC under Al Proffit, began work on the section of the Faculty Handbook dealing with Tenure, Reappointment and Annual Faculty Evaluation, building on two years of work on this section begun by a task force under Casey Hurley and Newton Smith, faculty chairs . In the early Fall 2005, the Senate passed what was later called “Section K” (see links below) as an initial attempt to further define the standards, principles, roles, procedures and responsibilities they felt were missing from 4.02 Guidelines for Conferral of Academic Rank, Promotion, and Tenure of the Faculty Handbook (see links below). The document was forwarded to the Provost’s Office and Legal Council for their comments
After review, Legal Counsel rejected the recommendation. The most serious issue was that most of Section K, including other sections of the Faculty Handbook related to tenure and promotion would have to be sent forward to the Board of Governors for approval, and that some of the content appeared to be inconsistent with other sections of 4.02. (see link below). The Provost, in response, asked the Senate to set up a small revision committee to look over the issue. Starting in December 2005 until it was presented to the Senate in April 2005, the committee consisting of Kyle Carter (provost), Scott Philyaw (vice chair of faculty senate), Newt Smith (chair of faculty senate), Rich Kucharski (legal council), and Jill Ellern (chair of CRC) met weekly to incorporate the principles of Section “K” into the TPR/Faculty Handbook.
This committee reviewed all sections of the Handbook that cover TPR. This was the first systematic review of these sections since 1979. Based on their findings, the committee decided to first reorganize the handbook related to tenure and promotion for clarity of organization, and also clarify wording as needed to remove or reduce inconsistencies and contradictions, before beginning the task of incorporating Section K into the Handbook. The Committee also added material from other sections of the Handbook, the Code, and from other established university policies that were relevant to the TPR process. This resulted in a new section 4 that included all information pertinent to the TPR process in the same section of the Handbook.
The draft document was presented to the WCU faculty at a Provost’s Panel Discussion and Forum on AFE/TPR on March 21 (see the video at https://www.wcu.edu/facctr/video/videostream.asp?v=2) It was presented also to the CRC and Senate for their approval. (see documents below)
However, the Senate voted to take additional time to edit various sections that were not included in the committee’s revisions. The Senate also wanted to present the completed document in its entirety to the faculty for their input. The senate did approve an overall outline of Section 4 and several portions of that section “to be used as a guide in completing the final document.”
In the Spring of 2007, a full draft of the entire section 4.0 was passed by the Senate. That document can be found below.
Documents Pertaining to the Handbook Revision:
Section K (passed Senate Fall 2005)
Draft of Faculty Handbook Revisions
(Sent to Faculty Senate April 2006)
Outline/Guide for Revision Committee
(passed Senate April 2006)
"Least Objectionable" Sections of Faculty Handbook
(passed Senate April 2006)
Section 4.06 (passed Senate February 2007)
Section 4.07 (passed Senate February 2007)
Section 4 (entire) (passed Senate Spring 2007)
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