Approval of Previous Minutes —

Meeting minutes from June 28, 2023. Motion to approve by Josh Arpin. Seconded by Sam Brody. Motion passed unanimously.

Student Senate Report

1. Student Senate orientation is tomorrow night. It is for new senators elected in the spring and for freshman interested in getting involved. Orientation isn’t mandatory.
2. Committee work starts next week, so there may be activity coming up soon.
3. We have a lot of interest from this group of freshmen, so the Student Senate may be re-evaluating the size of its body, etc.

Staff Senate Report

1. The Docking survey final forum is September 21, 2-3 p.m. in Watson 3 West Reading Room. More details will be coming.
2. Staff Senate will be working on recommendations that came out of the survey response report.
3. Staff Senate will be tabling at the Staff Leadership Summit on September 14th.

Faculty Senate Report

No report currently.

University Senate Report

1. We should try to get presidents’ reports submitted prior to the full senate meeting with enough time for review, ideally by the Monday the week before the meeting. This would allow for time to get items on the agenda.
2. Grievance procedures within University Governance
   1. We don’t have any process or procedures for dealing with behavioral issues in Governance.
   2. Kristin, Suzanne, and Caty spoke with a representative of the Policy Office to discuss our options. Our first step will be to create a Code of Conduct to serve as a baseline and common understanding of what behavior is acceptable and expected.
   3. Victor: Does the university already have something that we could use for this, e.g., a code of conduct, a grievance procedure?
      1. Kristin: We’re hoping to have something specific to this context and that covers the responsibilities and expectations for senators specifically. Most university grievance procedures are very punitive, and we are hoping for something that touches more on the interpersonal dynamics.
   4. Kristin: Does Student Senate have something like this?
      1. DaNae: It doesn’t, though that is a goal of DaNae and Turner this year.
   5. Sam: This seems to be part of a larger issue of needing an orientation resource for new senators.
      1. Kristin: Caty has been working on an orientation that at least covers University Senate. Caty will add the rest of SenEx to the Canvas to review.

New Business —

1. Technical Updates to University Senate Code
   1. Article 1 Section 2 (University Senate Officers)
      1. Motion to approve by Trina Collins. Seconded by Kevin Barnes. Motion passed unanimously.
   2. Article 1 Section 4 (Student Members on University Senate)
      1. Need to wait on this change to ensure that the CODE aligns with the Student Senate Constitution, which still requires a few membership updates to reflect the University Senate reorganization from Spring 2023.
   3. Article 2 Section 1 (Faculty Senate Membership)
      1. Motion to approve by Trina Collins. Seconded by Sam Brody. Motion passed unanimously.
   4. Article 6 Section 2 (SenEx Officers)
      1. Motion to approve by Brian Moss. Seconded by Trina Collins. Motion passed unanimously.
   5. There are additional technical edits throughout (misspellings, grammar, etc.) that are still pending, which do not make any changes to content.

Move to closed session to discuss the University Senate Vice President role. Motion by Josh Arpin. Seconded by Trina Collins.

Move to end closed session. Motion by Josh Arpin. Seconded by Trina Collins.

2. We will likely be getting questions and comments regarding the Excused Absences policy, specifically from instructors of larger courses.
   1. We will send out the Best Practices and Guidelines again that were published in Spring 2023.
   2. AP&P is charged this year with finding resources to assist instructors in managing large numbers of excused absences.