Office of Faculty Governance seeks candidates for new position
Community invited to attend memorial service for Galinsky
Decorations & Distinctions
Lincoln Financial Group offers free retirement help

Office of Faculty Governance seeks candidates
for new position

Director of research, communications and programs needed

The Office of Faculty Governance is looking for help, and its leaders say they want to begin — and end — their search close to home.

Joseph Ferrell, secretary of the faculty, said the office has grown more complex and multi-dimensional over the past decade, mirroring in a sense the growth of the University.

In response to these changes and the challenges they pose, Ferrell, along with Faculty Chair Judith Wegner, are seeking to create a new position of director of research, communications and programs.

Ferrell and Wegner said they wanted to make the availability of the position as widely known on campus as possible. One reason is the talent pool to be found here, they said. The other reason is the working knowledge of the campus that only people already here would already have acquired.

“So much about how the University operates is not written down and it not apparent from an organizational chart,” Ferrell said. “People can learn how to operate within this very complex organization, but it takes a while and we want somebody who can hop on it.”

Wegner said the creation of the position reflects an effort to add real strength to the office that is being called upon to do an increasing variety of difficult tasks.

“The need for someone who can really supplement the elected leadership has become clearer has time goes on,” Wegner said.

Ferrell said few people on campus realize how elaborate the University’s faculty governance system is.

Within the University, there are 3,905 members of the general faculty, with 3,030 of them voting members. Excluded from voting are fixed-term faculty members who are only here for one or two years.

The Faculty Council is an elected body with 77 members and it is much larger than the faculty senates at many of the University’s peer institutions that typically have no more than 25 members, Ferrell said.

In addition, the office has 11 elected committees with a total of 107 members, along with nine appointed committees who total 80 members.

Ferrell said the office is now in the midst of election season and is seeking roughly 70 candidates to fill 35 committee seats, plus candidates to fill about 25 or so open seats on the Faculty Council.

In addition, the office handles all of the research and paperwork related to bestowing honorary degrees and distinguished alumnus awards. It also prepares the citations.

Under Wegner’s leadership, the Faculty Council has initiated a host of studies that has called upon the expertise of the Office of Institutional Research.

“Judith is working right now on a study of graduate education that is nearing completion,” Ferrell said. “We were heavily involved in the salary equity study that was done a couple of years ago, even though the Office of Institutional Research did the real heavy lifting statistically.”

Wegner also spearheaded an extensive faculty survey exploring the range of factors both quantifiable and intangible that affect faculty retention.

She said the research the director does will not take the place of the excellent work that is done by the Office of Institutional Research, but will provide a preliminary workup on issues under study.

The director would also serve to improve communications, in part by posting more information more quickly on the Faculty Governance web site.

The director of research, communications, and programs will report to the secretary of the faculty and will work closely with the chair of the faculty.

A full job description is posted at www.unc.edu/faculty/faccoun/Director.htm.

Screening will begin immediately and will continue until an appointment is made.

According to the posting for the position on the Human Resources web site, the salary range for the position is from $50,000 to $70,000.

Ferrell said he hopes to have the position filled by May 1.

For more information
Interested candidates should submit an application letter, a curriculum vitae and the names and contact information of three professional references to:

Joseph S. Ferrell,
Secretary of the Faculty

UNC-Chapel Hill

203 Carr Building CB# 9170

Chapel Hill, N.C. 27599-91970

Community invited to attend memorial service
for Galinksy

Galinsky

The psychology department and Galinsky family invite all community members to a memorial service celebrating the life of David Galinsky, professor emeritus, who died Jan. 25.

The service will be held at 2 p.m. on Feb. 26 at the Tate-Turner-Kuralt Building, which houses the School of Social Work, at 301 Pittsboro St. 

Nearby parking is available at the Nash Parking Lot on Pittsboro Street (previously called the Water Tower Parking Lot) and the Bell Tower Parking Lot on South Road.

Leigh Hall
Assistant professor of literacy studies, Hall has won the Outstanding Dissertation Award from the International Reading Association (IRA) for her dissertation titled “Anything But Lazy: New Understandings About Struggling Readers, Teaching and Text,” completed at Michigan State University in 2005.

The award will be presented at the IRA annual convention in Chicago in May 2006.

Lincoln Financial Group offers free retirement help

Lincoln Financial Group, one of the University’s optional retirement program providers and a provider for the 403b supplemental retirement program, is offering individual counseling sessions to UNC employees to discuss their retirement investments.

Appointments are available on the following days:

McGavran-Greenberg Hall
    Conference Room 2101G:

March 16, 9 a.m. – 2 p.m.

Carroll Hall, Room 318:

March 20, 9 a.m. – 3 p.m.

March 29, 9 a.m. – 3 p.m.

May 10, 9 a.m. – 3 p.m.

To sign up for an individual appointment with the Lincoln Financial Group retirement consultant, call 596-1475, or e-mail kwilson3@lnc.com.