The Faculty Senate will discuss a proposal from its Executive Committee that would reduce the number of positions on the senate at its meeting Tuesday.

According to the proposal, the committee proposes reducing the positions from 15 to 12 over the next three election cycles.

“All Senate voices are valuable,” the proposal states. “However, the reason for this proposed change is that the reduction in faculty members across campus has increased demands on remaining faculty to fill positions on elected and appointed university committees.”

In 2006, Eastern had 618 full time faculty members. In the proposal, it said as of 2016 that number fell to 419 members.

The plan stated in the proposal is to elect four at-large senators each year going forward.

This would have the effect of drawing down the membership from 15 in 2016-17, to 14 in 2017-18, then 13 in 2018-19 and ultimately to 12 in 2019 and beyond.

“We view this gradual reduction in membership as preferable to only filling two seats in the current election cycle,” the proposal said.

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