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CIC Association of Professional Staff Councils Meeting

Teleconference on June 26, 2006

 

Present: 

University of Illinois –

Chicago Campus – Marietta Giovanelli*

Urbana-Champaign Campus – Vera Mainz*, Stacey Wilson

University of Iowa – Ella Born*, Mary Greer, Sheri Sojka*

University of Minnesota – Randy Croce*, Frank Douma, Richard Portnoy, Gavin Watt

Northwestern University – Rebecca Griffiths*, Jason Grocholski*

Ohio State University – Jay Young*

Purdue University – Kristie Bishop*, Mike Budzik*, Dan Leaird

University of Wisconsin – Bruce Beck*, Colleen McCabe

(*Indicates voting members)

Absent:  University of Chicago, Indiana University, Penn State, University of Michigan, Michigan State University, and Pennsylvania State University.

 

Vera Mainz, University of Illinois and current CIC Chair, welcomed the group.  All present introduced themselves.

 

1)  News and Updates

 

University of Wisconsin

  1. At the Madison campus, there was a mandatory review of promotions for academic staff.  Units were required to review the 374 academic staff that were identified as overdue and, of those, 141 received promotions (title changes).  There is a fairly elaborate job titling system. 
  2. A former Vice Chancellor submitted an appeal to the Academic Staff Appeals Committee and after review it was determined that the University had not established just cause for disciplinary action. 
  3. Still struggling with procedures on how to deal with employees charges with a felony.

 

University of Iowa

  1. Still in the middle of the search for a new President.  Only three staff and two faculty vice chairs are represented on the search committee.  The Athletic Director resigned shortly after the President.  The President position at the UI Foundation is being filled as well.        
  2. The model of the Shared Governance has been passed to the President. 
  3. The University purchased a “Live Well” health initiative.  Personal information is being kept on computer servers off-campus and only includes Doctor’s information if the employee grants access.
  4. The west side of campus has gone smoke-free. 
  5. Staff have gotten involved in a committee regarding the ownership of the photographs from staff id’s.  The staff public address list is now defaulted to restrict information and is only listed if permission is granted. 

 

University of Minnesota

  1. The Benefits Committee came up with a Wellness Program. 
  2. There have been similar conversations regarding privacy issues.
  3. A working group is looking at P&A classification and compensation and what it should like.  Three representatives from CAPA are on the group. 
  4. Strategic positioning of jobs is taking place because of what a centralized group has said – that real people are being mistreated with their job done away with – even given less than fifteen minutes notice and no reason why a change in job.  Promotional ladders are being defined but no open position to pursue.   

 

Ohio State University

  1. The Performance Culture working group is trying to promote staff to do their best.    
  2. Social security number has been removed from health care cards and are no longer used in the library to check out books.  IT staff are auditing to find and replace any systems that use social security numbers as identifiers.
  3. The VP for Human Resources Health Benefits Committee is monitoring and providing oversight to the President’s Cabinet to counsel and recommend direction for health care issues, more wellness incentives, and prevention of health issues.  There has been some bad press locally due to staff members being concerned over ramifications of this and the “big brother” aspect.
  4. The President announced her retirement in June 2007.  Unsure of the transition plans.
  5. The University Faculty/Student Senate made “reorganizing” comments at the last meeting.  The Secretary of the Senate spoke at a staff advisory meeting and made comments about shared governance and whether it included staff.

 

Purdue University

  1. Two positions are open – the CIO and the VP for Enrollment Management. 
  2. There is a new health improvement plan named “Healthy Purdue” that comes with a cash incentive for participation.  There have been nine thousand participants thus far.
  3. Current systems are being modified and new systems will be utilized to no longer use social security numbers as primary identifiers. 

