Mission Statement and Charter for the Financial Affairs Committee

Mission

The committee is to provide input for use in developing the annual internal operating budget of The Citadel. In this capacity, the committee may wish to review revenue forecasts, student fee data, Citadel Development Foundation grants, actual prior-year expense reports, Appropriations Act data, and other applicable financial reports available to the staff. Committee recommendations should not be limited to academic areas, and should consider the college's strategic planning objectives as well as program information such as new academic programs approved for implementation or decisions related to reduction or scope or elimination of specific programs.

The committee will also consider financial matters related to facilities planning and capital projects for The Citadel campus. In this capacity, the committee will coordinate its actions with other committees and/or staff elements assigned responsibilities in this area.

Charter

I. Membership

A. Representation

The Committee on Committees selects six tenured or tenure-track faculty members (with no more than two members from the same department) to serve on the committee. Academic faculty membership is restricted to tenured or tenure-track faculty members who have been employed at The Citadel for at least one full academic year at the time they begin committee service. In addition to the academic faculty members, the committee shall include one administrative liaison without voting privileges appointed by the Vice president for Finance and Business Affairs.

B. Tenure

Academic faculty members serve three year rotating terms, staggered so that at all times two-thirds of the committee have a collective memory of past decisions. All other members of the committee serve one-year terms. An academic faculty member may request a second consecutive term; no faculty member may serve on the committee for more than six years consecutively. If a faculty member cannot complete a term, the Committee on Committees will select another member to fill the un-expired term. Time spent filling the term of another faculty member will not count toward the "six-year rule" outlined above.

II. Structure

A. Chair

The committee shall have a chair selected by committee vote at an organizational meeting held before September 30 of each year. The term of the chair lasts until the next election. A member may not serve as committee chair for more than three years consecutively. The chair is responsible for scheduling and presiding over committee meetings, representing the committee before outside bodies, and producing an annual report of committee activities.

B. Subcommittees

The committee may form subcommittees to perform specific tasks.

C. Meeting

The committee must meet at least twice during the academic year [once in the Fall and once in the Spring]. The chair must hold a meeting if requested in writing by at least one-third of the voting members. A quorum consists of fifty-percent of the voting membership.

III. Activities

III.1 General Activities of Standing Committees

A. Information

The Financial Affairs Committee gathers, analyzes, and disseminates information relevant to finances at The Citadel. It is authorized to gather information by means of:

1. direct request to a college administrative department or activity; an academic department; another standing committee; or any group or association of Citadel faculty, staff or students
2. the development and use of questionnaires and surveys
3. the use of previously published information.

The committee analyzes information through statistical summaries, compilation of written material, or other established methods. The analysis may provide the college with information pertinent to a particular issue, or it may substantiate a recommendation for administrative action.

The committee disseminates information by means of:

1. a response (report) to a department or committee based upon a request for information
2. reports generated from within the committee
3. periodic status reports to the college as specified in its charter

B. Annual report

The Financial Affairs Committee will prepare an annual report summarizing its activities over the previous academic year. The report must include all decisions of the committee, excluding confidential matters. Copies of this report will be made accessible to all Citadel faculty, staff and students.

C. Other reports

The Financial Affairs Committee will report to the Faculty Council on the financial state of the college by the first week in February.

The committee is responsible for the timely dissemination of all reports to the Citadel community. Committee reports shall be made available as directed by the Faculty Council. Reports may contain recommendations or proposals. For the purposes of gathering information (see above), all reports are to be considered published information.

D. Tasks

The work of the Financial Affairs Committee consists of a series of tasks -- units of work involving the gathering, analysis, and dissemination of information. The committee assumes tasks through one of the following means:

1. Completion of tasks as articulated in the "Specific Activities" section of this charter.
2. Completion of a report which includes information requested by an administrative department or activity, an academic department, another committee, the Faculty Council, or the Academic Board. Requests of individual faculty members must be made through the Faculty Council. Students or other individuals may not assign a task to the Financial Affairs Committee except through one of the above-mentioned bodies.
3. Tasks can be generated from within the committee. Any committee member may request that the committee study a topic or issue within its sphere of interest. The committee may also develop its own long-range projects or studies as part of its ongoing mission.

III.2 Specific Activities of the Financial Affairs Committee

1. At the beginning of each academic year the Vice president for Finance and Business Affairs shall brief the committee on the status of funding from the State of South Carolina as well as advise the committee on the operating budget for the current fiscal year as approved by The Citadel Board of Visitors at its regularly scheduled annual meeting the previous June.
2. The committee will identify specific areas of interest to be addressed during the year and task committee members or the administrative liaison to develop appropriate presentations or provide resource materials for consideration by the committee.
3. The committee will review the most current strategic planning document for approved goals/objectives which should be considered in the allocation of available resources of the college.
4. The committee will prepare appropriate recommendations for consideration by the Faculty Council and the Administration early in the spring of each year so that the recommendations can be included in both the budget preparation and the student fee determination cycles for the upcoming budget year.
5. The committee may invite other members of the faculty and staff to attend committee meetings and/or present reports to the committee on specific subjects when appropriate.

IV. Autonomy

To ensure the efficiency and quality of committee work, the committee is granted a degree of autonomy over its own operations. Upon receiving a request from another college body, the committee will vote to accept or reject the request. A request for information can be rejected for the following reasons:

1. The request is unclear; the committee chair will ask the requesting body to clarify any ambiguities and resubmit the request.
2. The committee's workload is currently too great to perform the task in the requested time frame; the chair will return the request and suggest a date for re-submittal.
3. The task falls outside the scope or sphere of interest of the committee; the chair will ask the requesting body to either submit the request to another committee or (if the task falls within the scope of more than one committee) divide the task between the committees.
4. The committee does not have the resources or the authority to complete the task; the chair will explain which parts of the task cannot be completed, and the requesting body may resubmit a modified request.

V. Amending the Charter

The Financial Affairs Committee may modify its charter in consultation with the Committee on Committees. proposals for changes in the committee charter come to the Committee on Committees, which negotiates the changes with the standing committee and with any affected administrative departments. Consensus requests are forwarded to the Faculty Council for approval. In case of a lack of consensus, competing proposals may be sent to the Faculty Council for consideration.

Revised May 2008