At the conclusion of Faculty Senate Executive Committee Chair Ilana Feldman’s tenure as the body’s leader this month, faculty senators lauded her advocacy, inclusivity and communication with faculty and officials in the senate.

Assuming leadership of the committee in May 2023, Feldman steered faculty through GW’s transition to University President Ellen Granberg’s leadership from interim President Mark Wrighton and led senate discussions on shared governance and academic freedom. Faculty senators said Feldman was a guiding force who balanced, consulted and included all faculty perspectives in campus dialogue during a time of “tremendous change” at the University.

As chair, Feldman pushed for officials to uphold their commitment to academic freedom and shared governance through advocacy and initiatives, like holding regular meetings with the Board of Trustees Executive Committee and setting up an academic freedom reporting portal. She has also pushed for greater consultation and communication between officials and faculty on issues, like the Board ‘s decision to arm some GW Police Department officers, the University’s response to the pro-Palestinian encampment and the Medical Faculty Associates’ persistent financial losses.

Feldman also acts as the lead faculty representative at the University, crafting and delivering reports on behalf of the senate and its committees at meetings with the Board.

Feldman did not return a request for comment.

Katrin Schultheiss, an associate professor of history and a member of the committee, presented a resolution at the senate meeting Friday that recognized Feldman for her “distinguished service” as FSEC chair. Feldman will remain on the body as a senator for the 2025-26 academic year after reaching the two-year term limit for serving on FSEC.

“Professor Feldman has earned the highest level of respect, gratitude, and admiration of her colleagues on the Faculty Senate as well as the esteem and appreciation of the entire University community,” the resolution states.

Feldman at the meeting thanked committee members, faculty senators and the GW community for their “activation,” collaboration and “deep and abiding” commitment to students, research and scholarship as well as the “health” of GW.

She said she agreed to become FSEC chair in 2023 because she hoped to collaborate with Granberg at the beginning of her tenure. She added that she also took the position partly because it looked “relatively calm” at the University when she began.

“Despite the times and the myriad of challenges that have come with them, it has been a pleasure to work with all of you, and I look forward to continuing to do so as a member of the senate,” Feldman said at the meeting.

Feldman said senators will vote on the next FSEC chair at the senate’s May meeting — the first senate meeting of the 2025-26 academic year. Feldman said a nominating committee is in the process of nominating the next FSEC chair.

Granberg said at the meeting that it has been a “wonderful experience” to work with Feldman over the past two years as the first FSEC chair she’s worked with at the University.

“I so appreciate your thoughtful and collaborative, intellectually grounded and always very calm voice that you bring to the room, that you bring to the Executive Committee meetings and that you have brought to the conversations that we’ve had the opportunity to have,” Granberg said at the meeting.

The Faculty Organization Plan stipulates that the FSEC oversee the functions of the senate, including setting its agenda, carrying out its actions, making and submitting reports on the senate’s progress and other initiatives around GW and acting on behalf of the senate in emergencies.

Feldman also serves as the sole faculty representative on the University Steering Committee, which is charged with developing the University’s new strategic framework, a plan with goals and initiatives for the future of the University, according to its website.

Schultheiss said she has only been on the committee with Feldman for the past year, but she’s seen Feldman’s “consistent advocacy” for improving communication between the senate and administration.

She said Feldman is very “skillful” at talking to individuals with various positions at the University, from the senate to the Board.

During the encampment last year, Feldman led the FSEC in an emergency meeting where members drafted a letter to Granberg and Provost Chris Bracey urging officials to take a “de-escalatory approach” and offered to have senators help officials communicate with student protesters.

“She’s a model of how you can be an effective communicator and a bridge builder and a listener,” Schultheiss said.

Feldman is very “evenhanded” as FSEC chair and will always listen to and respect the community’s “wide range” of opinions, regardless of her personal views, she said.

“I’ve always been very impressed with her sort of diplomatic skills and her communication skills, her openness to viewpoints that may or may not agree with her own,” Schultheiss said. “Those are some of the qualities I’ve really admired in her leadership.”

John Warren, a FSEC member and a professor and director of the graduate publishing program, said he admires what Feldman has been able to accomplish as chair of the committee. He said Feldman has been “very supportive” of faculty advocating for shared governance and communication between University administration and faculty.

“I think the more communication, consultation that the administration can have with the Faculty Senate and Faculty Senate Executive Committee and all the community is really important,” Warren said.

Feldman said at a Board meeting in October 2023 that newly organized meetings between the FSEC and the Board’s Executive Committee have been “very valuable” in strengthening shared governance, especially as the University planned to embark on its strategic framework development process.

The meetings followed discussions between faculty, University administration and the Board about shared governance principles at the University over the past several years and calls by the faculty that the decision to arm some of the GWPD was made in defiance of the principles.

Feldman continued to raise the issue of a lack of faculty consultation on the decision to arm the GWPD at last month’s senate meeting after officials released a report stating that the University failed to “meaningfully and adequately” consult community members on the decision. She said officials never told the senate about how the decision to arm was made in May 2023 or how the issue was brought to the Board.

“Not only was there not the consultation that people would have liked, not only was a decision different than many people might have wanted but actually we were not told in honesty about how the decision process was being made,” Feldman said at the meeting. “And that, I think, is not great.”

Guillermo Orti, a professor of biology and a former member of the FSEC, said he has had the privilege of serving on the committee and the senate alongside Feldman.

“I admire her courage and dedication to serving others and remain forever thankful for all her work on behalf of the GW Faculty,” Orti said in an email.