Greetings! Can you believe it's November already. It's been a very busy month!!
The big thing hanging over us for most of the month has been a resolution to the state budget. As you will note from my comments in the blog entry below, a compromise was agreed on and signed into law. Now from the state we are watching 2 issues. First is what will happen with leave reporting and the second is the negotiations on staff pay raises for the 2007-2009 biennium.
A Special Regents' Committee on Response to the LAB Audit will be making recommendations on leave reporting and I serve on that committee – we will be meeting on November 16 in
On campus the big issue before the senate is the program alignment process. I personally attended all but one of the Chancellor's Listening Sessions to make sure I knew how you felt about this and the other topics addressed. As a side note I have to say that the SSA listening session was very good. It is always interesting to hear the student's perspective (and important as campus leaders we are listening to the students as well). On October 23 the Provost invited me and the Faculty Senate Chair to the Dean's Issues Meeting. At that meeting the 4 models were narrowed to 2. The two models which are variations of model #3, have been presented to the Senates and we will discuss them at the Tuesday, Nov 6 meeting of the combined senates. The campus is welcome to attend (2:30pm in Ballroom A).
As for other meetings where I represented the Senate, the Chancellor's Advisory Council (CAC) met twice in October. At the October 1 meeting we continued our discussion of the Honor's Taskforce Report and gave approval of the recommendations. Next, Meridith Wentz reviewed the executive summary of the NSSE 2007 Report. The NSSE is an annual undergraduate survey that assesses the extent to which first-year students and seniors engage in a variety of good educational practices. It was suggested that we may want to review our policies and revise them to address the identified concerns/issues. Student engagement is critical to the mission of the university and to retention of students. Our senate and the Faculty Senate will be looking closely at concerns raised and taking an active role in this issue. Meridith also reviewed the executive summary of the FSSE report which is a survey designed to measure faculty expectations of student engagement in educational practices that are linked to high levels of student learning and development along with how faculty use these practices in their work with students. The FSSE is designed to be used in conjunction with NSSE's survey. To me is was eye-opening to see the gaps in perception of the students and faculty/instructors. Finally, Meridith reviewed the 2006-07 Teaching Workload Report. An observation was made that the report does not include the number of preps.
At the October 15 CAC meeting, George Acker introduced Craig Sachs and Michael McMahon, consultants from Miller Wagner Coenen McMahon of Neenah, WI to discuss formulation of the Campus Master Plan. This is the step in the campus master plan development process where they are conducting discussion sessions with numerous groups on campus. It is expected to have the process completed with a final campus plan proposal in October 2008. Next, Howard Lee, Richard Tafalla and Holly Teuber shared a revised Minority Faculty and Staff Network (MFSN) Committee Form and asked for formal university recognition. The charge is linked to several of our enduring goals, as well as Goal 5 of Plan 2008. As the committee represents both unclassified and classified staff, their members would like to be independent of senates but will be looking at how they can be connected to the senates in working on diversity issues. Our senate does have a diversity senator position appointed by the Chair and I have asked the MFSN to provide an individuals name to serve on our senate.
I also attended the statewide Academic Staff Reps Council (ASRC) meeting in
Next the formal meeting began with Associate Vice President Ron Singer and Bob Jokisch. The meeting began with a presentation by General Counsel Pat Brady on Legal Issues Facing the UW System. Pat began with a review of Chapter 36, which is the legal framework for the UW System. s. 36.09 (4m) of the statutes explains the role of academic staff in the UW System. Pat noted that in addition to the statutes, UW System Administrative Codes (which the Board of Regents adopts), campus policies, Board policies, System Administration policies, and finance and personnel guidelines impact academic staff.
After that we then discussed with Ron Singer the issues raised during our separate discussion among only campus reps. Regarding leave reporting, the academic staff reps raised the issue of academic staff being treated the same as faculty under the new proposals.
Ron Singer and Todd Bailey with the Office of Policy Analysis and Research (OPAR) then discussed the Voluntary System of Accountability (VSA) with the Academic Staff Reps. VSA results from an interest in higher education to providing greater accountability. Two national higher education groups, NASULGC and AASCU, are taking the lead in VSA. VSA will provide a web-based portrait that will be uniform for all institutions. Three sets of information would be shown on the template: Student and family information, Student experiences, Student learning outcomes.
Associate Vice President Ed Meachen then discussed the Common Systems Roadmap and the Human Resources System (HRS) project with the Academic Staff Reps. The Common Systems Roadmap is a long range (10 years) look at technology for the UW System. The Roadmap looks at what outcomes we want for students, faculty, and staff, and what new technology we see coming. The Roadmap is a living document that will be reviewed annually. It was presented to the Board of Regents last week.
Ron Singer then provided further information to the Academic Staff Reps on the distinguished title. He shared a table showing the use of the distinguished title across the UW System, and noted that UW System Administration is developing criteria for the title. The use of this title is within the discretion of the campus. The Academic Staff Reps agreed to share criteria developed with each other.
Associate Vice President Freda Harris shared a summary of information available on the Governor's budget proposal for the Special Session. The Governor's budget proposal provides $22 million for the Growth Agenda, but $25 million biennally in lapses ($12.5 million annually). The tuition cap passed by the Assembly is not included. Costs to continue are fully funded under the Governor's budget and the Compensation Reserve is funded at the same level as Joint Finance. Freda noted that the lapse would certainly slow the Growth Agenda. Freda also noted that this proposal may not pass.
The ASRC meeting ended following further discussion among Academic Staff Representatives.
Other meetings I participated in on behalf of the Senate included:
- 10/3 - attended AS Personnel Committee Meeting
- 10/9 – the Faculty Senate Chair and I presented results of her performance evaluation to Vice Chancellor Moen
- 10/12 - met with SSA President and Faculty Senate Vice Chair (we plan to hold monthly meetings to enhance dialog and cooperation between the 3 senates)
- 10/17 – met with the Chancellor, Provost, Vice Chancellor and other senate leaders to discuss status of state budget negotiations (I want to say a special thanks to the Chancellor, Julie, and Diane for bringing the senates in on almost every major decision the campus has to make – I do talk to the other campus reps and our relationship with administration is envied around the state!)
- 10/19 – participated in ASPRO Board teleconference
- 10/25 – monthly meeting with Chancellor Sorensen
- 10/26 – Polytechnic Steering Committee meeting
- 10/30 – met with Provost and team from Stout going to
- 11/2 – myself and the SSA Presient and Faculty Senate Chair will have a private meeting with Regent Bartell this morning. Our Vice Chair Jerry Addie then will represent our Senate at a lunch with the Regent (thanks Jerry!)
Well, that's it for my report this month. Hope to see you at the Senate meetings on Tuesday!!
Dennis Shaw, 2007-2008 Chair
Senate of Academic Staff
