There are two possibilities.

Have Separate Committee

Create  a standing committee of the Senate called the “Committee on the Professional Status of the RTE Faculty.” It would consist of ten RTE members reasonably distributed across the colleges and across the three RTE faculties. Two of the seats would be reserved for RTE faculty who do not have voting rights. The Dean and Associate Dean of Faculty would be ex officio members.

This Committee would be charged to consider aspects of RTE titles that relate to free speech, hiring, promotion, professional development, and retention. It would continually monitor how the different colleges are using RTE faculty and how the University and RTE faculties interact. It would develop criteria procedures for awarding emeritus/a status for those who retire from certain RTE titles.

The idea would be to have an RTE version of the Academic Freedom and the Professional Status of the Faculty Committee. Here is some prose from that Senate Committee’s charge:

Examine and make recommendations concerning issues and considerations in the following areas:

Academic Freedom and Responsibility.

Freedom of Teaching and Learning, including but not limited to the special concerns of the faculty that teaching and learning at Cornell University be carried on freely and without disruption, interference, or intimidation.

The Professional Status of the Faculty, including but not limited to policies and procedures relating to faculty appointments, promotion, retirement, separation, tenure and other related matters.

Modify the AFPSF To Include RTE Oversight

This Committee would be charged to consider faculty issues that relate to free speech, hiring, promotion, professional development, retention, use of titles, retirement, reappointment, and tenure.

There are several advantages to having a single committee. It is consistent with the idea that the University and RTE faculties have interlocking futures and that major problems should be addressed jointly by both types of faculty. It also would make the University Faculty more aware of the concerns of the RTE faculty and vice versa. Two committees would create communication/liaison inefficiencies and promote thinking in isolation.

Regarding membership, here are the current rules for AFPSF committee:

Nine members of the faculty appointed with the concurrence of the Faculty Senate by the Nominations and Elections Committee for three‐year terms.

Two student members (of which at least one shall be an undergraduate) with voting privileges, selected annually by the Staffing Committee of the Student Assembly. Reselection of a student for a second year shall be permitted. Student members of the Committee shall not participate in the review process set forth in Subdivision B, C, D and E of the Committee’s Charge.

To ensure a proper mix of University and RTE faculty this could be modified to something like this:

Nine members of the University Faculty and up to six members of the voting RTE faculty with the concurrence of the Faculty Senate by the Nominations and Elections Committee for three‐year terms.

There are three forms of regular membership on the Graduate Faculty: general, division, and minor.

General Membership

General members typically are selected from the voting members of the University faculty—that is, primarily professors, associate professors, and assistant professors with the highest degree in their field and unmodified titles who are resident on the Ithaca, Cornell Tech, or Geneva campus. To be eligible for general membership on the graduate faculty, a University faculty member must be actively engaged in University research and teaching or outreach in an established field of graduate education. A Ph.D. is routinely required, though exceptions may be granted in some cases (See below).

A general member of the graduate faculty may serve as chair or minor subject member of any special committee in any subject which the faculty member represents.

Individuals holding the following titles are also eligible for general membership on the graduate faculty if their responsibilities qualify them:

• visiting professor, visiting associate professor, and visiting assistant professor
• research professor, research associate professor, and research assistant professor
• adjunct professor, adjunct associate professor, and adjunct assistant professor
• courtesy professor, courtesy associate professor, and courtesy assistant professor
• graduate faculty member of the Weill Cornell Graduate School of Medical Sciences
• instructor holding the degree of Ph.D. on the resident staff at Ithaca or at Cornell Tech
• senior scholar and senior scientist
• principal research scientist and research scientist
• senior research associate holding the degree of Ph.D.

Individuals holding the following titles are not normally general members of the graduate faculty:

• clinical professor
• professor of the practice
• senior lecturer
• senior extension associate
• visiting critic
• tenured or tenure-track professor without the highest degree in the field.

In exceptional circumstances general membership may be granted to individuals in these categories if the individual’s research is comparable at least to that of tenured Cornell associate professors who are general members of the graduate faculty in the same field, and if the individual’s supervision of graduate students is an explicit job responsibility, making membership on special committees appropriate. Senior research associates, senior lecturers, senior extension associates, visiting critics, and tenured or tenure-track professors without the highest degree in their field who were approved for general membership prior to the establishment of this policy retain their membership.

Division Membership

Tenured and tenure-track professors without a Ph.D., clinical professors, professors of the practice, senior lectures, senior extension associates, and visiting critics may be routinely nominated to division membership on the graduate faculty. As division members, they are limited to administering and advising in professional degree programs —in their area, or serving as a minor member for research degrees as below.

Minor Membership

Academic staff members not normally eligible for general membership—including division faculty, clinical professors, professors of the practice, senior lecturers, senior extension associates, and tenured or tenure-track professors without the highest degree for that field—may be nominated to minor membership if their qualifications justify the designation. Graduate faculty members of the Weill Cornell Graduate School of Medical Sciences and those faculty affiliated with the Tri-Institutional Research Program are eligible for minor membership on the graduate faculty, based on nomination to a field as below.

Minor members of the graduate faculty may serve as minor subject members on any special committee.