History of Shared Governance at FDU

Shared Governance at FDU

Shared governance has been a part of FDU since its founding in 1942. Prior to the restructuring of shared governance approved by the FDU Board of Trustees in March 2024, the last review of FDU’s shared governance occurred in 1999, prior to the founding of FDU’s Vancouver Campus.  

2023-2024 Shared Governance Charter Initiative

As the work of the Steering Committee of FDU’s Middle States Self-Study Report Project unfolded in the Spring 2023 semester, Benjamin Rifkin, then Dean of Becton College of Arts and Sciences (later named Interim Provost and Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs), observed that the University had not done a substantial review of its shared governance system in over 20 years. Dr. Rifkin discussed the matter with Dr. Michael Avaltroni, who at that time held the position of Interim President and Provost and Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs, and Dr. Avaltroni agreed that it would be in the University’s best interests to set up a process to review its shared governance structure and, if deemed appropriate, to propose changes to that structure.  

The Shared Governance Task Force, convened for this project, consisted of three faculty (one from Florham, Metro, and Vancouver: Patricia Melloy, President of the Faculty Senate, from Florham/Becton, Alex Casti, Faculty Senator, Metro/Gildart-Haase, Connie Bygrave, Faculty Senator, Vancouver/SPGA), three professional administrators (Anita Rivers, President of the PAS, Metro; Karen Stecher, Speaker of the PAS Florham Campus; Arlette Hernandez, Director of Enrollment Services, Vancouver Campus), and three students (Suleima Mestanza, President of the Metro SGA, Natalie Van, Florham; Parsa Mokari, Vancouver), most of whom were appointed by their respective governance bodies (the Faculty Senate, for all three campuses, the Professional Administrative Senate and the Student Government Association for the two New Jersey campuses). The Shared Governance Task Force (SGTF) created questions that constituted part of a survey administered to the entire FDU community. The responses to these questions demonstrated that the vast majority of community members, regardless of their role in the University, felt that they had little voice in shared governance and would like to be more engaged.  

Dr. Benjamin Rifkin, then Interim Provost (and subsequently Provost), and the Director of Academic Affairs, Vanessa Perez, facilitated the meetings of the SGTF. The goal of the task force was to review the existing structure of shared governance at FDU and, if the task force deemed it appropriate, to develop a proposal for a new shared governance structure for Fairleigh Dickinson University that would reflect our University’s core values, best practices in shared governance, and the needs of our University as it has evolved since the last major revision in 1999. 

The Shared Governance Task Force received a charge from President Avaltroni and worked in accordance with that charge over the course of the Fall 2023 semester and into the Spring 2024 semester.

In mid-December 2023, the Shared Governance Task Force distributed to all members of the FDU community a proposed charter of Shared Governance. This document was the basis of feedback sessions held in person on the Florham, Metro, and Vancouver campuses, and on zoom for the Wroxton campus, as well as on Zoom for faculty, professional staff, union representatives, and students. In addition to those synchronous feedback sessions, over 130 individuals responded to a survey about the proposed charter. The Shared Governance Task Force met in late February 2023 to review all the feedback received, make changes to the proposed charter as the Task Force deemed appropriate, and submitted the proposed charter to President Avaltroni for his and the Board’s consideration.

In its March 2024 meeting, FDU’s Board of Trustees approved the proposal for a new charter of shared governance to go into effect as of the Fall 2024 semester.

The various stakeholder bodies (Faculty Senate, Professional Administrative Senate, Union, Student Government, and Alumni Advisory Councils in NJ and Vancouver) appointed or elected representatives to the various committees and councils described in our new charter of shared governance during the spring of 2024 so that the committees and councils were ready to begin their work in the Fall 2024 semester without delay. In addition, the University has established a website for shared governance to operationalize our community’s aspiration for greater transparency in shared governance.