 

Northwestern University

  1. The University is also transitioning away from utilizing social security numbers.  Health Plan carriers can longer use them as well. 
  2. There is a 5/10 year strategic plan for the reorganization of benefits with changes to take place is 2007.  Meetings have been taking place for two years now and there was recently a presentation that calls for a transition to higher deductible plans in PPO’s and fewer HMO’s with a four tiered selection plan.  This will be a huge change for staff but the University has communicated very well up to this point.  No final information has been distributed.  Three hundred people attended a luncheon meeting in May and staff are positive about changes at this point.
  3. Vacant spots on the Council will be filled via interviews.
  4. The Council was informed that Human Resources called a meeting with all ten-month appointment employees were regarding a change in benefits.  Benefits will no longer be covered for the two remaining months of employment.
  5. After looking at the marketplace, IT positions have been reclassified (title and grade change) in the past three months.  There is no money currently available to move into the new categories but pay will be adjusted next year.  This will affect over 500 campus IT’s.

 

University of Illinois

  1. Chicago Campus –
    1. An Academic Professional Open House was held and the Chancellor spoke.  She was very responsive and positive towards the APs and is interested in a promotional ladder system.
    2. CAPE award nominations are submitted.  The Chancellor would like more nominees. 
    3. Elections will be held and there are seven candidates for three seats.  Candidates must be employed great than 50% time and be permanent, not visiting.  AP’s will vote. 
    4. Performance Reviews are due July 15th.  They are not tied to a raises or promotions.
    5. There are licensing issues regarding employees being required to pay their licenses required to perform their job, rather than the Unit being responsible for payment.  This is an issue across the campuses but the licenses on the Chicago campus are among the most costly.
  2. Urbana-Champaign Campus –
    1. The Senate is determining how to handle department merges and name changes.  There are rules within the UI Statutes that explain how these changes should occur and that votes are required within the unit and at the Senate level.  During discussions it was found that in the last few years both tenured and tenure track professors have been hired into programs which have not been approved as academic units.  This puts these employees at risk as their programs usually have no formal bylaws which would govern the tenure process. 

 

2)  Minutes

      1. The minutes from the January 23, 2006 meeting were discussed and approved with any additional changes requested by email going to Vera. 

 

3)  CIC APSC “Official” Status as a Working Group

      1. This issue will be tabled until the face-to-face meeting in October.

 

4)  Updates on Sub-Committees

 

Benefits – An email survey was sent and the results will be posted on the CIC website for reference.

 

Compensation and Advancement Committee – Six schools were heard from and there were many questions and discrepancies regarding centralized versus un-centralized.  Minnesota is looking at a more centralized system and Purdue has put more of a “family” positive spin on it.  Compensation/Classifications tended to be more centralized.  There are discrepancies among different campuses and units regarding pay for the same job.  As far as pay raises, there is a centrally provided pool that comes with guidance but there is a lot of latitude on how the pay is distributed, supplemented, etc.  The information gathered from the surveys will be summarized and a final report ready to distribute at the face-to-face meeting in October.

 

Performance Review – Nothing new to report at this time.  Will work to put a survey together and have information ready by the face-to-face meeting in October.

 

Job Security – Five universities responded with mixed results that were split down the middle.  The notice period for most is 30 days, though some offer more time.  Minnesota is the only university having protection in non-renewal policies.  The length of contract also varies.  Some are at will; a few have contracts that guarantee at least one year.  Some have multi-year contracts but that is rare.  Most do have a priority for re-hiring, or at least considering, those laid off.  The group requests more input to help establish the norms. 

 

Shared Governance – Nothing new to report at this time.  Will work to put a survey together and have information ready by the face-to-face meeting in October. 

 

 

 

5)  Additional Issues

 

The next meeting will be Sunday, October 15 and Monday, October 16, 2006, 8:30 – 3:00 pm at the Big Ten Center, Chicago, IL – face-to-face. 

 

Some topics to consider for the fall meeting:

      1. CIC Status
      2. Benefits (open report)
      3. Reports from subcommittees
      4. Promotional ladder discussion
      5. Strategic planning of how to use the gathered information for leveraging at respective universities
      6. Please bring printed copy examples of how your university communicates with its staff.  (i.e.: faculty/staff newsletter, newspaper, emails, online announcement pages, etc.)
      7. Evaluation tools and examples of universities used as a benchmark?

(Example:  Minnesota uses the University of Florida)

 

The group adjourned at 9:45 a.m.

 

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