Faculty Athletics Committee to hold forums

Before you tell your neighbors to clean up their backyard, yours better be clean, too.

That’s how Joy Renner, chairwoman of the Faculty Athletics Committee, describes the work her committee does on athletics reform at UNC. A lot of the time, the committee hears concerns about changes that can only be done at the national level — but they’re still important, she says.

The committee, which includes Chancellor Carol Folt and Athletic Director Bubba Cunningham, will hold its first-ever open forum today and Thursday to answer questions about UNC and broader issues.

“The point of it is to provide an opportunity for faculty and staff members who have concerns or questions they want to ask to come express their concerns,” said Lissa Broome, a member of the committee. “The committee will listen to folks, improve communications and let people feel like there is a way to help the committee to focus its agenda for next year.”

When a group of 32 retired faculty members issued a letter earlier this month criticizing a lack of faculty involvement in the athletic scandal, it became apparent to Renner that the committee was not adequately communicating its work — though the forum was in the works before that.

The committee stopped giving extended presentations at Faculty Council meetings this academic year because a faculty survey revealed many professors were tired of talking about athletics, Renner said.

“This year we didn’t have to do so much reporting. We moved into monitoring mode,” she said.

Renner said the committee is now working on its communications strategy, such as through the Office of Faculty Governance’s website and recently launched Carolina Commitment website.

Two statements from the committee were issued last week, one which emphasized the committee’s commitment to helping make UNC a leader in transparency.

The other statement regards a tweet sent by former athletic learning specialist Mary Willingham about the 2005 men’s basketball team, which claimed that all five of the team’s starters and one other player took more than 69 “paper classes,” or classes that were fraudulent and did not meet.

Renner said she anticipates questions from faculty that are all across the board.

“Questions related to the APRs, GSRs, some of it is simple things like that,” she said.

“Some of it is them asking, ‘Is it true that 80 percent of athletes are in communication studies?’ which is not true. ‘What are your plans? What does UNC think abut the role of athletics?’”

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