The third faculty member elected this spring to the Senate Advisory Committee on University Affairs will be Heather O’Malley, assistant research scientist of pharmacology in the Medical School.
O’Malley won a two-candidate runoff with Shanna K. Kattari, associate professor of social work in the School of Social Work, and associate professor of women’s and gender studies in LSA.
The Senate Assembly, which consists of 74 elected faculty members from the Ann Arbor, Dearborn and Flint campuses, elected O’Malley via a virtual ballot, with results announced March 24.
The runoff election was required after O’Malley and Kattari tied for a third open SACUA position in an initial election conducted March 20 by the Senate Assembly, which consists of 74 elected faculty members from the Ann Arbor, Dearborn and Flint campuses.
That first vote saw the election of Vilma Mesa, professor of education in the School of Education and professor of mathematics in LSA, and Alex Yasha Yi, professor of electrical and computer engineering in the College of Engineering and Computer Science at UM-Dearborn.
All three will begin their terms May 1, succeeding Allen Liu, Kentaro Toyama and Sergio Villalobos-Ruminott, whose terms end April 30. SACUA members serve three-year terms, with a third of the seats up for election each year.
At the May 20 meeting, O’Malley delivered a candidate statement outlining her goals and university issues she hopes to tackle as a SACUA member.
“I think that shared governance provides us the means by which we can express our highest aspirations for this institution, resolve difficulties and come together as a body for the amplification of all faculty voices at all levels,” O’Malley said.
“As faculty, our vision for the future is essential to the direction of this university as we move into a future which is filled with not only opportunity, but also with challenges and uncertainty.”
SACUA is the nine-member executive arm of U-M’s central faculty governance system, which also includes the Senate Assembly and the full Faculty Senate. The Faculty Senate consists of all tenure track professorial faculty, research faculty, librarians, executive officers and deans of each school or college.
