Rationale for Committee Structure

While most faculty react favorably to designating the General Education Committee a Standing Committee of the Faculty Senate, two concerns have been raised about the constitutional amendment proposed by the current Gen Ed Committee; both involve the proposed committee structure.  The proposed language is:

The General Education Committee will consist of five (5) faculty elected by the Faculty Association.  Each member will serve a five year term, elected one per year.  The members must be selected from five (5) different divisions.  The chair of the committee will be elected annually from among the members of the committee.

One objection is the term of service, 5 years.  The current term for membership on a standing committee is set by the Constitution of the Faculty of Lewis-Clark State College at 2 years, with a limit of two consecutive terms (Article IV Section 2 Subsection E).  Members of the Faculty Senate “are encouraged to serve for three (3) years” (Article I Section 6 Subsection C.1).  Multi-year terms are specified because of the learning curve of the individual and the need to maintain continuity within the committee, so that not all work in progress is lost in the transition between academic years. 

The rationale of the 5 year term for the Gen Ed Committee is the same; there is a very steep learning curve, even for those new members who have been involved in the teaching of GE courses throughout their career.  There is an even greater need for continuity in the Gen Ed Committee, as assessment processes take years to show any results, and even moderate changes to General Education at any institution are glacially slow in the conservative academic environment.  It is hoped that the proposed 5 year term would result in a particular member serving on the committee for 3-4 years before chairing the committee, bringing several years of experience to bear on the task. 

A second objection is the size of the committee; it is felt by some, upon first thought, to be so small as to be non-representative of the Faculty.  Alternate proposals call for seven members or divisional representation.

There are multiple reasons to choose the smaller committee size.  Having as few as five members encourages a working-group model where it is easier to focus on the task at hand.  Meeting scheduling itself is simplified with half as many members as a divisionally represented committee would have.  The larger the number of members, the more frequently members miss meetings, and so the more time is eaten up by backtracking and reviewing past events so the previously absent member will be able to participate in a meaningful way.  Choosing members from the Faculty at large encourages the members of the committee to shed their local view of General Education and adopt a “big picture” mode of thought. 

There is a significant reason to not choose a large committee composition, particularly one with divisional representation.  Divisional representation encourages parochial thinking; that is, a divisional representative is always cognizant of representing the division.  Nothing is or could be more divisive on a small campus such as ours.  In such an arrangement it is hard for the question “what is best for LC students” to win out over “what is best for my division” or “what is best for my majors.” 

Meetings of standing committees are “open to general faculty except when such open meetings would be an infringement of individual rights” (Article IV Section 2 Subsection D), and it is difficult to imagine a curricular issue which would infringe individual rights.  Moreover, all products of all standing committees are forwarded to the Faculty Senate for approval; should the committee make an error of omission or ignorance, the Faculty Senate stands as a deliberative and oversight body to remedy those errors. 

The General Education Committee must focus on the goals of the College and the needs of all of its students in order to function as it should.  The small committee size and longer term of service selects for and encourages members to identify with the College and its students rather than with a particular division and its students.