Friday, April 24, 1998
Four vie for vice chair of UCLA faculty
FACULTY: Duties include taking role of chairman after serving
one year
By Brian Fishman
Daily Bruin Contributor
Elections that are being held today for vice chair of the
Academic Senate will define the future of the UCLA faculty.
The election will not include a vote for chairman. Instead, the
person elected to the vice chairmanship for next year will serve as
chairman the following year. Election results should be available
late next Monday.
Four candidates are vying for the VC position: professor of
public health Linda Bourque, senior English lecturer David Rodes,
professor of education Carlos Torres and professor of nursing Donna
Vredevoe.
As usual, within a generally cohesive Academic Senate, elections
are expected to proceed without partisanship.
"There are no groups banding together. There is commonalty with
respect to issues among the candidates," said Chand Viswanathan,
current senate chair.
Major issues confronting the Senate are the continued role of
shared governance, how to use technology for teaching and how to
protect the overall intellectual integrity of UCLA.
All candidates see the Senate playing an increased role in
governing the university because of Chancellor Carnesale’s limited
experience at UCLA. Each claims that the Senate must assert its
influence with the Chancellor to ensure the future of shared
governance .
"UCLA’s cherished principle of shared governance needs to be
fostered by mutual respect, wide and sensible consultation, and
efficiency," Rodes said in a statement.
Faculty has been left out of the decision-making process
involving technology proposals, such as the Instructional
Enhancement Initiative, said Vredevoe.
"I want faculty more involved in developing the Internet," she
said.
Bourque emphasized the importance of making technologies known
and easily accessible for faculty once they are available.
"There is a lot of technology going on. The faculty needs to be
aware of that," Bourque asserted, claiming that some faculty
members are unfamiliar with Internet technology.
"There is some proportion of faculty, often over 55, that is
very insecure about it," Bourque continued.
Besides the Internet, other less high-tech, university policies
were a hot topic of discussion. Torres asserted the importance of
faculty in preserving diversity at UCLA.
"The faculty is not responsible for the problems, but it may be
able to soften the blow and reverse the current trend," Torres
said.
Diversity will be one of the main topics for faculty discussion
next year regardless of who is elected, Torres said, acknowledging
that the diversity issue will not be easily solved.
"Politically, we are between a rock and an almost impossibly
hard place," said Torres.
Rodes was more interested in policies directly affecting the
classroom than those affecting admissions.
"I think the whole matter of general education needs to be
looked at. We have 500 classes fulfilling general education
requirements. I don’t believe all of them are good enough," Rodes
asserted.
If elected, Rodes hopes to address the general issue of
allocating UCLA’s resources in an effective manner.
"The biggest issue for the Senate and the Administration is to
grow and change and cut back in some areas. Any time you need to
trim, you need to consult faculty and students," Rodes said.
Despite the different issues candidates emphasized, all
expressed desire to increase the role of faculty in governing
UCLA.
"The concept of excellence is being changed as new dimensions of
creating and delivering content change," said Vredevoe. "Faculty
will create the innovation and must benefit from it."