Faculty and administration disagree on proposed advisor agreement

By Sam Fran Scavuzzo and Andrew Lewis
Collegian Editor/ Collegian Staff
December 5, 2007

A deadline for a proposed advisors agreement was recently waived amid concern expressed by La Salle faculty members regarding legal liability.

The agreement, as proposed by the Division of Student Affairs, affected advisors for all student organizations and required them to sign a document each academic year.

Because of the complaints raised by the Faculty Senate, Dean of Students Dr. Joseph Cicala removed the deadline for advisors to submit signed agreements in an e-mail to faculty Nov. 15.

“A revised plan to accomplish the necessary goal of clarifying the roles and responsibilities of advisors to registered student organizations is in development and will be announced soon,” Cicala said in the e-mail.

“We hope that all those who have perspectives and recommendations to share will accept the invitations to do so that will be extended, and that we will be able to bring this project to a satisfactory conclusion within a reasonable timeframe.”

President of the Faculty Senate Dr. Elizabeth Paulin, after discussions with university officials, said:

“From my perspective, requiring organizations’ moderators to sign agreements is off the table.”

Specific requirements enumerated in the “Student Organization Advisor Agreement” include having advisors regularly meet with organization officers, participate in event planning, attend continuing education opportunities to enhance advising skills and annually attend a training session on Clery Act compliance, among others.

Furthermore, the document states, “As employees of La Salle University, advisors are required to report all policy violations, crimes (actual and alleged) and unsafe activities to Security and Safety” and other university administrators.

Discontent originated from several complaints Paulin received from faculty members serving as advisors.

“As a result of those complaints, I looked carefully at the new advisor contract and compared it to the guidelines set forth in the University Handbook. While the University Handbook does not preclude such a contract, neither does it require faculty to sign such a contract in order to serve as advisors,” Paulin, an economics professor, said.

Official complaints from faculty “focused on the content of the contract, liability issues and the process by which the contract was imposed upon the faculty,” Paulin said.

In an e-mail to Dean of Students Dr. Joseph Cicala, Associate Dean of Students Allen Wendell, Provost Dr. Richard Nigro and advisors, Paulin offered her suggestion that advisors avoid signing the agreement before a meeting was held with university administrators.

Responding to Paulin, Nigro suggested a meeting between Cicala, Wendell and her.

Cicala then issued his e-mail, lifting the requirement to sign the agreement.

Paulin described the meeting itself as “collegial.” There she discussed grievances of the faculty, as Nigro and Wendell laid out the idea of the agreement.

The concept for an agreement has evolved over the past year. Since a 1999 incident at Texas A&M where a student died because of a student organization’s bonfire, universities have constructed agreements for advisors, Wendell told Collegian.

Texas A&M, Arizona State and Villanova, among other schools, served as models for La Salle in approaching advisors agreements.

Angie Hill Price, speaker of the Faculty Senate at Texas A&M, said that at her school it was just another paper an advisor has to sign.

“When you accepted the responsibility of being the moderator of a student organization, this is just something you have to accept. I have never heard of anyone refusing to sign the agreement,” Price said.

Serving also as advisor for the American Welding Society Student Chapter in addition to teaching engineering technology at Texas A&M, Price was not in her position when the agreement was reached.

Outside of the origins of the idea, though, Wendell and Paulin both agree change would not be a bad thing.

“We want organizations that are well-supported by strong advisors. All advisors should have confidence in themselves,” he said.

“There needs to be something.”

“We do have all the same goals,” Paulin said. “Everyone agrees that all advisors need to be up to speed on the university’s policies.”

Despite the common ground, Paulin feels that the university handled the situation poorly.

“The intent was good. The process that followed was not,” she said.

Although she doesn’t doubt the administration extended offers to discuss the agreement, she feels many advisors were not as well informed as they could have been.

“I feel the faculty will be more inclined to listen now, given what has happened,” she said.

Wendell emphasized that open discussions on this issue occurred since the inception of the idea. All advisors were invited to Student Leadership Day where a discussion on this issue took place.

Throughout campus, there was mixed reaction in response to the university’s initial proposal of advisor contracts.

Following the initial request to sign agreements, the advisor for The National Communication Honors Society Lambda Pi Eta, Dr. Richard Goedkoop, resigned his position.

“The contract itself has a number of requirements, several of which have legal liabilities,” Goedkoop, a communication professor, said.

“To be honest, many people just don’t do well in regards to mandates.”

The faculty advisors do not receive significant pay for their efforts despite spending a substantial amount of time and effort working with their organizations.

“I believe that [my opinion] is the opinion of a lot of faculty members,” Goedkoop said.

However, upon learning about the Faculty Senate’s negotiations over the new contract, Goedkoop decided to withdraw his resignation.

Many members of La Salle’s sorority and fraternity organizations expressed concern over the newly announced contract.

Lauren Kane, a senior finance and marketing major and president of Alpha Sigma Tau, found the news to be nothing out of the ordinary.

“I think that if you don’t have a good relationship with your advisor and keep them informed, the contract will be very unfair to the chapter advisors,” senior finance and marketing major Kane said.

“The position of chapter advisor is an important one. Our advisor is present at all of our meetings and is actively involved in all major decisions made throughout the semester, and therefore AST is not affected by the [proposed] advisor contract.”

However, Kane feels the true success of the contract for all organizations simply depends on the members of each organization.

“Advisors can advise their Greek letter organization to do the right thing, but in the end it is the members who are going to make the right/wrong decisions.”

Secondary education/history major John Castaldo of Sigma Phi Epsilon does not believe the contract is the way to solve the issue.

“There’s no way advisors should be held down by a contract…they shouldn’t be responsible—the students should,” Castaldo said.

The Student Affairs’ Committee will be taking up this issue in the future, according to Paulin.

At the recent Faculty Senate meeting this week, new ideas were discussed. One involved different organizations having different requirements for advisors.

“For example, I am the advisor for the Economics Honors Society. I should have different requirements than a fraternity’s advisor,” said Paulin.

Both Paulin and Wendell remain hopeful no matter what else.

“We’ll see where it goes. I’m sure we’ll be able to work something out,” Paulin said.

scavuzzos1@lasalle.edu