City College department heads will have to battle to fill the full-time positions they’ll lose to retirement at the end of the semester.

The positions were created after the college received state fundings for the first time in decades, specifically to hire six new full-time faculty.

The Academic Senate will begin hearings in early October from college departments to decide where these six new positions will be go.

“First I think we should take a moment and smile, and be really happy that we are getting funding specifically for faculty positions,” said Marilynn Spaventa, interim executive vice president of educational programs. “Because it hasn’t happened for a really long time.”

This Friday is also the deadline for faculty to announce retirements. The college has currently six announced retirements, an amount which matches the number of funded positions.

The senate discussed whether the funded positions would automatically be available to fill the ones opened after faculty retirements.

“If we’re going to fund the six new faculty, what’s the point of hearing the faculty replacements,” said Senator Stanley Bursten. “I assume that we’re to approve all of those.”

President Kimberly Monda pointed out that the college would want to collect information from each department to research where the replacements are mostly needed. She also stated that many departments have previously had retirements that were not replaced because the funding wasn’t available.

“All requests are on an even playing field, and that gives us the ability as a body to get the information we need, and make decisions that are best for our college,” said Senator Jennifer Maupin.

The senate members voted to continue with the hearings, which will begin Oct. 7.