Minutes for October 2, 2023

UC members present: Bernard-Donals, Jones, King, Tejedo-Herrero, Thibeault (chair), Zweibel

Others present: Greg Bump, AJ Butler, Michelle Felber, Jennifer Noyes, Julie Scharm, Jake Smith

Chair Thibeault called the meeting to order at 1:31 pm.

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 committee appointments and waivers at 1:31 pm. Two tenure clock extensions were approved.

Jones motioned to reconvene in open session at 2:01 pm. It was seconded and approved.

The minutes from September 25, 2023, were approved by automatic consent with one correction.

Michael Bernard-Donals attended at BTAA Faculty Senate Leadership phone call and shared two issue that came up. One issue was concerns about athlete travel with an expanded conference, and the other was concerns about public access to class locations and times. The UC decided to invite Ann Sheehy to talk about travel for athletes and other updates from the Athletic Board.

The University Committee discussed how religious observances should be listed when they begin at sunset the day prior. Right now, dates included are only dates the observance happens during the daytime with an asterisk that indicates the observance starts the evening prior. Every member of the University Committee agreed that they should continue to be represented in this way.

Cary McAndrews, chair of the Campus Transportation Committee, Tanara Teal-Tate, Director of Parking Services, and Gabe Mendez, Director of Transportation Operations presented the Campus Transportation Committee report for 2021-22. In 2021-22, they continued to offer the reduced price parking program for lower income workers that began in 2020 with the pandemic. They approved a 1% parking permit increase for several types of permits. Transportation Services continues to work on sustainability with B-cycle stations, solar panels on bus shelters that power real time bus information, and six new vehicle charging stations. In addition, Dane County awarded Campus Transportation Services the Climate Champions award due to the large number of employees coming to campus in ways that are not a single passenger vehicle.

Jennifer Mnookin, Chancellor, shared news about the 45 day reprieve on a government shutdown that was passed by both houses and signed by the president during the weekend.

The annual class profile is out with UW-Madison having more than 50,000 students for the first time in its history. The class includes over 3800 Wisconsin residents and about ¼ of them are receiving Bucky’s Tuition Promise (full tuition) or Pell Pathway (full tuition plus cost of attendance).

The Strategic Hiring Initiative will be additive to regular hiring, and they are hoping to target over a number of years 8-10 areas of interdisciplinary hiring to take on big challenges with faculty at different stages in their careers. She expects there will be collaboration on hiring over several schools/colleges. They plan to start with one or two areas with this year’s hiring cycle. AI will be one of the areas. The University Committee discussed the need for faculty to provide their ideas for the topics if a dean isn’t asking for their input. They suggested a website.

The search firm for the VCRGE search ahs been selected, and they are setting up some initial discovery sessions as they work on developing the first draft of the PVL.

Conversations continue to take place about the engineering building and pay plan. UW-Madison and UW System are trying to understand the variety of perspectives in the legislature.

Thibeault adjourned the meeting at 3:07 pm.

Minutes submitted by Heather Daniels, Secretary of the Faculty