From the Senate Chair: Welcome to 2022-23

September 21, 2022

Dear Senate Colleagues,

My name is Ahmet Palazoglu, and I write to you as your new Senate chair for 2022-24. I am joined this year by Vice Chair Kadee Russ and by our many committee chairs and members.

I want to thank outgoing Senate Chair Richard Tucker for his exemplary leadership during two challenging years. We were fortunate to have him and his consensus-building skills at the helm. Thank you, Richard!

As we kick off the new academic year, I have conversed with Senate committee chairs, administrative leaders, and many of you, and there is undoubtedly a common theme: a desire for the campus community to reconnect and reengage. Many of us have felt the challenge of returning to a past equilibrium, even after resuming in-person classes and activities.

In that spirit, I am dedicating Senate leadership’s time this year to reinvigorate our sense of community and collegiality. To start, I am hosting a department chair luncheon and visiting faculty executive committees to understand more deeply the local circumstances across campus. If you would like to invite me or other Senate leaders to attend meetings or functions at your school, college, or department, please contact me at aschair@ucdavis.edu.

The Davis Division will also work on familiar priorities: clarifying faculty personnel processes; implementing recommendations from the Special Committee on Evaluation of Teaching; and partnering with Provost Croughan on a broader faculty salary equity analysis. The Systemwide Senate continues to deliberate the future of online education and degrees at the University of California, which we too will consider locally. Additional Systemwide Senate priorities include access, growth, and inclusion at UC, and coordinating climate crisis efforts.

Even with the pandemic, our shared governance at UC Davis has remained strong and meaningful—among the best, I wager, in the UC system. I will work my hardest to keep this strength, improve where needed, and steward with care the work and goals of you, our faculty.

It is my honor and great pleasure to serve as your chair, and I look forward to our years ahead, sharing our passion for excellence.

Sincerely,
Ahmet

Ahmet Palazoglu
Chair, Davis Division of the Academic Senate
Distinguished Professor of Chemical Engineering
University of California, Davis