History of the Academic Senate

History of the Academic Senate in California

In 1963, an Assembly Concurrent Resolution asked the State Board of Education to establish academic senates “…for the purposes of representing [faculty] in the formation of policy on academic and professional matters …”.

While there were at the time local academic senates, this resolution gave senates legal recognition and a specific jurisdiction—academic and professional matters. In 1967, legislation was enacted to create the Board of Governors and the Chancellor’s Office for the California Community Colleges.

In 1968 Norbert Bischof called the first statewide meet­ing of local academic senate presidents to explore ways to create a state senate to represent local senates at the Chancellor’s Office and before the Board of Governors. A constitution was drafted in May 1968, ratified statewide, and approved by the Board of Governors in October 1969; the Academic Senate incorporated as a nonprofit organization in November 1970.

 

What is AB 1725, and why is it important?

In 1986, the Commission for the Review of the Master Plan for Higher Education issued a report focusing exclusively on the community col­leges. This document, The Challenge of Change: A Reassessment of the California Community College, led the way for the great reform legislation, AB 1725.  Passed by the legislature in 1988, AB 1725 gave many new responsibilities to both local senates and the Academic Senate for California Community Colleges, that included:

  • Shifting the power of governance from the legislature to local boards
  • Involving faculty directly in matters of hiring and participatory governance, and creating areas of responsibilities known as the 10+1
  • Instilling the 75:25 ratio of full-time to part-time instructors, creating a calculation known as the Faculty Obligation Number, or FON
  • Creation of funding models 

In 1989, the document California’s Faces, California’s Fu­ture supported this community college reform and contextualized the Master Plan within California’s shifting demography. The legislation resulted in the July 1990 adoption of Title 5 Regulations, “Strengthening Local Senates.”  In 1992, the Academic Senate and the trustee’s organization the Community College League of California (CCLC), issued a Memorandum of Understanding that offers a joint interpretation of the Title 5 regulations.