Dear Dr Reid, at the University of Alaska Fairbanks we are a unionized faculty and graduate committee membership is determined in faculty workloads, with variations college to college. We are discussing acknowledgement of community members as committee members. In Indigenous studies we are discussing policies on the inclusion of Elders and other Knowledge Experts as committee members.
We have a 7 year time limit for Masters students and 10 years for PhD. We do not formally penalize students who approach these time limits. We have an appeals process for students who run over these limits.
Richard Collins, University of Alaska Fairbanks
