Approved 11-02-23

ASEC Minutes

2:00 – 4:30 p.m. Thursday, October 26, 2023

53 Bascom Hall

https://uwmadison.zoom.us/j/93223941305

Members Present: Donna Cole; Stephanie Elkins; Alissa Ewer; Julie Hunt Johnson; Albert Muniz, chair; Terry Paape; Lindsey Stoddard Cameron; Nola Walker

Guests: Rob Cramer, Lucien Gerondeau, Patrick Sheehan, Scott Wildman, Jen Young

The meeting was called to order at 2:01 p.m.

The minutes of October 19 were approved.

Motion to Convene in Closed Session Pursuant to Wis. Stats. 19.85(1)(c), and (f) to Discuss Nominations to the Dean of the School of Education Search and Screen Committee (Stoddard Cameron). Seconded. Approved.

Motion to Reconvene in Open Session (Johnson). Seconded. Approved.

Business

• Nominations – for vote

Motion to nominate Luz Arroyo Calderon, Mariana Castro, Anna Lewis, Sarina Lotlikar, and Chell Parkins to serve on the Dean of the School of Education Search and Screen Committee (Elkins). Seconded. Approved.

General Reports

Albert Muniz, ASEC Chair, discussed the Inside UW article regarding the pay plan. He reminded members that contacting elected officials advocating for passage of the plan must not be done on university time or with university resources. Albert, Donna, and Alissa met with Transportation Services, following up on meetings they held throughout the last academic year. Demand for parking has gone up significantly, which has highlighted limitations around overall availability of spaces. Transportation Services is working to encourage reduction of single vehicle occupancy. Madison Metro ridership has also seen a decrease. Transportation Services meets with Metro regularly, and UW still comprises over half of the ridership with Metro. ASEC agreed to invite Patrick Kass to present these updates and data on permit purchases at the December Assembly meeting.

Jake Smith, Secretary of the Academic Staff, reported on the news article about ASEC’s discussion with Provost Isbell that was published in Inside UW on October 24. ASEC is expected to meet with Dean Karpus and a member of the University Committee on November 9 to discuss the proposed change in reporting line for the Dean of the Graduate School. The Assembly Committee on Colleges and Universities held a public hearing on the morning of October 26 on four Assembly bills, some of which were related to free speech and academic freedom. Jake also reported on the recently announced staff reductions at UW-Platteville. The standing committee chairs will be meeting with ASEC leadership on November 2 to discuss this year’s committee initiatives. The Fall CASI Info Session will be held on November 9.

Liaison Reports

Stephanie Elkins met with the steering committee of the Librarians’ Assembly. The committee has new leadership and invited Jake to answer organizational questions and discuss main issues for the CASI. Stephanie also reported on the latest meeting of the Wisconsin Public Media CASI, which saw continued discussion and feedback on the organization’s updated ethics policies. WPM has also joined the Public Media for All organization. The WPM HR department will present information on titling and compensation at the next meeting.

Albert Muniz reported on the College of Letters and Science CASI. ATP continues to be an area of discussion, as well as concerns around career paths and salary ranges. The group also discussed having their own mentoring program.

Guest: Patrick Sheehan, Chief Human Resources Officer

The Office of Human Resources has been looking at the Title and Total Compensation webpage, now that the institution is two years out from implementation of the TTC Project. OHR’s new web manager has been looking at which documents are hosted on the TTC webpage. Approximately 1.5% of total OHR web traffic is going there, so OHR is planning on sunsetting the page. ASEC had raised concerns about sunsetting the page when substantial progress on TTC Phase 2 related to benefits still has yet to be made. Any communication on benefits enhancements will shift over to webpages related both to benefits and communications. Other TTC resources located on the page will shift to the compensation section of OHR’s site, so that employees will still have access to those resources. OHR will continue to communicate about strategic goals with respect to benefits.

There was discussion about alignment of messaging between OHR and local HR. Patrick discussed historical rollout of initiatives like compensation exercises and talked about improvements made around communication. There continue to be challenges in this space. OHR holds biweekly meetings with local HR reps, as well as meetings with divisional HR leads. There have been early conversations around service level agreements and expectations, and communities of practice related to ATP and future state operating model have also been created.

ASEC asked Patrick his thoughts on the Office of Child Care and Family Resources’ revised mission statement, which focuses on student parents and no longer includes mention of support for faculty and staff parents. OHR is interested in discussions around this issue, and Patrick recommended inviting Cigdem Unal to a future meeting to talk further about the office’s change to its mission.

Guest: Rob Cramer, Vice Chancellor for Finance and Administration

Vice Chancellor Cramer covered the history of the state budget and where we are at with implementation of the pay plan for UW employees. Chancellor Mnookin and President Rothman are working diligently to address the concerns expressed by members of the Joint Committee on Employment Relations. An article in Inside UW identified how employees can contact their legislators as long as it is not on university time using university resources. New concerns have been articulated from some members of JCOER related to position authority.

Administrative Transformation Program leadership presented a case to the Board of Regents for delaying implementation of ATP to July 1, 2025. We want to get implementation right, and the 2024 date entailed a number of risks. The Board of Regents approved the delayed date, which remains a year ahead of the original overall timeline. They also reviewed the impact of the delay on the program’s budget, and there is still a high probability that we will come in under budget. The ATP team is looking at all the work that was stacked up for the 2024 deadline and spreading it out to allow additional time for end-to-end testing and user experience testing. The delay will also allow time to go through all of the ancillary system integrations that are necessary. Activities related to training in March 2024 will be moved back a year. The additional time for implementation will also give us more time to see what reporting and security role mapping will look like as well. Data, Academic Planning, and Institutional Research are looking at integration with our existing data reporting and confirming how data will flow from Workday in the future state. The delay also allows us to take time to work on standardizing processes across units and divisions where it makes sense.

Vice Chancellor Cramer is interested in working with ASEC on its priority related to exploring increased dining options that are both affordable and healthy. There may be shorter-term opportunities related to the West Campus District Plan, with an eye toward longer-term opportunities in other areas of campus. Housing shifted food service from a la carte to the “all-you-care-to-eat” plan based on student feedback as well as the increased number of students over the last couple of years.

Business                                

• Ageism Committee Resolution Discussion

ASEC members reviewed the resolution and will look at the finalized version at the next meeting.

• November Assembly Agenda

ASEC reviewed the Assembly agenda and will vote to approve it at the next meeting.

• Topics for Guests

Provost: updates on restructuring of Provost Office; discussion of any issues specific to academic staff that have been brought to him outside of those from ASEC/governance; what resources are planned to support non-instructional engagement with AI

VCSA: with this year’s reduction in the size of the freshman class, has there been reduction on resource/staff pressures to support the number of students; what specific work is Student Affairs doing to support students impacted by the situation in Gaza; how is Student Affairs collaborating with the Division of Teaching and Learning to address issues around student hesitation using AI; update on the new First-Generation Badgers program

Interim VCRGE: current state of searches for open center director positions and impacts of those vacancies on academic staff

Meeting adjourned at 4:32 p.m.

Minutes submitted by Jake Smith, Secretary of the Academic Staff