UBC faculty to vote on non-confidence in board

Members of the University of British Columbia Faculty Association are taking a formal vote of non-confidence in the school’s board of governors.
The faculty members met Tuesday and the electronic vote began on Wednesday. The vote will close on Tuesday at noon, said president Mark MacLean.
Last month, the faculty association held a survey, completed by 885 faculty members, that found that the majority had lost confidence in the presidential search committee. The faculty association has also called for an external review of the board’s operations, charging that the board has lost credibility by conducting business in secret, with poor record keeping.
The same survey found that 71.4 per cent of respondents thought both Greg Peet and chancellor Lindsay Gordon should resign from the search committee. Both were named in documents as being part of a meeting that resulted in the abrupt resignation of former UBC president Arvind Gupta last summer.
The university is searching for a new president and Gordon announced recently that the search committee has reviewed a longlist of potential candidates. Gordon’s announcement said there “is significant interest in the position from a large group of highly qualified individuals.”
After its review of the list, the committee has created a final list of 16 names, Gordon said. A shortlist will be finalized in April, with interviews to be held in April and May. Gordon said the search committee is on track to announce the new president by June 30.
The search committee is still short one faculty member, after Jennifer Berdahl, the professor at the centre of an academic freedom breech that occurred after Gupta’s departure, quit the committee last week, saying she has lost confidence in the willingness of the committee to hear the concerns of the faculty and to learn from the mistakes of the recent past to improve the future of UBC.

tsherlock@vancouversun.com