UPRC Restructuring
Effective Date
Faculty Senate approved Nov 27, 2023
Overview
Restructures the Faculty Senate University Planning and Resource Council (UPRC) by replacing it with two new positions on the Faculty Senate Executive Council, the “Faculty Senate University Budget Representative” and “Faculty Senate University Budget Deputy Representative.”
The central work of these two positions will be advocacy, transparency, and communication as they represent budget-related faculty perspectives, questions, and concerns to the administration. Both positions will serve a 1-year term, with the Deputy Representative stepping into the Budget Representative position at the end of their term.
Background
For more than a decade, the UPRC has been largely ineffective. Though the bylaws offer an array of charges, most of those have been overlooked, and it has spent the bulk of its time offering recommendations to the administration regarding external decision packages and internal budget proposals. UPRC has never been able to effectively integrate its recommendations into the budget process of the University. Its recommendations have often been too late to have any effect and rarely seem to have had any impact on Western’s actual budget requests. All of the work of the UPRC has always been merely advisory. Over the past several years, UPRC has undergone various kinds of revisions, all in the service of making it more effective. None have been very successful.
In addition, over the past three years, the administration has been revising the budget proposal process. Currently, decision packages no longer go through a committee process, and the internal budget proposal process is on hold, with the expectation that this process will be relocated within colleges. Thus, the central work of UPRC no longer exists. In addition, the administration has created the University Budget Committee, which performs work similar to the UPRC, offering recommendations to the Cabinet. This University Budget Committee, chaired by the Provost and the VP for Business and Financial Affairs, makes much of the work of UPRC not merely ineffective but redundant.
University Budget Representative
The University Budget Representative will be a non-voting member of the Faculty Senate Executive Council and will attend meetings of both the Faculty Senate Executive Council and the Faculty Senate. They will offer quarterly updates to the Senate regarding the budget. They will be a voting member of the University Budget Committee. They will conduct regular meetings with the Vice President for Business and Financial Affairs and the Provost. In addition, the University Budget Representative will work regularly with the chairs of the College Governance Committees. They will also moderate and maintain a web page and blog on the Faculty Senate website, where faculty can pose questions and offer feedback, and where they can offer updates and information about the budget.
Deputy Budget Representative
The primary responsibility of the University Budget Deputy Representative is to support the work of the University Budget Representative and to familiarize themselves with the university budget and budget operations. They will be a non-voting member of the Faculty Senate Executive Council and will attend meetings of both the Faculty Senate Executive Council and the Faculty Senate. They will be a voting member of the University Budget Committee. At the end of their term, they will step into the University Budget Representative for a one-year term.