U. Senate explores adding part-time graduate student representation

After several part-time graduate students expressed interest in running for University Senate positions last year, a committee will investigate whether these students should be allowed to hold positions in the school’s most powerful legislative body.

Part-time graduate students cannot run for positions in the Senate, which directly advises university President Dan Mote on policy issues. Even if the Elections, Representation and Governance Committee decides they should have seats, its options for providing them are limited by the Senate’s constitution. One likely remedy would give the university’s nearly 3,600 part-time graduate students a single seat in the Senate.

“I think they have different concerns than a lot of full-time graduates, and that should be reflected in the makeup of the Senate,” said Aaron Tobiason, a graduate student member of the Senate Executive Committee.

Senate Parliamentarian Marvin Breslow said part-time graduate students are excluded because the constitution “just wasn’t set up” to include them.

“I strongly support having a part-time graduate student representative to the University Senate,” Senate Chair Elise Miller-Hooks wrote in an e-mail. “These students are an important part of our community.”

But how to give them a seat is a stickier issue. Allowing them to run for some of the 10 graduate seats in the Senate would require revising the constitution, a costly and time-consuming process that includes a university-wide referendum.

“It’s not written in stone, but it’s also not meant to be done too easily,” Breslow said.

Without changing the constitution — known as the Plan of Organization — the Senate’s options are limited. The plan allows the Senate to create up to 10 seats for representatives of constituencies not otherwise covered by the document.

One such seat is held by Sean Sullivan, who represents part-time undergraduates at the university. Sullivan said representing the viewpoints of all 1,925 part-time undergraduate students is difficult, a challenge that would be magnified for a part-time graduate student senator, who would have to speak for the 3,591part-time graduate students on the campus.

The issue arose last year when several part-time graduate students expressed interest in running before being told they were ineligible, Senate Director Reka Montfort said.

“A lot of the policies and procedures in place impact part-time students just as much as full-time students,” said Kurt Banas, a part-time student in the MBA program who was interested in running last year. “I don’t see why there should be a real distinction between the two in the bylaws.”

Senate members noted the graduate spots on the Senate are designed to represent all graduate students — not just full-time students. And the University Senate’s organization is not built on strict proportionality. Despite students outnumbering faculty at the university, there are about three times as many faculty as students in the the Senate. Breslow said different constituencies have different stakes in the university that should be taken into account when determining  representation.

More seats for part-time graduate students could be added when the plan is next reviewed.

The plan, which was last updated in 2006, must be reviewed at least every 10 years by a special committee. In the meantime, Banas said, giving part-time graduate students one seat would be a good start.

“At least for the time being, I think one seat would be sufficient,” Banas said, noting that part-time graduate students tend to be less engaged in campus life.

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