Approved 3-19-15

Members Present:  Bruno Browning, Trish Iaccarino; Sarah Kuba; Heather McFadden, Chair; Michael Moscicke; Kevin Niemi; Robert Newsom; Deb Shapiro

Guests: Marsha Mailick, Jake Smith, Mark Walters

The meeting was called to order at 2:00 p.m.

The minutes of February 19 were approved without changes.

General Reports
•    ASEC Chair Heather Mc Fadden discussed the Ad Hoc Committee on Credentialing of Instructors.  This committee would discuss a policy and process to meet the new accreditation requirements to make information on instructors highest education degree available to students and the public.  Heather M. will reach out to some individuals about serving, and ASEC will finalize members at the next meeting.  The Faculty Senate will be voting on two resolutions on Monday: public authority and shared governance.  Heather M, Kevin and Heather D. met with the Provost Thursday morning regarding job security.  This is in response to rumors regarding changes to academic staff job security moving forward.  There is a request to the Chancellor’s office to set up a meeting to follow up on the materials that were sent to her.    
•    Secretary of the Academic Staff Heather Daniels reported that the Executive Education grants call was sent out this week.  In addition the Excellence Award winners have been identified and the process of notification has begun.  She also mentioned that Category A academic staff fact sheet was developed in response to questions representatives in the legislature might have about academic staff.  

Liaison Reports
•    Heather M. will attend the academic staff representatives meeting next Friday.

Standing Committee Reports
•    Heather D. reported on behalf of the Professional Development and Recognition Committee that this year’s Excellence Award winners would receive a voucher for a course at the Division of Continuing Studies.  Jeff Russell had offered to provide vouchers to some academic staff when he had attended an ASEC meeting last fall.

Business
•    March Assembly Agenda
There was a motion to approve resolution on the 30th anniversary of academic staff governance.  Seconded. Approved.
There was a motion to approve the resolution on budget cuts.  Seconded. Approved.
There was a motion to approve the resolution on shared governance.  Seconded. Approved.
There was a motion to approve the resolution on public authority. Seconded. Approved.
There was a motion to approve the resolution on job security.  Seconded. Approved.
There was a motion to approve the March Assembly agenda.  Seconded. Approved.
•    Future Topics for Provost
ASEC should send topics to Heather McFadden.
•    Next ASEC Meeting, March 5, 2015 – for decision
The ASEC chair may cancel this meeting depending on agenda topics.  No guests are scheduled to attend.  The meeting will start no earlier than 3 pm due to the Board of Regents meeting that day.

Guest: Mark Walters, Interim Director of the Academic Personnel Office (APO)
Mark Walters briefly discussed the reorganization of the Office of Human Resources into one office focused with units in specific areas.  He also talked briefly about academic staff layoffs during budget cuts by the state.  Historically the reason of funding loss has been used.  Approximately one and a half months ago the annual academic staff promotional exercise was sent out.  There have been some questions about whether this exercise still needs to be completed.  APO has consistently said it does, and that budget is not a reason to hold a promotion.  ASEC pointed out this is similar to faculty, where tenure packets would not be held up due to a budget shortfall.  ASEC asked Mark to provide regular updates regarding layoffs and non-renewals for academic staff due to the proposed budget cuts.  
There was a question about SHICC.  Since SHICC is contained within the pay plan, in the case of a public authority SHICC would need to be included within the university’s personnel systems.  There are not changes in the budget to allow merit increases for unclassified staff without a public authority in place.  Mark pointed out that the Wisconsin Veterinary Diagnostic Lab and State Lab of Hygiene would not be part of the new authority.  Most of these classified employees would have the option to change to academic staff.  There is discussion about whether it makes sense to offer them this change as they would become classified staff a year later when the authority takes effect.

Convened in Closed Session Pursuant to Wis. Stats. 19.85(1)(c), and (f) to discuss nominations to the Nominating Committee and appointment to the Communications Committee (Moved. Seconded. Approved.)

Reconvened in Open Session (Moved. Seconded. Approved.)

Motion to place Lauren Klink, Eric Geifer, Sharon Kahn, and an academic staff member to be named later on the Nominating Slate.  Seconded. Approved.

Guest: Marsha Mailick, Interim Vice Chancellor for Research and Graduate Education
Marsha Mailick reported that the University Research Council (URC) met for the first time.  The Council consists of 2 faculty from each division, 2 academic staff and 1 classified staff.  The goal of the URC is evolving and will continue to do so.  The URC will have a partial governance function, mainly the review of centers and approve other changes to centers like name changes.  The next meeting of the URC will involve a discussion regarding the qualitative function of the URC.  

She discussed bridge funding in light of the resolution passed by the Assembly.  The report on the Bridge Funding program from last year is almost complete.  The largest grant was given to an academic staff member.  Being a permanent PI did not seem to be a factor as to which academic staff received funding.  WARF has provided some additional money for bridge funding as matching funds.  Approximately $2M was given to schools and colleges for distribution while $4M was kept at the campus-level.  Some of the campus level funding will likely support multi-investigator grants, who were unlikely receive any assistance from last year’s program.

The WARF board met last week, and it was a good meeting.  They will vote on final approval of the annual grant given to UW-Madison at their May meeting. 

Guest: Darrell Bazzell, Vice Chancellor for Finance and Administration
Darrell Bazzell reported that deans and directors have received guidance about budget cuts.  He is hopeful that numbers can be shared with everyone soon.  The numbers included the total percent to cut, the percent to cut in the first year, and the percent to cut in the second.  In addition a four number was provided and deans/directors were asked to model what this additional cut would look like in the second year.  This will save approximately $33M between the two years.  There is also other revenue redistribution.  An increase in the centralized service assessment will generate an additional $5M.  Athletics will contribute an additional $2M.  There is a proposal to increase tuition remission perhaps as high as $10,000 per year in 2015-16 and $12,000 per year in 2016-17.  Lastly, there is also consideration about taxing 131 funds for revenue generating programs.  The proposal would be a 10% tax during the first year that increases to 20% the second year.  New programs would have a 20% tax.  This could be implemented selectively if needed.  131 funds have historically been shielded from cuts.  This would generate approximately $18M in total.  The remainder of the cuts would be made up from tuition increases for out of state and professional students as well as an increase in the out of state student cap.  Tuition proposals could be considered at the April Board of Regents meeting.  UW-Madison administration is also looking at implementing a broad program around retirement.
 
Meeting adjourned at 5:08 p.m.

Minutes submitted by Heather Daniels, Secretary of the Academic Staff