The Academic Senate has approved nine full-time faculty and is on the verge of recommending 12 more positions to be filled, offering relief to departments like Physical Education, which lost one-third of its full-time teachers.

The college is obligated to fulfill specific requirements to receive state aid, including a certain number of full-time faculty positions.

“For each percentage of growth we have to hire two faculty members,” said Lana Rose, academic senator.

For every unfilled position, the state penalizes the college with a fine of $57,535 from the college’s budget, said Leslie Griffin, controller of the college handling fiscal management.

The senate approved the nine positions in its Oct. 22 meeting.

They were approved last year as replacement positions but were not filled due to the college’s budget crisis, said Peter Haslund, president of the Academic Senate.

The senate will rank the positions today based on the merit of each case. Only the first 12 positions will be filled and the remaining six will have to wait till the funding situation improves, said Haslund.

The senate will consider replacements for some positions open for recruitment after four instructors announced their retirement. The retirees are Sue Watkins (HIT/CIM); Scott Gordon (MAT); Greg Cain (Physics); and Margaret Eejima (Drafting).

Full-time faculty have 40-hour work weeks and are more accessible to students than part-time faculty. Haslund said they are paid on a different scale than adjunct faculty and generally, more is expected of them.