Minutes for February 19, 2024

UC members present: Bernard-Donals, Jones, Li, Tejedo-Herrero, Thibeault (chair), Zweibel
Others present: John Horn, Leslie Fisher, Jennifer Noyes, Julie Scharm, Jen Young

Chair Thibeault called the meeting to order at 1:00 pm. 

Rob Cramer, Vice Chancellor for Finance and Administration, shared an update on the Budget Approach. The goals of the new budget approach are to efficiently and fairly distribute resources; maintain fiscal health and responsible stewardship; enable leaders to act strategically; provide greater transparency and predictability; and reward collaboration, innovation and entrepreneurship. Several task forces will be formed to consider implications of adopting a particular budget approach. They will make recommendations to the coordinating committee, which includes shared governance representatives, who will make recommendations to the executive sponsors. Final recommendations go to the chancellor for a decision. The new approach would affect 101, 131 and 150 funding received by schools and colleges. Central campus will continue to cover the cost of central support units, supplement state pay plans and pay a significant portion of research infrastructure costs as well as contributing to start up and retention costs of faculty. So far two task forces have been put together to look at undergraduate tuition distribution and overhead distribution.  

Michelle Felber and Jack O’Meara provided an update on legislative bills. The Assembly will take up the Engineering building and reciprocity bills this week. Legislation has been introduced to strengthen gun laws on campus and move the university start date to September 1. There is also a bill on loyalty pledges that will be taken up by the Assembly. PROFS is still involved in the lawsuit brought forward by the governor. They are also moving ahead with a panel discussion on flagships scheduled in April. 

Bill Karpus, Dean of the Gradate School, reported that the transition to the Provost Office is going well. He has been having discussing regarding HR, finance, research administration and IT. IT is the most difficult to figure out especially in regards to database management. For desktop support, they will likely use DoIT. He expects they may need fewer developers once the applications program moves to a vendor system. OVCR will be able to take additional IT FTEs for research security. OVCR will continue to provide research administration and WARF accounting for the Graduate School. There will be no space changes. 

He feels he has more access to the Provost and still engages with OVCR meetings with the same frequency as he did before the move. 

Dean Karpus discussed ways to enhance mentoring on campus for both faculty to become better mentors and graduate students to become better mentees. The Botany department recently required mentor training of faculty who would like to have graduate students in their lab. Michael Bernard-Donals suggested a group of faculty could bring forward a proposal regarding mentoring to the UC that could then be brought to the Senate or other places for action. 

Cynthia Czajkowski, Interim Vice Chancellor for Research, provided an update on center directorships. They have finalists visiting for the Primate Center and WIPAC (or Icecube) in the next couple months. They will also launch a search for the Arboretum director later this spring.

She received the report on RSP from the outside consulting firm recently and is working through it with Petra Schroeder, Mark Sweet and Kim Moreland. Overall the structure seems to be fine, and leadership is well regarded. One issue is that there is a lot of oral tradition rather than things written down. There is also a need for additional positions in RSP. The report also recommends additional training for staff for RAMP. The original training was not required. There are new IP templates that can be used including for MDAs. It may make sense to separate out clinical trial contracts.

Vice Chancellor Czajkowski echoed the comments from Dean Karpus about the relationship between the Graduate School and the OVCR. 

In terms of opportunities for a new VCR, making sure there is adequate infrastructure for in the influx of new faculty will be important. Expanding industry sponsored research and foundation grants are a possibility for the research portfolio as well as developing partnerships outside of academia to respond to new types of federal funding such as the Tech Hubs. Lastly, there is an opportunity to look at research needs for the west end of campus development plan. 

Chancellor Jennifer Mnookin reported that she was very proud of the UW-Madison students who participated in the recent Board of Regents meeting. She announced three initiatives in her remarks including sustainability, entrepreneurial committee and the RISE initiative. 

The committee looking at the black experience continues to meet and has asked for an extension. The legislative initiatives agreed to continue to move forward.

UW-Madison has announced a delay in student decisions this year due to the FAFSA delay. Students will have until May 15 to decide whether they want to attend UW-Madison. This does place more pressure on SOAR, summer programs and housing. 

Bernard-Donals motioned, and it was seconded and approved, to convene in closed session pursuant to Wis. Stats. 19.85(1)(c) and (f) to discuss waivers and committee appointments at 3:03 pm. One tenure clock extension was approved. 

Zweibel motioned to reconvene in open session at 3:10 pm. It was seconded and approved. 

The minutes from February 12, 2024, were approved by automatic consent.

Thibeault adjourned the meeting at 3:35 pm.

Minutes submitted by Heather Daniels, Secretary of the Faculty