University Committee Minutes for 12-12-2022

UC members present: Babcock, Bernard-Donals, Li, Papp (chair), Tejedo-Herrero, Thibeault

Others: Michelle Felber, Julie Scharm

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

The minutes for the meeting of December 5, 2022, were approved.

Karl Scholz, Provost, shared that the staff climate survey report is out along with tableau visualizations. There will be a report out soon on the Administrative Quality Satisfaction Survey.

In regards to the idea of shadow grading, the provost reported talking with both Lori Reesor and ASEC. One of the reservations mentioned was building up the GPA in the first year. John Zumbrunnen will be bringing the idea to advisors and associate deans in the colleges.

He also discussed calendaring issues. We are the only Big 10 school that holds finals on Saturdays and Sundays. It’s not possible for UW-Madison to hold finals on fewer than 6 days. We are required to have 15 weeks of instruction for federal financial aid. We currently have 69 days of instruction. Michigan has 66. If we had fewer instructional days in the fall that would provide some relief for a fall break and possibly an additional day off for Thanksgiving.

Jaimee Gilford, Director, Office of Compliance, Mari Abdo, Office of Legal Affairs and Bob Gratzel, Research and Sponsored Projects attended to discuss the anti-human trafficking policy. This policy is required if we have federal contracting over $500,000. The policy is consistent with our peers and the compliance/management plan would rarely be triggered.

Beth Meyerand announced that the policy to ask former employers a set of questions about any confirmed allegations against someone applying for a tenured position at UW-Madison has been finalized and will go live on January 1. The TOP program is set to end this year. The Nellie McKay and Anna Julia Cooper programs will continue.

The Hostile and Intimidating Behavior working group has met a couple of times. They are working to identify resources for faculty and staff to address bad behavior.

Allison LaTarte, Interim Associate Vice Provost for Academic Planning and Institutional Research, and Scott Owczarek, Registrar, talked about data they produced to look at whether access to AP courses affected enrollment appointments. They found than 91% of incoming students had the opportunity to take AP in high school. Some demographics were less likely to have external testing credits such as first generation, international students and transfer students.

Enrollment appointments at UW-Madison follow projected academic level, but also have priority enrollment for some groups such as veterans.

They looked at 3 semesters of fall enrollment appointments. If they removed external test credits from appointment consideration, 41% of undergraduates have a reduction of one or more academic levels and about 50% have an earlier enrollment appointment. The biggest positive impact would be for transfer and international students. SOHE and School of Education would see the largest gains in enrollment priority while Engineering and Business would see the largest decrease. Scott Owczarek offered to talk to his peer registrars at an upcoming conference about this issue and report back to the University Committee.

Papp motioned, and it was seconded, to convene in closed session pursuant to Wis. Stats. 19.85(1)(c) and (f) to discuss waivers at 3:12. Two tenure clock extensions, one leave of absence and tenure clock extension and two dual roles were approved.

Papp motioned to reconvene in open session at 3:29. It was seconded and approved.

Papp adjourned the meeting at 3:30.