By Kate Augusto and Matt Collette

In its first meeting since the rare executive session two weeks ago, the Faculty Senate passed a resolution yesterday aimed at resolving concerns about faculty participation in major university decisions and an opportunity at shaping the agenda.

Since 2002, the Faculty Senate has passed revisions to the Faculty Handbook, though many remain unresolved. In response to those issues, as well as a general feeling among faculty members that they were being excluded from major decisions, the Senate passed a resolution defining the faculty’s views.

“In the spirit of shared governance outlined in the current Handbook,” reads the resolution. “We respectfully request that the President and Provost work with the Faculty Senate to ensure meaningful input and participation and transparency in the Northeastern University decision-making process to improve the functioning of the university.”

The resolution calls for the administration to review the unsigned resolutions from previous years by the end of the academic year, either approving them or citing specific issues.

Carol Glod, chair of the Faculty Senate Agenda Committee, stressed the need for the Senate to pass the resolution in order for the university to be able to continue to function. Glod said that if issues of administrative transparency were not solved, “we might as well just go home, and the last one out can turn out the lights.”

Much of the Faculty Senate expressed the sentiment that the shared governance of the university was in a state of limbo, largely because President Joseph Aoun seemed to operate his administration behind closed doors, shunning collaboration and consultation with the faculty.

In the Senate’s Sept. 16 meeting, the first of the academic year, the faculty went into a closed-door administrative session to discuss methods to redress grievances with President Aoun’s relationship with the faculty. A major concern, stressed Glod, was that tenure-track professors were feeling as though they were being overlooked by the administration.

After the Faculty Senate’s first meeting of the year, where many of the faculty’s grievances surfaced, Glod met with President Aoun to discuss ways to develop a strong relationship between the administration and the Faculty Senate.

“In all honesty, last year the Senate Agenda Committee met with [Aoun] once and we worked very, very closely with the provost,” Glod said. “We need joint meetings between the President and the Senate Agenda Committee, joint meetings between the Dean’s Council and the Senate Agenda Committee, more transparency, more openness about decisions before they get made.”

Glod said Aoun was conciliatory toward the senate, apologizing for the strained relationship he had established with the faculty. He agreed to consider having the chair of the Faculty Senate sit on his leadership team, she said.

“He said ‘I’m sorry,’ very directly,” Glod said. “He spoke to me and to the Senate Agenda Committee, and that means a lot. And that should mean a lot to the faculty, and to the university.

Glod called Aoun’s gestures “good next steps.”

On Sunday, Aoun announced the appointment of Mary Loeffelholz to serve as his liaison to the university faculty. Loeffelholz, who has served in the Faculty Senate and is the former chair of the English department, will report directly to Aoun. According to Glod, Aoun had not discussed the creation of the position with the Senate prior to the closed executive session.

“My job will be, [