A possible vote of no confidence in University President Bruce Speck took another step forward today.This afternoon, members of Missouri Southern’s Faculty Senate received via e-mail the final report from an ad hoc committee it formed last month. The report contains something the preliminary report doesn’t: a procedure for the vote.The report will be presented formally to the Senate at its Oct. 5 regular meeting. According to the document, the procedure is as follows:

The Faculty Senate should first conduct a vote of no confidence. If the senate vote indicates no confidence then all faculty with senate representation, exclusive of temporary personnel with one year contracts, should take part in a campus-wide vote according to the following procedure:

1. An on-campus location and date for the vote will be determined and announced by the Faculty Senate Executive Committee at least two weeks prior to the vote. 2. Voting will take place from 8 a.m. until 3 p.m. on the designated date.3. A locking ballot box will be placed in the room scheduled for the vote.4. A representative of the Faculty Senate Executive Committee and a representative of the Administration, exclusive of Dr. Speck, will be present for the voting.5. When faculty enter the voting location, they will identify themselves, secure a ballot, cast their vote, and place their ballot into the locked ballot box. 6. The ballot will have two options: (1) I have confidence in President Bruce Speck. (2) I do not have confidence in President Bruce Speck.7. At the conclusion of voting the senate parliamentarian will count the vote in the presence of the Executive Committee and the Administration representatives and provide an accurate accounting of the votes cast.8. The results will be reported to the Faculty Senate and administration.

A comparison of the final draft and the preliminary report showed the voting mechanism as the only difference between the two documents.On Aug. 31, the Senate voted 23-2 to form a committee to explore a vote of no confidence in Speck. The report issued today is the result of that committee’s work.The Chart is publishing the final report here and will later update with supporting evidence presented in an open session of the Board of Governors by Faculty Senate President Roger Chelf. That evidence was given by Chelf to Speck and the Board during the meeting and afterward to the media.