Meadows Commission on Faculty Issues Grievance Policy

Grievances can be submitted to the commission by any member of the Meadows faculty or by the Office of the Dean of the Meadows School. Grievances must be forwarded in writing to a member of the commission or to the Office of the Associate Dean for Academic Affairs.

Grievances should be forwarded only after normal administrative procedures have been followed. If those procedures have not been followed, the grievance will be returned to the person who submitted it.

Grievances that are handled better by another committee or administrative entity of the University will be returned to the faculty member who submitted the grievance with a recommendation for a more appropriate venue.

Grievances will be accepted for review at the discretion of the commission.

When necessary to ensure confidentiality and avoid conflicts of interest, the chair of the commission may ask an individual member of the commission to recuse him/herself from a specific case . An individual member may also recuse him/herself. At their discretion, the other members of the commission may elect, for that single case only, a temporary commission member to represent the division of the recusant.

Each case that is accepted by the commission will be dealt with as expeditiously as possible. Under normal circumstances, grievances submitted to the commission before March 15 will be handled within the same academic year. When the load is extensive, the commission may elect to consider cases regardless of their date of submission. The order of priority, in such instances, will be determined by the commission chair in consultation with the other members of the commission. In cases of special urgency, the commission chair is empowered to convene extra sessions of the commission.

The commission will reach its decisions by majority vote. In cases where, in the opinion of the chair, there is a strong dissenting opinion, the chair may ask the dissenting members to express the reasons for their dissent in writing and will forward that dissenting opinion along with the majority opinion.

When a decision has been reached, the commission will forward its written recommendation and any associated material to the Associate Dean for Academic Affairs. For any dispute in which the Associate Dean is involved, the recommendation will be forwarded to the Dean.

When a grievance is accepted for consideration, the faculty member who submitted the grievance will be notified in writing. After the case has been considered, that faculty member will receive a written summary of the commission's decision.