United States
See also: Higher education in the United StatesIn the United States of America the Academic Senate, also known as the Faculty Senate, is a governing body for a university made up of members of the faculty from various units within the university. In most cases administrative units such as human resources or other university support units do not have representatives as they are not scholastic units. Individual faculty or academic departments such as the Department of Biology or units such as the library may select representatives for the Academic Senate.
The Academic Senate normally creates university academic policy that applies to the university. The policy created by the Academic Senate is restricted to and must be congruent with policy by the university system of which the university is a member institution, any accreditation bodies, state laws and regulations, federal laws and regulations, and changes derived from judicial decisions at the state and federal levels of the court systems. While a majority of universities and colleges have some form of an academic senate, the general perception is that the organization has more of a ceremonial role. However some researchers have found a negative correlation between centralization of university administration and the presence of an academic senate indicating that an academic senate acts as an organizational force for the decentralization of a university in the area of academics.
The Academic Senate meets periodically with a published agenda. Meetings normally use Robert's Rules of Order. The senate will have a set of committees, both standing committees and ad hoc or working committees, which are assigned particular areas of responsibility for policy formation.
The officers of the Academic Senate may include the President of the university and the Provost of the university. Other officers are Academic Senate members who are elected to officer posts by the members of the senate. Deans of colleges as well as department chairs may be ex officio members of the Academic Senate.
Motions, recommendations, or actions that are generated by the Academic Senate through discussion and which are passed by the body are never final and will normally be referred to the President of the university for final approval. Depending on the authorizing legislation or statutes and types of recommendations being made, Boards of Trustees, Boards of Regents or the equivalent may have to authorize senate recommendations.
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Famous quotes related to united states:
“... when we shall have our amendment to the Constitution of the United States, everyone will think it was always so, just exactly as many young people believe that all the privileges, all the freedom, all the enjoyments which woman now possesses were always hers. They have no idea of how every single inch of ground that she stands upon to-day has been gained by the hard work of some little handful of women of the past.”
—Susan B. Anthony (1820–1906)
“The popular colleges of the United States are turning out more educated people with less originality and fewer geniuses than any other country.”
—Caroline Nichols Churchill (1833–?)
“The recognition of Russia on November 16, 1933, started forces which were to have considerable influence in the attempt to collectivize the United States.”
—Herbert Hoover (1874–1964)
“The boys dressed themselves, hid their accoutrements, and went off grieving that there were no outlaws any more, and wondering what modern civilization could claim to have done to compensate for their loss. They said they would rather be outlaws a year in Sherwood Forest than President of the United States forever.”
—Mark Twain [Samuel Langhorne Clemens] (1835–1910)
“What makes the United States government, on the whole, more tolerable—I mean for us lucky white men—is the fact that there is so much less of government with us.... But in Canada you are reminded of the government every day. It parades itself before you. It is not content to be the servant, but will be the master; and every day it goes out to the Plains of Abraham or to the Champs de Mars and exhibits itself and toots.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)