Faculty Senate and Council
Biography
To understand the history of the Faculty Senate at the University of Iowa, it is helpful to know the environment during the twenty years preceding its founding in 1967. President Virgil M. Hancher appointed the University Committee on Communication between the Faculty and the President on May 14, 1947. The committee was charged with the task of establishing the University Council (later called University Faculty Council) as a means to represent faculty views to the president of the University. After one year of meetings during which members were elected and proposals were drawn up, the first meeting of the Faculty Council was held on May 4, 1948. From October 1959 through May 1960, Faculty Council's main focus was to decide whether the establishment of a University Senate would promote understanding between faculty and administration, and provide direction to University policies. Finally, on January 17, 1967, the University Faculty Council, by a vote of 8 to 4, decided to recommend a document to the faculty, which would establish a University Faculty Senate. President Howard Bowen and the Regents approved the constitution of the Senate and the Council on April 4, 1967. Stow Persons wrote in The University of Iowa in the Twentieth Century (Iowa City: University of Iowa Press, 1990) that Bowen gave faculty members a stronger voice in the guidance of the University in order to combat low faculty morale. This gesture did not align faculty opinions with Bowen's, however, as is evident in the first issue to involve large numbers of faculty members: the Senate voted against ROTC presence on campus, a stand which the administration and the State Board of Regents rejected. The relationship of the Senate to the Council was set in December, 1960, in anticipation of the formation of a Senate: the Senate would be the representative and deliberative organization of the faculty, and the Council would act as the administrative agency of the body, disseminating reports and minutes of the Senate. As of 2004, the Council considered and amended reports of the Senate, and prepared the agenda for the Senate. To view current Faculty Senate membership, constitution, committees, agenda, and minutes, visit their Web site at http://www.uiowa.edu/~facsen/.