Senate Advisory Committee on University Affairs elects Kentaro Toyama chair

This story originally appeared in the University Record. Read it here. 

The Senate Advisory Committee on University Affairs has elected Kentaro Toyama of the School of Information as chair and Kirsten Herold of the School of Public Health as vice chair for the next school year.

SACUA members elected Toyama, the W K Kellogg Professor of Community Information and a professor of information, and Herold, a lecturer IV in the dean’s office, on April 6.

Their terms leading the nine-member executive arm of U-M’s central faculty governance system begin May 1 and extend through April 30, 2027.

Toyama, who ran unopposed, will succeed Derek Peterson, Ali Mazrui Collegiate Professor of History and African Studies, and professor of history and professor of Afroamerican and African studies in LSA.

Herold, who also ran unopposed, will succeed Soumya Rangarajan, clinical assistant professor of internal medicine in the Medical School.

Toyama called faculty the “soul of any great university” and acknowledged the honor of being elected to serve as chair of the University of Michigan Faculty Senate.

“In this role, I commit to working closely with SACUA, the Senate Assembly, and its committees to represent the whole of the faculty in our engagements with university leadership,” Toyama said. “As we navigate tumultuous times as individuals, as departments, and as a university, it is all the more critical that faculty voices be heard in university shared governance.”

Herold said she was proud to be the first lecturer elected to SACUA last year, but progress is still needed. 

“I believe that as faculty we should all be viewed as equally important, whether we are tenure-track professors, clinical or research faculty, lecturers or librarians, archivists and curators,” Herold said.
“All of us contribute to the mission of this great institution. At a time of unprecedented attacks on higher education, research, and healthcare, we in faculty governance need to come together to defend what makes Michigan special: our excellence in education, research, and healthcare — and athletics. And this excellence can only be achieved through respect, open dialogue and academic freedom.

“In my vice chair role, I also want to build on SACUA’s collaboration with the campus unions on both the academic and Michigan Medicine side. As faculty, we are also employees, and share our working conditions with employees across the institution. In those efforts, I will approach my work in the spirit of collaboration, dialogue, and honesty.”

Toyama and Herold will also serve as chair and vice chair, respectively, of the Senate Assembly and the full Faculty Senate.

The Senate Assembly consists of 77 elected faculty members from the Ann Arbor, Dearborn and Flint campuses, and the Faculty Senate consists of all tenure-track professorial faculty, research faculty, clinical professors, librarians, archivists, curators, lecturers I, II, III and IV who have at least a 50% appointment, executive officers and deans of each school or college.