MUN faculty association pushing for board of regents reform, investigation into harrassment accusations
The MUN Act does not allow for faculty to sit on governing board
It is time for Memorial University's board of regents to open its eligibility to more people, says the president of the school's faculty association.
Bas Kavanagh wants to see the Memorial University Act amended to allow members of the faculty to sit on the board, which makes decisions on fiscal matters that Kavanagh notes often directly affect staff.
With the board of regents mired in controversy over bullying accusations by a former student rep, Kavanagh said it's indicative of a powerful group of people who reject challenges.
"They don't want to change," he told the St. John's Morning Show on Monday. "We have to bring some pressure to bear on them to get them to change."
Faculty should be elected to board
In their research, Kavanagh said the faculty association found 95 per cent of other universities in Canada allow staff to sit on governing boards.
His colleagues are perplexed as to why they can't be more involved, he says.
"The faculty association believes the university is making many decisions behind closed doors that impact the entire university community," Kavanagh said. "We are the higher education institution in the province, and they basically don't want our feedback on things that affect us."
The board consists of 17 appointed members, six members elected by alumni, four full-time students and the university chancellor, president and vice-president. The faculty is pushing for changes to the MUN Act to allow its members to be elected to the board.
Kavanagh also weighed in on the accusations of bullying from former board of regents student representative Brittany Lennox.
While on the St. John's Morning Show on Friday, board chairwoman Iris Petten waffled on questions about whether there had been bullying before eventually denying it. In an interview with the St. John's Telegram, she denied it again and also called Lennox's state of mind into question.
"That observation supports what Brittany has been saying the entire time," Kavanagh said. "It's being completely dismissive."
The faculty association is lobbying university president Gary Kachanoski for a respectful workplace investigation, a process common at many schools, Kavanagh said.
"There's no reason, if we really want to get to the bottom of this, why an investigation couldn't really occur."
With files from the St. John's Morning Show