The Academic Senate is made up of faculty, and some students and members of the administration. The focus of the senate is first to improve academic learning, for example some of the Ad Hoc Committees as well as the Honors and Curriculum Committee. Secondly it is to express concerns of the faculty and students with committees such as the Faculty Affairs Committee and Student Academic Grievance Committee. It is responsible for

…the recognized role of the faculty concerning academic functions and activities of the University; to provide an orderly manner, including the establishment of Bylaws, through which the faculty may assume its role; to provide for the expression of opinions from others in the University community who are also interested in the academic functions and activities of the University; and, to provide the faculty with the means to conduct such studies as may become necessary to the expression of a responsible opinion.1

The records of the senate begin in 1959; however some of the committee’s documents were formed before the senate’s founding, going back further than the actual Senate records, such as the Library Committee which had reports are early as 1937. Recent Academic Senate Minutes and Agendas, dating from 2000 to present, may also be viewed through the Academic Senate website at: http://www.ysu.edu/acadsenate/ index.html