Overall Rating Gold
Overall Score 73.84
Liaison Andrew Horning
Submission Date Dec. 19, 2022

STARS v2.2

University of Michigan
PA-3: Inclusive and Participatory Governance

Status Score Responsible Party
Complete 1.88 / 3.00 Andrew Horning
Managing Director
Graham Sustainability Institute
"---" indicates that no data was submitted for this field

Part 1. Shared governance bodies

Does the institution have formal participatory or shared governance bodies through which the following stakeholders can regularly participate in the governance of the institution?:
Yes or No
Students Yes
Academic staff Yes
Non-academic staff Yes

A brief description of the institution’s formal participatory or shared governance bodies:
The Central Student Government (CSG) of the University of Michigan - Central Student Government strives to provide valuable services, programs, and events to students at the University of Michigan. Each unit of CSG is tasked with specific purposes.
The Legislative Branch, made up of the Student Assembly as well as the University Council, serves to collectively represent the student voice at the university and to make decisions for the organization in a deliberative manner. The Executive Branch serves to execute campaigns and services to make student life better in various ways. Campaigns are often facilitated through commissions. The Judicial Branch, made up of the Central Student Judiciary, is designed to serve as a body to adjudicate any disputes that may arise between CSG, students, student organizations, or a combination thereof.
Central Faculty Governance provides the structure for shared governance at the University of Michigan. Through its three bodies, faculty are represented and contribute to a collective voice concerning institutional policies and other matters of University-wide concern. Senate Advisory Committee on University Affairs (SACUA) is the executive arm of the Central Faculty Governance system and coordinates and implements the actions of the University Senate and the Senate Assembly. Senate Assembly consists of 74 elected faculty members from the Ann Arbor, Dearborn and Flint campuses, each serving a three-year term to represent the interests and concerns of faculty throughout the University of Michigan system. Membership of the Faculty Senate consists of all members of the professorial staff, research faculty, members of the library staff, the executive officers of the university, the dean of each school or college, and others designated by the Board of Regents from time to time.
Voice of the Staff is U-M’s employee engagement program. It is a volunteer-based program that was launched in February 2005 to give staff at all University campuses and the Health System a forum for sharing ideas and defining the campus community issues that matter most to them. About 120 staff members from all areas of the University community serve as volunteers on NetworkTeams focused on six key topics. A subset of that group, the VOICES Core Team, has a direct dialog with the University’s Executive Officers and shares ideas regularly with the University’s President and Associate Vice President for Human Resources.

Part 2. Campus stakeholder representation in governance

Total number of individuals on the institution’s highest governing body:
8

Number of students representing their peers as official members of the institution’s highest governing body:
0

Number of academic staff representing their peers as official members of the institution’s highest governing body:
0

Number of non-academic staff representing their peers as official members of the institution’s highest governing body:
0

Part 3. Gender equity in governance

Number of women serving as official members of the institution’s highest governing body:
3

Percentage of official members of the highest governing body that are women:
37.50

Website URL where information about the institution’s highest governing body may be found:

Part 4. Community engagement bodies

Does the institution host or support one or more formal bodies through which external stakeholders have a regular voice in institutional decisions that affect them?:
Yes

A brief description of the campus-community council or equivalent body that gives external stakeholders a regular voice in institutional decisions that affect them:
The University is governed by the Board of Regents, which consists of eight members elected at large in biennial state-wide elections. The Regents have general supervision of the institution and the control and direction of all expenditures from the institution’s funds. Meetings of the Board of Regents are scheduled throughout the year according to the schedule posted on the website, and all formal sessions of the board are open to the public. As a part of their regular monthly meeting agenda, the Regents set aside time for individuals to present comments to the board.

The University of Michigan Community Relations Office coordinates partnerships with the University, local government, and greater Ann Arbor community organizations. The office is a primary point of contact with the City of Ann Arbor on areas of mutual concern like parking, transportation, off campus neighborhoods, facility construction, economic development, tourism, public service, and safety.

Community engagement is also sought in a wide variety of specific issues/decisions impacting the community. A specific example is the President’s Commission on Carbon Neutrality community portal - a public comment form on its website where community members were welcomed to share their ideas, suggestions and concerns with the Commission. The Commission also hosted several engagement activities designed to educate the community on the PCCN’s activities and to gather input and ideas from a wide range of university stakeholders. This included public community forums on the Ann Arbor campus as well as visits to the UM-Dearborn and UM-Flint campuses where they shared the commission’s work with faculty, staff and students at each campus, and provided opportunities for the Dearborn and Flint communities to get involved.

Optional Fields 

Number of people from underrepresented groups serving as official members of the institution’s highest governing body.:
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Website URL where information about the institution’s governance structure is available:
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Additional documentation to support the submission:
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Data source(s) and notes about the submission:
http://regents.umich.edu/

The information presented here is self-reported. While AASHE staff review portions of all STARS reports and institutions are welcome to seek additional forms of review, the data in STARS reports are not verified by AASHE. If you believe any of this information is erroneous or inconsistent with credit criteria, please review the process for inquiring about the information reported by an institution or simply email your inquiry to stars@aashe.org.