The Faculty Senate passed a new plan recommending changes for developing and revising curriculum on Monday.

Among the changes the Commission to Review the Curricular Process recommended was making the curriculum and class forms an all electronic process.

The committee also recommended the university consider moving the beginning of PASS from February 1 to March 1. Moving PASS back a month will allow more time for curricular changes, according to the committee’s official report.

The Commission’s recommendations passed with an amendment directing the users’ group, which will advise the university on the curriculum process, to compile a list of objectives that can be met in the next 12 months.

The Senate also approved philosophy professor Thomas Norton-Smith as the new member of the Faculty Ethics Committee.

In her remarks to the Senate, President Carol Cartwright announced an $860,000 grant from the Keck Foundation to benefit the biology department and the Liquid Crystal Institute. She also announced the appointment of a new dean of architecture, Steven Fong. He will begin his term Dec. 1.

Negotiations recently broke down with a candidate for dean of the College of Fine and Professional Arts, Cartwright said.

“By the end of the process, his realities and our expectations were quite far apart,” she said. “It was frustrating to have it fall apart.”

In her remarks, Cartwright never directly mentioned the possible strike by the American Association of University Professors, but she said faculty had always stood by the university in tough times.

“Whenever the university has been severely challenged, the faculty has stepped forward to serve,” she said.

The senate intends to remain “neutral, but not neutered” in the negotiations, Faculty Senate Chair E. Thomas Dowd said.

­Contact on-campus reporter Amanda Garrett at [email protected].