Faculty of Arts & Sciences Bylaws

NAME
The name of this body shall be the Faculty of Arts and Sciences, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, Virginia.
PURPOSE
The purpose of the Faculty in assembly shall be to establish academic policy for the College and Graduate School of Arts and Sciences and act upon other matters affecting undergraduate and graduate education.
MEMBERSHIP
1. Voting membership shall consist of all persons holding a full-time academic position in Arts and Sciences with the rank of assistant professor and above, and University professors. Full-time faculty members in Arts and Sciences below the rank of assistant professor shall become voting members after three years' service in the University.
2. The President is a member ex-officio of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences. Administrative officers who are not members under Section III. A. may be invited to participate in faculty meetings without vote. Full-time faculty members in Arts and Sciences below the rank of assistant professor and with fewer than three years' service, and professors emeriti, have voice but not vote in this body.
3. The student members of Faculty committees and one representative designated by the College Advisory Board to serve an entire year, a graduate student designated by the Graduate Student Council, and the student-elected President of the College of Arts and Sciences shall be entitled to be present and to speak, without vote, at meetings of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences.
4. The Faculty shall have the right to invite advisors to its meetings. Such persons shall be entitled to speak at meetings of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences to which they are invited; they shall not be entitled to vote

OFFICERS
1. The Dean of the College and Graduate School of Arts and Sciences (hereafter the Dean) is the Presiding Officer of the Faculty. In the Dean's absence, the Chair of the Steering Committee shall preside.
2. Duties of the Dean shall be to:
  1. Notify the membership of meetings; prepare and distribute the agenda.
  2. Appoint the members of such ad hoc committees as circumstances may require.
  3. Serve as an ex officio member of the Steering Committee and the Committee on Educational Policy and the Curriculum.
  4. Present to the Faculty all appropriate communications from outside that body.
  5. Sign and authenticate all resolves, votes and formal acts of the Faculty, and forward such as required.
  6. Maintain the archives of the Faculty which shall include all minutes, committee reports, communications, and papers concerning the affairs of this Faculty.
3. Duties of the Associate Dean for Academic Programs shall be to:
  1. Serve as an ex officio member of all standing committees except the Nominating and the Committee on Budget and Personnel Policy, offering proposals for the improvement of the quality of education in the College and Graduate School.
  2. Report annually to the Faculty on the state of educational programs and the effectiveness of existing rules of the College and Graduate School.
4. The Dean shall appoint a Parliamentarian, whose duty shall be to advise the Presiding Officer on questions of parliamentary procedure.
5. The Secretary of the Faculty shall be nominated by the Dean, and elected annually by the assembly. The Secretary may serve successive terms.
6. Duties of the Secretary shall be to:
  1. Keep minutes of meetings of the Faculty, which after their approval, shall be the official record of all actions of this body.
  2. Incorporate in the minutes all documents and papers laid before the Faculty as well as committee reports and communications.
COMMITTEES
1. Members of standing committees shall be elected by the Faculty.
  1. Members of the Nominating Committee and of the Steering Committee shall be elected for three-year terms commencing on the first day of Registration for the fall semester; one-third of each committee shall be elected each year. Each committee shall have no more than one member from any single department. Nominations for these committees shall be invited by mail by the Secretary; additional nominations may be made from the floor at a regularly-called meeting of the Faculty, usually in March. Nominations shall not be closed until at least twice as many names have been placed in nomination as there are vacancies on the committee to be filled. No member shall be eligible for re-election until one full year has passed after the expiration of his/her previous term of office. Elections shall be conducted by secret mail ballot, and the results announced by mail. The Dean shall thereupon (or no later than the first week of the fall semester) convene the Nominating and Steering Committees for the purpose of electing a for each committee.
  2. For the other standing committees the Nominating Committee shall annually solicit from all departments recommendations of candidates from the various academic ranks, in consultation with the Dean. The Committee shall ordinarily propose its slate to the Faculty for election at the March meeting. Members of these committees shall be elected for one year; they shall be eligible for re-election, except that it shall not be regarded as normal for any elected member to serve for more than four consecutive terms on any one committee. The Nominating Committee, in presenting its slate, shall designate one member of each committee to serve as chair. Nominations from the floor shall be in order for membership on any standing committee, and, if more names have been offered than the number to be elected, election of the members of this committee shall be by secret ballot, the persons receiving the highest number of votes being declared elected. In the event of a tie at the bottom of the poll, selection shall be made by lot. In like manner, alternative nominations from the floor for the chair of any committee shall be in order, and, if such have been made, the vote shall be by secret ballot. In the absence of nominations from the floor, the slate of the Nominating Committee shall be elected by voice or rising vote. The same electoral procedure shall be followed in the filling of vacancies as they occur.
  3. Members of ad hoc committees may either be appointed by the Dean or the Steering Committee or be elected by the Faculty, as it determines.
  4. The student members of the standing faculty committees shall be elected by the Faculty in the same manner as other members, except that, for the purposes of undergraduate student elections, the College Advisory Board shall perform the functions of the Nominating Committee, and for graduate student elections, the Graduate Student Council shall perform the functions of the Nominating Committee. The Faculty Nominating Committee may, however, in its discretion, make additional nominations, and additional nominations may likewise be made from the floor.
