Committee

Committee (23)

Many institutions have Distance Education Committees specified in their negotiated agreements. This term type generally explained the duties, powers or composition of Distance Education Committees. This term was included in 23 contracts. Committee activity is a permissive term for bargaining.

Examples

Observations. Shared governance, including committee participation, has always been an essential part of the faculty role in higher education. Indeed, this “management” like role of faculty has made private university faculty ineligible to form a union under the case of NLRB v. Yeshiva University , 444 U.S. 672 (1980). The Court in Yeshiva found that the full time faculty members at Yeshiva University were managers and thus were excluded from the rights to unionize provided by the National Labor Relations Act (29 U.S.C. §152(3)). The NLRA and most state bargaining statutes prohibit supervisory personnel from collective bargaining. However, professionals are specifically included under the NLRA and faculty are included as professionals (Kaplan & Lee, 1995) Fortunately, the Yeshiva case applied only to specific situations where faculty exercised extensive management responsibilities and thus it has not been applied to state institutions (Kaplan & Lee, 1995). Thus, the ability to bargain for distance education and other committees continues to be a permissible activity under all state statutes covered in this study.

While the AAUP does not speak specifically to distance education committees, it’s distance education documents regularly recommend that faculty take the lead in nearly all policies related to distance education (e.g., AAUP, undated a). A distance education committee is one place for that to happen. Many terms specify the makeup of the committee, insuring that all key parties are at the table. Having a standing distance education committee also gives an institution the ability to keep abreast of the regularly