University of Virginia Library

Open Faculty Meetings

Open College Faculty meetings hang in the
balance of today's vote of the faculty at a
plenary special session in the Wilson Hall
Auditorium.

We believe that the arguments to open
these monthly meetings to students, without
voice, far outweigh those to limit attendance
to approved students of faculty committee
and to two representatives from the College
caucus of student council.

The final report of the Committee on the
Presence of Students at Faculty Meetings
stated that "we do not consider students
inherently irresponsible; we do not think their
desire for increased participation in the affairs
of the University necessarily dangerous or
absurd; we do-not see any reason to believe
that individually they would be more
obstructive at faculty meetings than some of
our colleagues are."

For the faculty to really live up to this
type of statement we feel that it is mandatory
that they vote today for opening up their
meetings to all students.

The crux of the argument against opening
the meetings is that there is just not enough
space for a potential influx of students into
the meetings. The majority of the committee
felt that the only way there could be adequate
space for students would be to move the
meetings to a larger hall.

The Committee stretched this argument to
its farthest limits: "Even if we allowed only a
limited gallery of observers, that space could
conceivably deprive faculty members of seats
unless the Dean moved the meeting to a larger
auditorium, and it seems inevitable that with a
succession of volatile issues, the pressures
upon the Dean to allow more and more
observers would become intense; and although
it may appear to be a banal point, the larger
the room in which we meet, the less able we
will be to talk to, not to mention hear, each
other."

One member of the committee, Fred Diehl
of the Department of Biology, did not agree
with this line of reasoning and neither do we.
As Mr. Diehl stated in his minority report,
"Our common goal is effective education in
an open academic community. Therefore, it
would seem reasonable to allow interested
students to obtain first hand knowledge of
how the decisions which are made by this
faculty are reached."

If the faculty really does want to maximize
"effective education of students in academic
matters which affect their daily lives at the
University, they should allow students to
attend the meetings in reserved sections.
These students, of course, would have to
maintain proper decorum during the meetings.

The obstacles faced in allowing student
observers attendance at the meetings are
hardly insurmountable. The benefits gained
by students and faculty in having a greater
understanding of each other's affairs far
outweigh the potential difficulties that have
been enumerated.

If necessary, the faculty could move their
meetings to a larger room such as Cabell Hall
Auditorium. Even in Wilson Hall Auditorium
where the faculty currently convenes, is ample
room for a large number of student observers.

Last week's plenary meeting drew only a
few more than a hundred College Faculty
members. During the curriculum sessions in
the fall of this year which have been called the
most important academic reforms in twenty
years at the University there was never any
trouble in finding a seat. Volatile issues just
do not, in fact, ever draw tremendous
attendance at the meetings.

Perhaps in the future more faculty
members will become interested in University
issues and will have the time to attend the
meetings. If the meetings were moved to a
bigger hall, the business of the faculty would
still receive close internal scrutiny. Arrangements
could be worked out so that members
could hear themselves and others talk. The
present decision making process would not be
impaired.

Many faculty members seem worried that
opening the meetings would rob the plenary
sessions of the "faculty" character. This is a
false fear. The faculty, no one else, would be
making the final decisions. We do not believe
that the mere presence of student observers
would cause the faculty to vote one way or
another on any particular issue. The character
of the faculty meetings would remain intact.

If the faculty really does trust the
students, does want to maximize student
effectiveness, and does want to remove some
of the damaging secrecy that for students
characterize faculty decisions, they will vote
for Mr. Diehl's resolution to allow student
observers attendance at faculty meetings.