2. Standing committees of the College and Graduate School of Arts and Sciences shall be advisory to the Faculty, and except as hereinafter noted in the case of the Faculty Rules , shall act ultimately by means of recommendations and reports to the Faculty. Their primary function shall be to consider matters, motions, and resolutions directed to them by the Faculty, the Steering Committee, or the Dean, or raised on a committee's own initiative. Recommendations shall be presented to the Faculty in such a form as to facilitate orderly discussion and ready decision. Standing committees or their chairs may be directed by the Faculty to represent it in discussions or negotiations with other groups within the University. If committees are to make substantive proposals at any meeting of the Faculty, these shall be drafted and placed in the hands of the Faculty at least four days before the meeting. Except by suspension of the rules, no action may be taken by the Faculty if advance notice has not so been given. All committees shall report annually in writing and, if called upon, orally to the Faculty according to a schedule agreed upon with the Steering Committee.
3. The functions of the standing committees shall ordinarily be as follows. No committee, however, shall be precluded by lack of specific directions from considering any matter lying within the area of its concern as such concern may reasonably be inferred from the name of the committee.
  1. The Steering Committee (eight elected members), as one of the two directly elected committees in the College, shall have special responsibilities for oversight and coordination of the other standing committees. To this end the Steering Committee, after having selected its chair, shall call a meeting of all outgoing and incoming committee chairs at least once a year in the early fall, in order to clarify charges, transmit records, review current business, and discuss priorities. The Steering Committee shall also take any initiative it sees fit on matters that fall outside individual committee functions as stated in these Bylaws or extend across the jurisdiction of several committees. In consultation with the Dean, the Committee shall decide the agenda for regularly called meetings of the Faculty. This Committee shall be responsible for recommending changes in the size and constitution of standing committees. The annual report of the Steering Committee to the Faculty shall be either an evaluation of the Faculty in discharging its responsibilities or an examination of some aspect of those responsibilities. The Dean shall be an ex officio member of the Steering Committee. The Chair of the Committee shall be elected by secret ballot at the first fall meeting, with the Dean presiding.
  2. The Nominating Committee (six elected members), taking into account representation of departments and academic ranks, shall in March propose to the Faculty nominees for all committee assignments that are to be filled by election. (See V. A. 2.)
  3. The Committee on Educational Policy and the Curriculum (twelve elected faculty members, one elected graduate student member and one elected undergraduate student member) shall deal with broad policies affecting undergraduate and graduate education and such specific matters as course changes, new courses, new major programs, degree requirements, special programs such as distinguished major programs and programs leading to the degree with honors, and rules governing the academic status of students. To these ends it shall receive and transmit to the Faculty with its recommendations, proposals from departments and other sources. The Committee may advance proposals of its own. Its deliberations on undergraduate programs shall be guided by the ideals of a balanced liberal education as these are understood both in the nation at large and the University. It shall endeavor to keep the rules simple and coherent and the curriculum free of undesirable duplication. The Committee shall consult regularly with the Dean and shall make no recommendation without review by the whole committee, even when it delegates some of its work to sub-committees.
  4. The Committee on Budget and Personnel Policy (six elected faculty members) shall be charged with general oversight of budget policy and allocation of resources by the Dean, and of policy concerning faculty appointments and their termination, promotions, tenure, and salary ranges as administered by the Dean. The Dean shall keep the Committee informed on all these policy matters and meet with the Committee as either deems necessary.
  5. The Faculty Rules Committee (six elected members) shall be empowered to interpret the rules of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences and to determine how they are to be applied to individual students who appeal decisions made in their cases by the Associate Dean for Academic Programs. From the decisions of the Faculty Rules Committee there ordinarily shall be no appeal. The sole grounds for appeal shall be: (1) the introduction of important new evidence pertaining to the case; (2) gross procedural violations in handling of a petition by the Faculty Rules Committee; and (3) reasonable grounds for believing that the Faculty Rules Committee, as currently constituted, would be unable or presumptively unlikely to render a fair and unbiased decision in the case, or that the decision reached was contrary to the evidence. Decision as to whether such appeal should be granted shall rest with the Dean, and if appeal is granted, the Dean shall appoint an ad hoc committee to render a final decision in the case and report to the Faculty thereon.
4. Standing committees shall ordinarily report back to the Faculty at its next regular meeting resolutions or enactments that have been referred to them for study except when the Faculty has set a more distant reporting date. In cases where no date has been set and more time is needed for study, the committee may take it, except that, after one month, the Faculty may, by a two-thirds vote, discharge any committee from further consideration of any resolution or enactment, and bring the matter to immediate vote, without committee action, and, after two months, the Faculty may do so by a simple majority vote.
5. Committees of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences shall meet at the call of the chair, or upon written request to the chair of one-third of the members of the committee.

