Recent News from the Standing Committees of the Academic Staff Assembly SPRING 2016
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Academic Staff Executive Committee (ASEC)
Category A Maxima: These have been raised by 10% to account for cost of living increases. This is a short-term fix that the titling and compensation study will resolve. New rates went into effect on December 1, 2015.
The University Committee in conjunction with the University Staff Executive Committee, the Associated Students of Madison, and ASEC have drafted language for consideration by the Faculty Senate to create the University Budget Committee, a shared governance committee. The Senate will hear about the committee and see draft language at their March 7 meeting and the language will be voted on at a subsequent meeting.
The Ad Hoc Committee on Instructional Titles presented a report recommending instructional titles to the Assembly at the February 8 meeting. The Assembly will vote on the recommendations in the report at their March 14 meeting.
The Ad Hoc Committee on Titling and Compensation is working to develop final recommendations for the UW System Titling and Compensation study. This committee is planning to present their report to the Assembly in either March or April.
Electronic proposal deadlines:
Academic Staff Professional Development Grants — March 11, 2016 https://apps.ohr.wisc.edu/staffdev
Executive Education Grants — April 1, 2016 https://apps.ohr.wisc.edu/staffdev/
Communications Committee
The Committee has prepared a poster for the 17th annual UW-Madison Showcase on Wednesday March 16. The presentation describes the professional and personal benefits of participating in academic staff shared governance. Additional information about Showcase 2016 can be found at the following: http://quality.wisc.edu/showcase.htm
The Communications Committee is also currently reviewing and developing content for the 2016 Academic Staff Newsletter, which highlights the varied roles and responsibilities of selected Academic Staff committees.
Districting and Representation Committee
The District and Representation Committee (DRC) is charged with creating districts for representation purposes in the Academic Staff Assembly.
To that end, we base those districts on affinity groups of staff with similar interests. Those groups are determined based on what department or group employs the staff member, the staff member’s job, and location of employment.
Current districts were created based on criteria that no longer accurately reflect work roles or affinity groups at UW-Madison. Criteria have failed to grow with the reality of the university’s structure, resulting in increasingly arbitrary districting and radically unbalanced membership distribution. Further, some criteria don’t define affinity groups, but principally serve as a means to break affinity groups into districts of manageable size.
To solve this problem, the DRC has two proposals:
First, eliminate the districting criteria that serve only to break affinity groups into multiple districts and eliminate criteria the Assembly has outgrown. This will mean finding another way of dividing affinity groups into districts.
Second, establish new districting criteria based on broad work affinity groups.
We expect to bring both proposals to the assembly shortly. The second proposal depends on approval of the first, so the two proposals will be brought up separately.
In December, the Mentoring Committee hosted a well-attended professional development event entitled:“You are the Weakest LinkedIn. Good Bye: Ensuring Your Profile Will Make an Employer Click” featuring guest speaker Don Stanley of the Department of Life Sciences Communication. Check out the committee’s LinkedIn group, where they announce programming and facilitate discussions about mentoring resources: https://www.linkedin.com/groups/4669870
In November, the committee held the first meeting of the Mentoring Community of Practice, which is an ongoing initiative. All meeting minutes, discussions, and connections to resources are available through their Learn@UW portal: https://uwmad.courses.wisconsin.edu/d2l/home/3203319
In October, the committee hosted the Fall Kick Off event. The event offered time for discussions, presentations, and opportunities for new mentors and mentees to start building their partnerships. If you have any questions about the Academic Staff Mentoring Committee, please contact co-chairs Heather Weltin (heather.weltin@wisc.edu) or Linnea Burk (burk@wisc.edu)
Professional Development and Recognition Committee (PDRC)
The spring academic staff professional development grant deadlines are coming up soon.
Mark your calendars as follows:
- March 11, 2016 – Online Proposal Submitted Electronically to department chair/unit head
- March 18, 2016 – Department chairs and unit heads electronically approve proposals
- April 1, 2016 – School/College/Division Dean/Director electronically approves proposal
- April 1, 2016 – School/College/Division Dean/Director emails ranked list of applications to the Secretary of the Academic Staff (if applicable)
- Week of May 9, 2016 – Announcement of the grants (tentative)
For more information, visit the Academic Professional Development Grant website or contact Jake Smith, Office of the Secretary of the Academic Staff, (608) 263-2985, pdrc@soas.wisc.edu
The Nominating Committee has completed work on providing a slate of candidates for the Standing Committee elections this spring. We encourage academic staff to take the time to review the ballots and vote to fill committees. We are now contacting candidates to fill open positions of appointed committees. Please keep an eye out for discussion and voting on changes to ASEC terms and Curriculum Committee adding more academic staff.
Learning and Talent Development, part of the Human Resources Office in partnership with the Office of Talent Management, is launching a new training program. Called ‘Thrive@UW-Madison,’ it consists of courses designed to help UW-Madison staff and faculty discover skills and knowledge that allow them to uniquely contribute to their team and/or organization. UW-Madison employees are encouraged to participate in learning opportunities that maximize their ability to grow personally and professionally. For complete course descriptions and to register click here. https://www.ohrd.wisc.edu/Catalog/Default.aspx For more information, contact Program Coordinator Alice Y Traore with Learning and Talent Development at alice.traore@wisc.edu or by phone at 608-890-1872.