The Fallacy of "Shared Governance" at UVA : Part II

The University of Virginia has not historically operated by shared governance. Since its founding as stipulated in the University's Charter, decision-making authority has rested exclusively with the Board of Visitors, the legally designated body responsible for UVA’s governance. Despite this longstanding structural reality, recent statements from various University groups have implied that shared governance has been a fundamental aspect of UVA's organizational framework. This assertion, however, is not supported by historical precedent.

In July 2025, the Faculty Senate invoked the "foundational principles of shared governance" in their attempt to influence the composition of the presidential search committee. They accordingly advocated for committee membership consisting of at least 75% UVA employees, as outlined in their Resolution on the Obligations and Conduct of the University of Virginia Board of Visitors (July 11, 2025). A similar request was made by the UVA Student Council merely three days later through SR25-21, which declared “students’ right to be meaningfully involved in the presidential search process, including a request for a minimum of five student representatives on the search committee…. “ However, Student Council soon discovered that they actually possessed no formal right to be involved in this capacity when their resolution went unanswered by the BOV. Their frustration was subsequently voiced on August 8, 2025, with the passage of another resolution, which declared that "the Board of Visitors has thus far failed to honor or discuss these requests" and further asserted that "the absence of meaningful student representation and input undermines shared governance." Their statement, however, was particularly disconnected from UVA's historical practices, considering that the presidential search committee assembled in July 2025 actually boasts the highest level of student participation in any such committee in UVA's history. Both these episodes highlight a significant misunderstanding of how shared governance, or more pertinently the lack thereof, has played out as part of UVA’s historical governance framework.

Despite the Faculty Senate claim that shared governance is a foundational principle, such assertion can easily be refuted. It was not until May 21, 2013 that the BOV even considered a Resolution on Faculty Role in University Governance,  specifying “areas of responsibility and authority of faculty in academic and governance matters.” Even then, it did not include any concept of shared governance. Subsequently, it took another two years for the BOV to pass in 2015 “a resolution providing for the appointment of a non-voting advisory faculty representative to the Board.” This change was subsequently followed by a revision of the BOV manual in September 2017, noting, “the Board approved adding a section to the Manual on appointing a nonvoting faculty representative.” Thus, the inclusion of their non-voting, advisory seat to the BOV happened only in the last ten years. Diving even further into history, by examining the archived minutes of the BOV from its 1817 until 2025, the phrase “shared governance” appears exactly and only seven times over 208 years.

The phrase "shared governance" first appeared in reference to a 1969 Cavalier Daily article mentioning it as an experiment at Antioch College and Richmond College. It did not appear again in Board of Visitors (BOV) minutes for more than forty years until 2012, when Rector Helen Dragas noted the incoming Chancellor for UVA-Wise was a supporter of shared governance.

After a six-year gap, the term reappeared twice in 2018. That March, a document recommending qualifications for BOV members to include an understanding of a consultative model of shared governance. Then in December, during President Jim Ryan’s second BOV meeting, Rector Frank Conner explored an idea of shared governance grounded in trust, communication – and role respect.

The term vanished again until 2023, when the minutes noted the BOV’s endorsement of Virginia’s “Council of Presidents Statement on Free Speech.” This was not a UVA document and it described shared governance as a process for developing policies. In December 2024, Faculty Senate Chair James Lambert discussed “all working together in governance-- shared governance--the term they use in the Faculty Senate.” Then his March 2025 remarks, the seventh and last recorded use of the term in BOV minutes, related “strategic initiatives, constructive ambiguities, and shared governance” to a Hermann Hesse poem. No further mentions of "shared governance" appear whatsoever.

This review makes clear that there is no historical precedent for shared governance at the University of Virginia. The concept is absent from all formal governing documents and appears only marginally—and infrequently—in Board of Visitors minutes over the past two centuries. The Faculty Senate and Student Council currently hold one non-voting seat each on the Board which provides for an advisory, not authoritative, role. Assertions that shared governance constitutes a foundational value of the University are therefore historically and legally unfounded; the Board of Visitors has consistently governed as the sole body with binding authority.