MEETINGS
1. Meetings of the Faculty shall ordinarily be called by the Dean, who shall furnish to members of the Faculty written notice and agenda of each meeting at least one week prior to the meeting.
2. Meetings of the Faculty may also be called upon resolution made in a scheduled meeting of the Faculty, or upon written petition to the Dean by twenty-five members of the Faculty. The Dean shall then call a meeting within ten days. Petitions must include signatures from members of at least two departments.
3. In the event of an emergency, rules governing advance call for the meeting may be waived by the Dean, except that action taken by such meeting shall not be valid unless the members present, by a two-thirds vote, confirm the existence of such emergency.
4. A quorum shall consist of forty persons qualified to vote.
5. Voting shall be limited to the members present, and a majority determined by voice vote, or at the request of two members, by secret ballot. A mail ballot by the entire faculty shall be conducted if requested by a majority of those present.
6. The Faculty shall have the right to move into Executive Session under the conditions and by choice of method delineated in Robert's Rules of Order, Revised.
7. Robert's Rules of Order, Revised shall govern meetings of the Faculty in all cases in which they apply and do not conflict with these Bylaws.

FACULTY SENATE ELECTION PROCEDURE
Each department shall elect a member from its faculty to a four-year term on the Faculty Senate. A Departmental Representative can be re-elected at the end of his/her term if the faculty in the department so vote. The result of the departmental election shall be communicated to the office of the Dean by the end of March in the last year of the Departmental Representative's term.

Senatorial seats assigned to the College and Graduate School of Arts and Sciences in excess of the number of departments (approximately 10) shall be filled by a college-wide election. Candidates for these positions will be nominated by the Nominating Committee. When the terms of these Senators expire, they shall not be allowed to succeed themselves until a year has elapsed.
AMENDMENT OF BYLAWS
Amendment of or addition to these Bylaws may be made at any meeting of the Faculty by two-thirds vote of the members present and voting, provided that notice of the proposed amendment or addition shall have been sent forth in the notice of the meeting.

Adopted April 28, 1970
rev. March 20, 1974
rev. March 29, 1979
rev. April 26, 1979
rev. April 30, 1987
rev. October 27, 1994
rev. December 3, 1996

Maintained by A&S Communications. Contact us