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Part A - Meetings
The Chancellor or the Chancellor's designee shall preside at Senate meetings.
Regular meetings of the Senate shall be held at least six times during the academic year. Dates and times of such meetings for the next year shall be proposed by the Senate Executive Committee and approved by the Senate at the last regular meeting of the academic year.
An agenda for each regular Senate meeting, extensive enough to be descriptive of the subject matter of each item included, shall be prepared by the Senate Executive Committee and sent to all senators at least five days prior to that meeting. The Clerk of the Senate will release the agenda to the appropriate news media on the same day it is distributed to the Senate. Items of business submitted to the Senate Executive Committee by any senator or Senate committee shall be placed on the agenda, provided that such items are submitted in writing prior to preparation and distribution of the agenda. Matters not included in the agenda may not be presented to the Senate without concurrence of at least two-thirds of the members present and voting.
The minutes of Senate meetings shall be recorded by the Senate Clerk and, as approved or amended by the Senate, shall be the official and permanent record of Senate action and debate. Copies of the minutes shall be distributed to all members of the Senate within a reasonable time after each Senate meeting.
One organizational meeting shall be held after the general election of senators and before the last day of classes. All newly elected faculty and student senators, those faculty senators whose terms extend through the next year, and ex officio senators shall be eligible to participate.
Prior to this organizational meeting, nominations shall be made for the Chair and Vice-Chair of the Senate Executive Committee and for members of the Committee on Committees.
The nomination and election of the Committee on Committees shall be as stated in Part D 6 (c) of these Bylaws.
Nominations for Executive Committee officers shall be made by the incumbent Committee on Committees. Nominations may also be made by others and must be accompanied by consent to serve from the person nominated. Nominations must be received in the Senate Office prior to the date set by the Senate Executive Committee. The nominations will clearly distinguish between Chair and Vice-Chair. The nominator shall provide a brief biographical sketch of each nominee.
The final elections shall be by ballot. The ballots shall be marked clearly to distinguish between the election for Chair and the election for Vice-Chair of Senate Executive Committee. Each voter may cast one vote for each position. The biographical sketches shall be included with the ballot.
The nominee receiving the highest number of votes for each position shall be declared elected.
As soon as the names of the nominees for a new Senate are known, the incumbent Committee on Committees will commence its work of nominating, as needed for the coming year, chairs and members of the other standing and ad hoc committees of the Senate and the Senate representatives to various other bodies. The Committee's nominations shall be reported at the organizational meeting of the new Senate. After nominations from the floor, the Senate shall hold the elections. At the election meeting, the Senate shall elect three faculty members of the Senate Executive Committee from among the faculty members who chair the standing and ad hoc committees of the Senate. The student members of the Senate shall elect the student members of the Senate Executive Committee before the organizational meeting.
Certification of election results will be completed by the Senate Clerk entering those results in the minutes of the meeting.
The organizational meeting shall be supervised by the Senate Executive Committee, and the Chancellor or the Chancellor's designee shall preside.
The Senate shall call an annual meeting of the faculty of the campus to hear reports from and to question the Senate Executive Committee and the administration.
The Senate Executive Committee shall be empowered to call special meetings of the Senate. At least five days prior to the proposed special meeting, notice of the date, time, place, and purpose of such a meeting shall be sent to all senators.
If an emergency exists on the campus requiring the convening of the Senate within a period of time less than the five days necessary for the notice provided above, the Chancellor or the Chair of the Senate Executive Committee may declare that such an emergency exists and convene the Senate as soon as may be practicable. The convening officer shall employ all practical means to notify all senators of the date, time, place, and purpose of such emergency meeting.
Meetings of the Senate shall ordinarily be open to the public. Accredited representatives of the news media may observe Senate meetings, and facilities shall be provided for the public at large to listen to and, if physically feasible, to observe Senate proceedings.
The Senate reserves the right to close its sessions in those cases in which public disclosure would substantially and adversely affect the matters being considered.
This policy that Senate meetings are open to the public, and any implementing procedures, shall apply to the Senate when meeting as a body, and also to Senate committees and other constituent bodies.
An administrative officer not a member of the Senate, expecting Senate debate on a matter of direct concern in the officer's official capacity, may request of the Senate the privilege of the floor at the time of that debate.
A student who is an officer of a registered student organization and who is not a member of the Senate, expecting Senate debate on a matter of direct concern in the officer's official capacity, may request of the Senate the privilege of the floor at the time of that debate.
Attendance is expected of all Senators at all regularly scheduled Senate meetings, and of all committee members at regularly scheduled meetings of the Senate's committees.
A Senator who is required to miss a regularly scheduled Senate meeting should notify the Senate Clerk prior to the meeting. A committee member who is required to miss a regularly scheduled meeting of a Senate committee should notify the committee chair prior to the meeting.
If a Senator misses two consecutive regularly scheduled Senate meetings during an academic year and has failed to notify the Senate Clerk prior to such absences as described in subsection (b), the Clerk shall notify the Senator in writing that because of irregular attendance, the Senator is presumed to have resigned from the Senate, effective as of the date of the letter.
If a student is removed from the senate of the Illinois student government, the senate of the Illinois student government will notify the Clerk of the UIUC Senate. The Clerk shall notify the Senator in writing that, because of action of the senate of the Illinois student government, the Senator is presumed to have resigned from the UIUC Senate, effective as of the date of the letter.
Upon receipt of a letter described in subsection (c) or (d), the Senator may, within fourteen calendar days after the date of the letter, notify the Senate Clerk in writing of his or her desire to continue serving as a Senator. Upon receipt of such a letter, the Clerk shall reinstate the Senator. If the Senator fails to respond to a letter described in subsection (c) or (d) within fourteen calendar days after the date of the letter, the resignation becomes final.
No Senator may be reinstated more than once in any one Senate term under the procedures outlined in subsections (c), (d), and (e) above.
If a Senator's resignation becomes final under subsection (e) or (f), the Senate Clerk shall notify the Senator's unit of that fact so that a replacement can be selected to serve the remainder of the resigned Senator's term.
If a committee member misses two consecutive regularly scheduled meetings of a committee of the Senate and has failed to notify the committee chair prior to such absences as described in subsection (b), the committee chair may notify the Senate Clerk of that fact. The Senate Clerk shall then notify the committee member in writing that because of irregular attendance, the committee member is presumed to have resigned from that committee, effective as of the date of the letter. Upon receipt of this letter, a committee member may be reinstated using the same procedures and subject to the same limitations described in subsections (e) and (f) above. If a committee member's resignation becomes final under these procedures, the Senate Clerk shall notify the chair of the Committee on Committees so that a replacement can be selected to serve the remainder of the resigned committee member's term.
At the end of each semester, the Senate Clerk shall cause the attendance records for that semester of all Senators at regularly scheduled Senate meetings to be published in any medium or publication chosen by the Senate Clerk.