The Faculty Senate will have its monthly meeting, the first meeting of the new year, at 3:30 p.m. Tuesday in the Great Hall of the Memorial Union.

The senate will be presented with new business that aids to address the merger between the department of anthropology and department of world languages and cultures.

A year ago, in December 2014 and January 2015, a small group of faculty from both departments tossed around the idea about the possibility of initiating a merger.

After doing so, two joint faculty meetings took place the following months, and on April 27 and May 8, tenure-stream faculty in both departments cast a vote to move onto the next phase of the merger — the planning phase.

The vote was unanimous in the anthropology and world languages and cultures departments, and both were in favor of the potential merger. From there, a planning meeting was created that consisted of faculty from both departments. Their job was to meet with relevant administration, along with academic parties, and propose a final plan.

Another unanimous vote in favor of the merger was cast this past December. The Faculty Senate can now move to resolve or approve the motion of the merger.

Some benefits of the merger, as outlined in a document emailed to the senate, will be that it will strengthen collaborations among faculty in both programs and will hopefully improve student learning.

“Moreover, the proposed merger will further consolidate existing strengths in the LAS [Liberal Arts and Sciences] cross disciplinary studies programs in which Anthropology and WLC faculty play pivotal roles,” the document stated.

The merger also hopes to improve efficiencies among the administration by making use of existing human resources.

Some challenges offered by the merger, however, include different teaching loads and office and teaching space.

If approved, the merger between the two departments will become effective July 1.

Sarah Nusser, vice president for research, plans to provide a review of the ‘Plans for the Research Mission’ for the university at the meeting.

The Faculty Senate is currently accepting nominations for the president-elect position for the 2016-17 school year. All sitting senators are eligible to run for the position, and forms should be submitted to the Faculty Senator office no later than noon Tuesday.

The election for the president-elect position will take place after the special order.