Discussions focus on accountability section.
By Rocky Garza Jr.
rgarzazachary@student.alamo.edu
An ad hoc committee to study re-establishing a tenure system will present its 50-page proposal to the Executive Faculty Council May 14.
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English Professor Lennie Irvin; Judah Leggett, president of Faculty Senate at Northeast Lakeview College; and Aaron Prado, president of the Faculty Senate at Northwest Vista College, will oversee the presentation to the council.
If the council approves, the proposal will then go to the Strategic Leadership Team, which is composed of the chancellor, vice chancellors and the college presidents.
If the team approves, the proposal can be forwarded to the board of trustees of the Alamo Colleges for a final decision.
At its April 23 meeting, the council focused on the committees’ recommendation for accountability.
Prado said there was a feeling from some members of the EFC that the ad hoc committee was trying to rewrite the accountability section and he said the EFC members told him that it wasn’t the committee’s job to do so.
Prado said that during the April 23 ad hoc committee meeting, Anthony Lack, Northeast Lakeview humanities professor, said he was against the committee’s recommendations and agreed with the EFC members that it wasn’t the committee’s job to determine procedures.
The committee plans to email the proposal to all faculty members in the Alamo College District to gather feedback.
The ad hoc committee is composed of Prado; Leggett; Linda Boyer Owens, vice chancellor of human resources; Cynthia Katz, Executive Faculty Council fellow; Elizabeth Tanner, vice president of academic success of Palo Alto College; and Julie Moore-Felux, English chair of Northwest Vista College.
Additional members are accounting Professor Amanda Salinas and Spanish Professor Vicente Guillot both of Palo Alto College; Irvin and nursing adjunct Dr. Daniel Flores of this college; biology Professor Brian Stout and English Professor Fiona McWilliam of Northwest Vista College; mathematics Professor Albert Guerra and Dr. Mary Keliata, biology professor, of St. Philip’s College; and biology Professor Karla Kosub and Lack of Northeast Lakeview.
Leggett and Prado said that an updated tenure system would include a Faculty Mentoring Model to pair tenured faculty members with tenure-track candidates.
Tenure was discontinued for new hires in 2011 by former Chancellor Bruce Leslie.
Faculty was told tenure was discontinued because a robust faculty evaluation system was needed along with improved faculty development, Prado said.
“The removal of tenure affects faculty because at the point tenure was suspended, all faculty who were hired after 2011 were placed on a year-to-year contract model, and that doesn’t provide us or anyone with longtime job security,” Leggett said.
“If tenure were to be brought back, the change of faculty contracts would transition from to one-year to automatic renewals,” Prado said.
The next Executive Faculty Council meeting is scheduled for 10 a.m. May 14 via Zoom. To join, go here.
