Uncontested: Apathy race between Faculty Senate and ASUA elections too close to call

Sitting on these bleachers are the members of the UA faculty who followed through on their promise to push for new faculty leadership.

By Shain Bergan

Hmmm, this election apathy seems familiar.

After a painstaking process, the official final nominations for the 2010 University of Arizona Faculty Senate elections are finally officially in, and the verdict is, well, less than inspiring:

Of the 15 colleges represented by the UA Faculty Senate, only one of them (The College of Fine Arts) has a contested election. One of them (Eller College of Management) has exactly zero nominees. And for the 29 seats that are up for grabs, there are a total of…29 candidates.

Not only are the executive positions without contestation, the faculty will have the EXACT SAME LEADERSHIP at the top. Your executive faculty leadership nominees:

-Chair of the Faculty: Wanda Howell, incumbent

-Vice Chair of the Faculty: Robert Mitchell, incumbent

-Secretary of the Faculty: J.C. Mutchler, incumbent

What’s the definition of doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results? Apparently the faculty can really talk the talk, but they can’t walk the walk.

Here’s the breakdown of the colleges and their nominees for the upcoming election, for which the voting deadline is Mar. 4. An asterisk denotes a candidate who will clinch a Faculty Senate seat as long as they can gather one, count ’em, one vote. A contested election is marked in red text:

College of Architecture and Landscape Architecture (1 seat)

*JOHNSON, LAURI M

College of Agriculture and Life Sciences:

*CUELLO, JOEL L

*DAHLGRAN, ROGER A

*GUERTIN, PHILIP

MISSING ONE

College of Fine Arts:

MCKEAN, BARBARA

LABATE, JOSEPH

College of Humanities:

*ULREICH, JOHN C

*ZWIRLING, LYNDA

College of Medicine:

*ANTIN, PARKER

*FREGOSI, RALPH

*ST. JOHN, PAUL A

College of Science

*DAVIS, OWEN K

*JULL, ANTHONY (TIM)

*TABOR, MICHAEL

MISSING ONE^^^

College of Education:

*SMITH, S MAE

Eller College of Management:

NO PETITIONS FILED

College of Engineering:

*OGDEN, KIM

MISSING ONE

College of Law:

*SILVERMAN, ANDY

College of Public Health:

*RENGER, RALPH

Non-College:

*BREWER, MICHAEL

*ÖZKAN, BETÜL

College of Nursing:

*DAVIS, AMY H TSANG

College of Optical Sciences:

*PAU, STANLEY

College of Pharmacy:

*NOLAN JR., PAUL E.

College of Social and Behavioral Sciences:

*WILLERTON, J P (PAT)

*ZEDENO, MARIA N

MISSING ONE

• Breaking down the only race in the Faculty Senate elections – In the only contested race in the 2010 Faculty Senate elections, Joseph Labate is looking to unseat incumbent Barbara McKean. Although both find themselves in the College of Fine Arts, their paths likely do not cross often, what with Labate the Chair of Photography at the School of Arts and McKean the director of graduate studies at the School of Theatre Arts. And seeing as their resumes are pretty scarce of defining moments and McKean is noticeably quiet at Faculty Senate meetings, I’m left to make predictions based off of appearance…

Hmm, they each look hip, Labate with his hat and beard, and McKean with her short rebel haircut and “Bobbi” nickname—should be a photo finish between the two of them.

• Second round of elections likely after all – With the Faculty Senate elections short at least five candidates, faculty leadership has decided to hold a second round of elections, specifically to fill these absent seats, following the end of the first round of elections Mar. 4.

It breaks down like this:

Colleges short of representatives:

-College of Agriculture (1)

-College of Engineering (1)

-College of Social and Behavioral Sciences (1)

-College of Science (1)

-Eller College of Management (1)

Unbiased reporting aside, this is a pretty pathetic showing from a faculty core who exclaimed from the mountaintops that they were fed up with administrative and faculty leaders. There’s an old saying that if you don’t like your boss, you can either change your job or change your boss. Apparently the faculty has chosen to do neither of these things.

Allowing the Faculty Senate incumbents to get elected uncontested—UA faculty, is this your way of saving the university, of standing up for a change?

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