CWU Names Associate Vice President For Faculty Affairs

June 6, 2005

Contact: Dr. David L. Soltz (509-963-1401/fax 509-963-2025/e-mail: soltzd@cwu.edu)

ELLENSBURG, Wash. - Dr. Michael Jennings has been appointed associate vice president for faculty affairs at Central Washington University. He will assume his new post beginning Aug. 1.

Jennings was selected from a pool of three finalists for the position, according to Dr. David Soltz, CWU provost and senior vice president for academic affairs.

"Dr. Jennings has significant knowledge on a broad range issues," Soltz says, "ranging from salary compression, academic freedom and labor law to academic culture, the intellectual environment and the challenges associated with research and professional growth in a time of tight public funding."

Jennings currently is as a professor of philosophy in the University of Alaska-Fairbanks (UAF) philosophy and humanities department. His stated special interests include social theory and justice studies, and Alaska Native studies.

For the last six years, he has served as the elected president of the Alaska statewide faculty union United Academics, which represents about 900 members on three campuses and at 14 extended sites around the state. During his tenure, Jennings was given credit for helping forge a system of shared governance that includes the union, faculty senate and university administration.

"Shared governance at CWU is entering a new era," Jennings says, "and it's critical that new administrative and faculty institutions start out on solid ground with as much mutual respect and understanding as possible."

Jennings earned his Ph.D. in social and educational policy studies from the University of British Columbia, and his Master of Education in cross-cultural educational policy and Bachelor of Arts in Native studies and political science from UAF.

After growing up in Wyoming and Idaho, Jennings moved to Alaska 30 years ago to work in Alaska Native social services.