Faculty Governance

Overview

CAS Governance Document Preamble

The College of Arts and Sciences (CAS) at the University of South Florida (USF) is a community of scholars dedicated to the idea that educated people are the basis of a just and free society.

CAS is the USF unit organized to provide general education, to offer curricula of study and research, and to grant degrees in the liberal arts and sciences. CAS is central to the academic mission of USF. The advancement and dissemination of knowledge in the humanities, social sciences, natural and mathematical sciences and related interdisciplinary fields by CAS constitute the intellectual foundation of the entire University. As such, research and teaching in CAS are the basis of all of the applied and professional schools at USF. CAS is a diverse College that supports strong disciplinary and interdisciplinary research and teaching. As part of the overall goal of a strong liberal arts education within a unified College, CAS will endeavor to maintain cohesion while supporting collaboration across departmental boundaries.

CAS faculty is dedicated to preserving standards of excellence and to enhancing quality in all graduate and undergraduate programs of study and research. CAS faculty recognizes that the College's mission and goals can be achieved only through an acknowledgment of the principles of shared governance. The fundamental premise of this document is that a relationship based on mutual respect, transparency, and clarity of roles exists among CAS faculty, staff and students, and in particular between those faculty named as College administrators and faculty whose activities are focused primarily on teaching and research. The governance process should be efficient and aim to include broad faculty participation.