Approved 05-18-23

ASEC Minutes

2:00 – 4:30 p.m. Thursday, May 4, 2023

53 Bascom Hall

https://uwmadison.zoom.us/j/93936751067

Members Present: Donna Cole; Stephanie Elkins; Julie Hunt Johnson; Stephanie Jones; Albert Muniz; Mallory Musolf, chair; Lindsey Stoddard Cameron

Guests: Jenny Dahlberg, Lesley Fisher, Jessica Karls-Ruplinger, Beth Meyerand, Terry Paape, Patrick Sheehan, Eric Wilcots, Scott Wildman

The meeting was called to order at 2:02 p.m.

The minutes of April 27 were approved.

General Reports

Mallory Musolf, ASEC Chair, discussed the PROFS/ASPRO forum that was held on May 2 to discuss the biennial budget. State Senator Kelda Roys, State Representative Robert Wittke, UW-Madison Director of State Relations Crystal Potts, and UW-Madison Professor J. Michael Collins participated in a panel discussion covering several aspects of the budget and talked about how the political parties can collaborate based on the divisiveness in politics.

Jake Smith, Secretary of the Academic Staff, reported that Dr. Charles Isbell has been announced as the new provost for UW-Madison. He will be starting in the role on August 1. Jake confirmed the summer schedule with ASEC. Mallory and Jake will be attending shared governance sessions with the finalists for the Vice Chancellor for Strategic Communications position. Jake and Donna participated in the recent Big 10 Collaboration on Staff Advocacy meeting. Jake shared best practices for governance structures to Big 10 peers looking to set up their own governance bodies for staff. Donna discussed issues related to staff morale, including administrative transitions, similar pains at other campuses with TTC-like projects, and DEI measures within state legislatures. The Faculty Senate will be looking at the proposal for amending scheduling of spring break at its next session in the fall.

Liaison Reports

Stephanie Jones reported on the School of Education CASI’s Coffee session. Dean Hess addressed the CASI and discussed professional development opportunities that the CASI might explore.

Donna Cole and the transportation subcommittee met on April 25 with Patrick Kass and Gabe Mendez to discuss issues related to parking and other areas. They discussed data from 2014 analyzing possibilities for a tiered parking program. They are in the process of refreshing these data, with preliminary figures showing that 40.46% of employees purchase permits. The rest are purchased by UW Health employees and by affiliates. There is high ridership on the Metro, but riders are finding issues with pickup times as a result of the revised routes and schedules. Of the UW employees that purchase parking, 24.22% of those are base lot permits. Use of flex parking went up with the pandemic. The salary threshold for the reduced parking program is $38,938. Transportation Services has no control over the B-Cycle program. Campus only pays for stations. The group will look at questions around electric vehicle charging stations in its next conversation.

Lindsey Stoddard Cameron reported that the Districting and Representation Committee met on April 28. They are working with DoIT on the coding for the new titles and continuing their revisions of district descriptions. Things are on track for a June implementation of the coding. Lindsey and Jake attended an ASEC listening session on May 3. Discussion revolved around how to address behaviors that may not rise to the level of hostile and intimidating behavior. There was also discussion of pay increases for those academic staff at the top of their salary ranges.

Guest: Eric Wilcots, Interim Provost

Interim Provost Wilcots reported on the student protest in Bascom Hall on May 3. Chancellor Mnookin and the leadership team sent a response today to the students’ demands. Vice Provost Zumbrunnen’s team will be sending a message soon to address the immediate issues of academic flexibility, and Chancellor Mnookin has opened an invitation for continued discussions on the other action items they want to see. Interim Provost Wilcots reiterated how abhorrent the video is, but this situation is not actionable by any of our statutes. Vice Chancellor Reesor is in communication with student leaders in ASM. At the same time, campus leadership is also navigating issues related to support for DEI and the state budget.

Guest: Beth Meyerand, Vice Provost for Faculty and Staff Affairs

ASEC discussed a request from an Assembly representative who represents researchers. The request is around climate issues for the researcher community, with improved compensation as a substantial part of this conversation. Researcher titles don’t have maxima, and so there is a lack of clarity when it comes to salary progression. Vice Provost Meyerand was supportive of a committee to look further into these issues and expressed a willingness to assist in whatever way ASEC thought would be best.

Vice Provost Meyerand and the HIB Working Group will review progress on each aspect of the committee’s charge at the next meeting. The group will be deciding which aspects of the charge are complete and which still need work. It is possible that the work of this group will continue, potentially with a new charge. Vice Provost Meyerand wants the new provost to weigh in on how this work will proceed beyond the current incarnation of the group.

Vice Provost Meyerand’s office held three sessions of office hours on academic staff professorial titles, with one session on each of the three titles: teaching professor, research professor, and professor of practice. The teaching professor session included those currently holding the title, as well as teaching faculty III and IV. The research professor session also included those currently holding that title, as well as those in scientist titles. The main question revolved around the utility of the title in certain areas, as well as whether there were any potential roadblocks in getting the titles. Vice Provost Meyerand offered to talk with anyone who is turned down for these titles at the department level and wants to hear more about situations where individuals are encountering barriers to moving into these titles.

Guest: Patrick Sheehan, Chief Human Resources Officer

Director Sheehan started off by talking about how the recent student incident is weighing heavily on the HR community and campus at large. He emphasized resources available not only to students but to faculty and staff as well in order to help process the situation.

ASEC discussed the same issues regarding researcher titles as it did with Vice Provost Meyerand. Reflecting on TTC issues that are outstanding, one of the things that HR is talking about is how to correlate “time in seat” with knowledge/skills/abilities. OHR understands the need for equity and is exploring what more centralized oversight looks like in our decentralized structure. The compensation team is currently looking at what other institutions are doing in this space. There have been a number of obstacles in building in salary increases in some grants due to the different restrictions from various funding agencies. OHR is investigating other solutions, and this issue connects directly to the chancellor’s strategic goals for research. This also intersects with issues related to pay plan for those individuals over their salary maxima. Campus will be looking to announce the next iteration of the compensation exercise in the next couple of months.

Salary compression continues to be a prevalent issue across campus. The compensation team is partnering with schools/colleges/divisions to address compression, and the Workday system will provide more reporting to help look at this issue.

On recruitment, we are seeing an uptick in overall applications, with an average of almost 18 applicants per position. This is almost back to where we were prior to the onset of the pandemic. The pace has slowed down since 2021, though, with 1000 jobs released in the last two quarters. So far, only 6.3% of recruitments have seen failed searches. Our investment in the LinkedIn recruiter seat has brought a significant increase in overall applicants as well as the diversity of applicant pools. OHR is also looking at other ways to use the job rotation program to increase talent development.

Business

• ASEC Chair/Vice Chair Election Procedure

Jake shared information on the duties of the chair and vice chair positions, and nominations for both positions will be open until noon on May 17. The election will be held at the May 18 meeting.

• Discussion of Briefing Materials for New Provost

ASEC looked at the briefing document for Chancellor Mnookin as a starting point and discussed various ways that it could be updated. A small group will meet to compose a draft for review at the May 18 meeting.

• Topics for Guests

Interim Provost: carryover topics from today—thoughts on request to form committee looking at concerns from staff with researcher and scientist titles; thoughts on the academic staff morale resolution; how the work of the HIB working group will continue

OHR: follow-up on ageism issue, Care.com resources

Meeting adjourned at 4:25 p.m.

Minutes submitted by Jake Smith, Secretary of the Academic Staff