What’s next after UNC board proposed School of Civic Life? Here’s what we know.

A new School of Civic Life and Leadership could be established at UNC-Chapel Hill after the university’s Board of Trustees approved a resolution proposing and supporting such a move at the board’s January meeting.

Since the board passed the resolution, questions have swirled about whether the proposal follows proper governance structures at the university, what steps will be taken to establish the school, how long the process will take and more.

We’ve compiled answers to some common questions about the resolution and the new school.

Here’s what we know.

When did the Board of Trustees approve the resolution?

The board unanimously approved the resolution at its meeting on Jan. 26.

The item was not on the meeting agenda, but board chair David Boliek introduced the resolution toward the end of the meeting, saying he had “walked on” the resolution.

The board’s bylaws say any member can present an item to the board during any meeting, and the board can take action on those items, even if the item is not on the agenda.

The board passed the resolution unanimously at that meeting.

What does the resolution say?

The resolution outlines the board’s reasoning for wanting to create the School of Civic Life and Leadership — including that “skills in public discourse” are “necessary” to the university’s strategic plan objectives of “promoting democracy and serving to benefit society.”

▪ The resolution also says the board “has identified the need for degree-oriented programs in the area of Civic Life and Leadership.”

▪ The resolution concludes with an action item: The board “requests” that university administration “accelerate its development of a School of Civic Life and Leadership.”

▪ The resolution says the school could be “nested within an existing college or school” at the university, and should have “a goal of a minimum of 20 dedicated faculty members and degree opportunities for undergraduate students.”

In a campus message on Jan. 27, the day after the board’s vote to pass the resolution, UNC chancellor Kevin Guskiewicz wrote that the board’s vote was “to support the exploration and development” of the school.

The full text of the resolution is available online and below:

What’s the purpose of the school?

As described in the resolution, the school would essentially be a way to create “degree opportunities” in civic life, leadership and public discourse, for which the board “has identified a need.”

The resolution also says “skills in public discourse” are “necessary” to fulfill objectives of the university’s strategic plan, including promoting democracy. That plan objective, among other action items, says the university should “conceptualize and develop” the university’s Program for Public Discourse, with a stated goal of “emphasizing respectful dialogue in classes and public events.”

The Program for Public Discourse, which officially launched in 2019, was met in its planning stages with controversy over alleged conservative leanings, influences and funding sources.

During discussion of the resolution at the board’s January meeting, members said that while the Program for Public Discourse was originally intended to be “robust,” it has, in practice, operated more as a campus speaker series. Last fall, the program hosted a fireside chat between former political opponents U.S. Sen. Thom Tillis and Cal Cunningham.

Establishing the School of Civic Life and Leadership, Boliek said during that discussion, would allow for in-classroom instruction to teach the ideals and skills behind the program, and eventually offer “degree-oriented programs” in those areas.

“I am grateful to the Carolina faculty, students, and alumni who have contributed to the success of this unique program, as it has served as an important foundation for what may be possible,” Guskiewicz said of the program in his campus message.

Is establishing the school a political move?

Below the resolution’s surface and text, however, a more politically motivated purpose for the school emerges.

In a Jan. 28 interview with Fox and Friends, Boliek said the proposal for the school is “all about balance.”

“At the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, we clearly have a world class faculty that exists and teaches students and creates leaders of the future. We, however, have no shortage of left-of-center, progressive views on our campus, like many campuses across the nation,” Boliek said on the morning show.

“But the same really can’t be said about right-of center views. So this is an effort to try to remedy that with the School of Civic Life and Leadership, which will provide equal opportunity for both views to be taught at the university.”

Of the 13 members on the UNC Board of Trustees, eight are appointed by the increasingly conservative-leaning UNC System Board of Governors and four are appointed by the Republican-majority North Carolina General Assembly. The remaining member, the student body president, serves on the board as an ex-officio member after being elected by students.

The board in July heard from UNC faculty researchers who were working on a report about free expression at UNC system campuses and how comfortable students feel sharing their views on political issues, The News & Observer reported.

Among other findings, the researchers found that “students across the political spectrum want more opportunities to engage with those who think differently.”

Is the new school part of UNC’s curriculum?

Some discussion of the resolution and school has involved UNC’s IDEAs in Action curriculum, which launched for first-year students last fall.

The curriculum includes instruction in the area of oral communication.

“There is a call for oral speech and communication, debate, deliberation as a capacity” for all students in the curriculum, UNC provost Chris Clemens told the board during discussion of the resolution.

There is discussion within the university’s College of Arts and Sciences about hiring faculty to the Program for Public Discourse to teach those skills, Clemens told the board, which would give the program a “superstructure.”

In an email to faculty sent last week, faculty chair Mimi Chapman also addressed the curriculum, saying there is a need for “capacity-building” in the College to teach the communications skills outlined.

“The College has been seeking to solve this problem by asking for a particular sum to hire additional faculty to be ready in a year and a half when juniors and seniors will need to enroll in these classes,” Chapman wrote.

But Chapman also identified other solutions to the problem, such as existing faculty proposing classes to teach as part of the curriculum or “developing out or expanding existing programs.”

“One that has been talked about a lot is the Program for Public Discourse,” Chapman wrote. “In my mind, that is a conversation for another day: a day when the Trustees have recognized and acknowledged the faculty’s role in creating curricula and degree granting programs and administrators have been transparent about what led us to this point even if that includes acknowledging their own culpability.”

Were faculty consulted by the board?

The Board of Trustees’ actions and resolution for the school have come under fire by faculty at the university for skirting shared governance structures.

Faculty had no involvement in the development of the resolution, according to Chapman, the Daily Tar Heel reported. Clemens, the university’s chief academic officer, also did not know the board was going to consider the resolution at its January meeting, the DTH reported.

The UNC Policy Manual, which UNC System schools follow, says “faculty expertise is essential for sound academic decision making at the campus and system levels” when making decisions about academic program needs at universities.

The UNC Faculty Code of University Governance outlines the UNC Faculty Council as a legislative body of the faculty, with the authority to “prescribe the requirements for admissions, programs of study, and the award of academic degrees.”

What’s the next step to create the school?

It is unclear what steps will be taken next to develop the school, or how long it will take to fully develop the academic unit.

In his Jan. 27 message to campus, Guskiewicz wrote that “any proposed degree program or school will be developed and led by our faculty, deans, and provost.”

“Our faculty are the marketplace of ideas and they will build the curriculum and determine who will teach it, just as they determined the capacities laid out in our new Ideas in Action Curriculum. I will be working with our faculty to study the feasibility of such a school and the ways we can most effectively accomplish our goal of promoting democracy in our world today,” Guskiewicz wrote.

The UNC Policy Manual includes flowcharts that outline months-long proposal and approval processes to create new degree programs at universities.

UNC’s newest school, the School of Data Science and Society, launched last fall, more than two years after the Board of Trustees endorsed a formal feasibility plan to establish it. The proposal for that school was developed over roughly a year, from May 2019 to February 2020, with input from more than 100 faculty, staff and students, and stemmed from previous data science initiatives at the university dating back to 2012.

The School of Data Science and Society does not yet offer undergraduate degree programs.

“I have found in my experience that things at the university level often run very slow,” Boliek told The News & Observer by phone last week.