Faculty Association and Faculty Senate, Faculty Meetings

In 1962, a faculty committee was formed to begin working on a Faculty Constitution, and the Faculty Association was formed in December 1968.  The Faculty Senate was created in 1979 and began to meet as representatives of the Faculty Association in fall 1979. 

Minutes of Faculty meetings were kept by the faculty secretary until the 1920s, when they began to originate in the office of the president, from Edna Dean Baker (1920-1949) to K. Richard Johnson (1949-1972) until December 1968, when the Faculty Association was formed. After December 1968, minutes of the Faculty Association meetings originated from the chair of the Faculty Association, and, after the creation of the Faculty Senate in 1979, they originated from the Chair of the Faculty Senate.

The number of regular, full-time faculty attending faculty meeting records were a half-dozen or so in the1910s, often presided over by Elizabeth Harrison (compared with 14 faculty members and seven “lecturers,” in addition to Elizabeth Harrison and Mrs. John N. Crouse, named in the1911-12 college catalog).  That number tripled to about 20 in 1920 and doubled again to about 40 in 1929, remained relatively constant through the early 1930s and declined by 1941. The number fluctuated thereafter, from about 60 faculty in 1950 to 50 in 1952, when a graduate program was introduced, to about 75 in 1962, and about 55 in 1969.  A tabulation in the 1970’s by science and mathematics professor Helen Challand produced the following figures for the relative growth of full- and part-time undergraduate teaching faculty, administrators and staff during the first three-quarters of the 20th century.  (The “Admin & Faculty” category refers to those, like Elizabeth Harrison, Mrs. Crouse, Edna Dean Baker and, later, department chairs, who held simultaneously administrative posts in the college and taught courses.) 

            Admin.          Admin.            UG              UG                & Staff & Faculty      Faculty      Students

1900   2                  2             18           - 1905   2               2             17           - 1910   2               2             12           - 1915   1               1             16       175 1920   2               5             15       183 1925   7               2             32       349 1930 16               8             36       497 1935   9               7             42       455 1940 18             10             47       679 1945 21               8             43       555 1950 18             10             41       778 1955 21             10             39       775 1960 33               6             42       735 1965 43               1             45       712 1970 55               2             50       717 1975 66               4             40       643

By 1970 the number of administrators and staff  exceeded that of the undergraduate faculty.  Enrollment figures for students were uncertain for the first few decades of the college’s history, but note the decline in student enrollments in the early 1930s (the Depression), early 1940s (World War II), and especially after 1950, when graduate programs were introduced.

Faculty meetings regularly were held monthly in the early years, then twice monthly 1916-22, then monthly again 1923-1929, then every other month until 1968, when the Faculty Association was formed, and then monthly thereafter.  When K. Richard Johnson became president in 1949, he began a tradition of two- to three-day workshops for faculty in September, and similar workshops (“retreats”) in December were begun in the mid-1960s.

Many faculty meetings dealt with recruitment, enrollment and retention of students; entrance exams; students’ poor performance; cheating on exams and otherwise, and an “honor” system for students; plagiarism; breaking of college rules; the relations between the regular and “special” (i.e., adjunct) faculty; grade inflation; smoking; cutting classes; student and faculty evaluations; the College’s finances; racial integration of regular full-time students (1930-31); dormitory life; the library; and curriculum.  Enrollment was frequently reported at the first faculty meeting in the fall of the year, as were the results of tests administered to incoming students, and updated mid-year. 

The curriculum was significantly revised in 1930, when a four-year program was introduced leading to the Bachelor of Education degree.  The curriculum leading to a Bachelor of Arts degree was later revised in the 1960s.

With the onset of the Great Depression, talk turned in 1932 to faculty contributing between 10 and 25 percent of their salaries to the college to ease the financial strain created by the significant borrowing that had been necessary to build the Evanston campus 10 years earlier.  Facing a deficit of nearly $100,000, the college filed for reorganization under the bankruptcy law in 1938.  A fundraising campaign to raise $500,000 was undertaken in 1940.

By 1939, specialized faculty committees had been formed to address specific college matters, and by 1958 there were nearly 50 of them, ranging from Absences, Alumni, Buildings and Grounds, Curriculum, Demonstration School, and Faculty Welfare, to Grading, Library, Measurement and Testing, Research, Residence Hall, and Retention, and many others.

The National College of Education was accredited by the American Association of Teacher Colleges in 1941.  Accreditation by the North Central Association had been under consideration since 1934 and the first North Central Association site visit was in 1935, but application to North Central Association for accreditation was not made in 1945.  Subsequently, the College (and later NLU) underwent regular, periodic accreditation studies by NCA and NCATE. After an NCATE visit in April 1963, the undergraduate program was reaccredited, but accreditation of the graduate program was deferred.  Both graduate and undergraduate programs were eventually accredited by the North Central Association in 1968.

A set of “Objectives for faculty and student growth” were developed in November 1941, followed by a “Proposed Re-Statement of the Purpose of National College of Education” in 1958, although optional student evaluations of faculty were being considered as early as 1953.  A Committee on Selective Admissions and Retention using College Board exams for admission, grades and dismissal was created in 1956.  Offering a Bachelor of Arts degree instead of the Bachelor of Education began to be discussed in 1958, and a revised undergraduate curriculum leading to the BA was introduced in 1965.

As accreditation grew in importance, NCE objectives for NCATE were developed in November 1962, followed by a “Philosophy, Objectives and Continuing Aims” of NCE in January 1970. 

A Faculty Handbook was created and distributed in September 1945, regularly updated in subsequent years, and a faculty salary scale and ranking scheme was developed in 1947.  A group Life Insurance Plan for faculty was introduced in 1957 and a TIAA retirement plan in 1960.

A Graduate Program was begun in the summer of 1952 with 50 students, through discussions of a graduate program dated back to 1947, and by summer 1955 there were 300 graduate students enrolled.  Men also were admitted in 1952, 3 graduates and 11 undergraduates. In 1956, the first man graduated from NCE with a Bachelor of Education degree.  Also in 1956, more than 200 students were recorded as enrolled in extension courses; by 1976, this number had grown to 9,000.

Credit by examination was introduced in 1966, and a new grading system based on competencies, not letter or number grades, was introduced fall 1969.  The Early Childhood Education program was begun in 1969, as were advanced certification programs in Special Education.

The American Association of University Women organized an NCE chapter in 1953.  The first open meeting of the American Association of University Professors was held at NCE in 1954.

In 1962, a committee was formed to begin working on a Faculty Constitution, and the Faculty Association was formed in December 1968. 

An ad hoc committee on tenure was formed in May 1973 to review the existing tenure policy, and the Board of Trustees adopted a “Policy Statement Concerning Tenure and Academic Freedom” in April 1977.  A university-wide academic ranking and tenure policy was approved by the faculty in 1978, and the Faculty Senate approved a Sabbatical Policy was approved in 1979.

Faculty records subsequent to 1985 have not been processed.

The Faculty Records include:

• Faculty Meeting Minutes (including Faculty Association and Faculty Senate); • Faculty Handbooks; • AAUP; • Individual Faculty members’ donations; • Accreditation Documents.