Internal ASCSU Actions Following the Disposition of Resolutions

AS-3073-12/Shared Governance Committee (Rev)

RESOLVED: That the Academic Senate of the California State University (ASCSU) adopt the policy that all resolutions brought forward to the plenary, regardless of disposition, be agendized at an appropriate subsequent meeting of one of the committees of the ASCSU (Academic Affairs, Academic Preparation and Education Programs, Faculty Affairs, Fiscal and Governmental Affairs, or Executive); and be it further,

RESOLVED: That the ASCSU adopt the policy that appropriate actions to follow-up resolutions be
noted in the committee minutes, carried forward to future agendas, and shared with other committees or entities as appropriate; and be it further,

RESOLVED: That the ASCSU Executive and standing committee chairs be requested to pursue appropriate measures to achieve transparency of the status of follow-up actions via publicly posting some means of tracking completed, ongoing, and intended future actions regarding specific resolutions and/or issues; and be it further,

RESOLVED: That the ASCSU change the bylaws of the ASCSU under reporting requirements to add the following to the bylaws to become bylaw 4(f):

f. Reporting Procedures
All standing and special committees, shall report to the Senate, and unless
otherwise specifically directed by the Senate, shall take appropriate action to
follow-up on resolutions which they sponsored, and will note in their committee
minutes the results of this follow up action. Where appropriate, follow-up
actions shall be carried forward to future agendas and shared with other
committees and entities. Committee recommendations shall not be considered
policy statements until formally adopted by the Senate

; and be it further

RESOLVED: That the ASCSU distribute this resolution internally and to campus Senate Executive
Committees

RATIONALE: This is one of a set of three resolutions addressing the issue of followup to actions of the ASCSU. The three resolutions address the desirable follow-up to ASCSU resolutions by each of three audiences. Those audiences are: (i) The ASCSU itself in tracking the consequences and concerns addressed by resolutions, (ii) The Office of the Chancellor (CSU) following the passage of a resolution by the ASCSU, and (iii) The Board of Trustees, in particular in the instance that the faculty representatives of a component (i.e., campus) of the CSU has seen fit to authorize, and then vote in favor of, a vote of “no confidence” in their administrative leadership.

It is specifically noted that formal resolutions are not the only means of communicating. The ASCSU acknowledges that the adoption of formal resolutions have an additional role of providing a historic record of positions held and actions advocated. It is in this spirit that the first and second resolved clauses fall (analogous to a “senate management resolution” on many of the campuses of the CSU). The motivation for this resolution was to ensure adequate follow-up to those resolutions passed while acknowledging the very real essence of shared governance in that sometimes issues, once identified, do not then rise to the level of having a resolution passed. Such a case is when a desired outcome is achieved for an issue that is unlikely to reoccur in its context.

While it is explicitly noted that not all resolutions require further action or any action beyond the immediate distribution of the resolution to the appropriate agency or individual, there are other instances where action would be appropriate but the actions to follow-up are not transparent to an individual trying to determine the current status of ASCSU involvement in a topic or issue.

The resolution, in resolved 2, 3, and 4, specifies the need for appropriate follow-up (e.g., assigning responsibility for an individual to contact one or more campuses for further input or follow through) subsequent to the passage of a resolution. It is anticipated that this follow-up will be determined by the appropriate committee (generally either the Executive or sponsoring committee), and that the allocation of responsibility for pursuing follow-up will typically be determined via a meeting of the Extended Executive committee prior to the subsequent interim meeting. These details of implementation go beyond that typically included in a resolution but are included in this rationale for context.

The resolved on transparency (resolved 3) is intended to facilitate keeping “older” resolutions, for which additional follow-up would be appropriate, at the forefront of committee discussion and provide a means to communicate the current status of action on policy suggestions, information seeking, or other aspects of shared governance. It had been suggested that a shared access googledoc or a blog type format might be used to track resolution/policy specific action. Access and IT considerations may well scale this back to the distribution of a table listing current and prior committee actions on resolutions/policies by each of the committee chairs (Standing & Executive) prior to, or with, each Plenary report. The request to the Executive committee is to further investigate such actions within the constraints of the IT capabilities and web-access available within the Office of the Chancellor. It is noted that any such resolution/policy issue tracking system could facilitate shared awareness and would also allow implementation status to be added to the annual report from the various committees of the senate.

Approved – May 3-4, 2012