This is the report of an investigating committee concerning the dissolution of the faculty senate at Spartanburg Community College in South Carolina. In April 2023, the SCC administration unilaterally abolished the faculty senate, an action it admitted taking to prevent the senate from voting that day to oppose the administration's imposition of a…

This report is an investigation into the crisis in academic governance that has occurred in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. Many institutions faced dire challenges in the 2020-21 academic year; for some, the pandemic exacerbated long-festering conditions. It was found that, at other institutions, governing boards and administrations…

This report concerns the action taken on September 15, 2022, by the administration of Emporia State University to terminate the appointments of thirty tenured and tenure-track faculty members under a temporary "COVID-related workforce management policy" adopted by the Kansas Board of Regents (KBOR) in January 2021. The investigating…

This report concerns issues of academic governance stemming from the actions of the governing board of the Maricopa County Community College District to terminate the "meet-and-confer" provision of the residential faculty policies manual and to mandate the later repeal of the entire manual. For four decades, the faculty and…

This report concerns actions taken by Linfield University to terminate Dr. Daniel Pollack-Pelzner, a tenured professor of English with ten years of full-time service. The Linfield administration has fully acknowledged that it declined to afford Professor Pollack-Pelzner a dismissal procedure. It has also stated that it dismissed Professor…

St. Edward's University is a private, four-year institution affiliated with the Roman Catholic Church that traces its beginnings to 1877, when the Congregation of Holy Cross, an order of French missionaries, founded St. Edward's Academy on farmland south of Austin, Texas. St. Edward's received its charter as a college in 1885 and as a university…

In November 2022, Florida governor Ronald DeSantis, won reelection by a decisive margin and the Republican party gained supermajorities in both houses of the state legislature. During the governor's first term and after reelection, the Florida House and Senate passed legislation and the DeSantis administration took executive actions that further…

This report concerns actions taken by the administration of Collin College to terminate the services of Professors Lora Burnett, Suzanne Jones, and Michael Phillips. The investigating committee found that the administration's actions involved "egregious violations" of all three faculty members' academic freedom to speak as citizens and…

This report describes departures from shared governance standards in the hiring of new University of Iowa President J. Bruce Harreld, appointed by the Iowa Board of Regents in spite of overwhelming objections from faculty. The investigation found that in contrast to historical practice at the university, which had been to involve faculty fully in…

This article presents a statement prepared by a subcommittee of the American Association of University Professors (AAUP) regarding best practices for communication between college faculty and governing boards of colleges. Based on a consideration of relevant AAUP documents and in view of the current climate in higher education, this statement…

The report documents a major breakdown in governance at UVA, focusing on the role of the board of visitors and its rector, Helen Dragas, who initiated the effort to force the president's resignation. It finds that the events at the university resulted from "a failure by those charged with institutional oversight to understand the institution…