Appointment
The Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences will appoint a nominating committee consisting of four members of the Taft Faculty Board, the Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences, the Vice President for Research, the Dean of the Graduate School, and two non-committee members of the Taft departments. The A&S dean will either chair the nominating committee or appoint a chair. The nominating committee will advertise the position, solicit applications, and interview the top candidates in order to recommend an appointee to the president of the university. Typically, this process will begin early in Spring Semester with selection of the Faculty Chair made no later than the end of Spring Semester with appointment to begin July 1st.
Term of Office
The Faculty Executive Board Chair will serve a five-year term, renewable for a period up to three years, subject to a review process.
If for any reason the Faculty Chair cannot complete his or her term, the Faculty Executive Board will meet and select by majority vote one of its own members to serve as Interim Faculty Chair, holding all of the responsibilities as described below. During the Interim Chair’s tenure, no substantial changes should be made to Taft programs. The Interim Faculty Chair shall serve until a new Chair can be appointed through the process described above. No Interim Faculty Chair should serve longer than twelve months.
During the term of service, the Taft Faculty Chair is not eligible to receive Taft fellowship awards (Center, Faculty Release, and Summer Research). The Taft Faculty Chair is eligible for all other appropriate Taft faculty award programs. The Chair is eligible for fellowship programs immediately following the conclusion of service, and may apply in their final year of service, as such an award would not overlap with any term of service.
Responsibilities of the Chair
- Solicit recommendations from Taft department faculty for individuals to be appointed to the board; in consultation with the A&S dean recommend board members for appointment by the university president.
- Assign board members to chair all standing and ad hoc committees. Create ad hoc, steering and advisory committees as needed. In consultation with committee chairs, appoint all committee members from the board and Taft faculty departments. Serve ex-officio on all committees and actively chair specified committees.
- Schedule, convene and preside at all board meetings. Prepare and circulate in advance to board members a meeting agenda and written committee or other recommendations for board action.
- Appoint a parliamentarian, secretary, financial coordinator or other officers as needed.
- Appoint, evaluate, and supervise Taft Research Center staff.
- After consultation with committee chairs and/or the planning committee, prepare an annual budget for board review and approval.
- Serve as liaison to the Taft trustees, meeting at least once per year to review board budget requests.
- Approve operating expenditures from the budget fund designated for the chair and grant discretionary awards of up to $1,000 from any unspent administrative funds.
- Prepare an annual report to the trustees, president, A&S dean, and Taft department faculty identifying in attachments recipients of Taft funds selected by different board committees.
- Promote and publicize the Taft Research Center in the university to the general public and throughout the national and international academic world. Heighten the visibility of the Taft Research Center for strengthening the Taft disciplines at UC.
- Coordinate all Taft events, including lectures, seminars, Center Fellows sessions and other programming opportunities.
- Oversee Taft Research Center publicity, including annual publications and website development and maintenance.
- Coordinate planning and conduct of the Taft Research Center Annual Symposium.
Membership
- The board will have one member from each Taft member unit, recommended by the Taft director to staggered four-year terms, typically with at least four new appointees to begin in the fall semester.
- Following completion of a four-year term, board members may not be reappointed for at least one full year.
- When board members are on leave for more than one semester of their term, the chair will recommend an alternate who may serve in their absence. If an alternate serves for a full academic year, the period will not count as part of the regular member's four-year term. The chair may remove from the board any member absent without good reason from three consecutive meetings and/or more than half of the meetings in one academic year. In the event a new member is needed to fill out the unexpired term of any individual leaving the board with more than a year left to serve, the chair will recommend to the president a new board member for a four-year term.
- No more than two department heads should serve on the board at any one time; department heads and university administrators should only chair grant review committees in exceptional cases.
- The president, the dean of the College of Arts and Sciences, the vice president for research, the dean of the Graduate School, and the provost will serve as ex-officio members of the board. They will serve in an advisory role, with no voting privileges.
- The Taft Faculty Executive Board will meet at least five times per year. Additional meetings may be called by the Faculty chair or a majority of the board.