Chair’s Report for April 26, 2005

 

Senate update

1.        Important links to agendas, minutes, Chair's Reports and other sites of interest are available
on the Senate web site: http://www.uwec.edu/Usenate. Senate Chair’s Report will be available on this site by noon on the day of the Senate meeting.

 

► Changes due to length of agenda and end of semester:

-          During debate, Senators may speak only twice to any motion or amendment. Each speaking term is limited to five (5) minutes. The Chair will add names of those wishing to speak to a speaker's list upon recognition.

-          Everyone wishing to speak to an issue will be allowed to speak once before second-round speaking terms begin.

-          Debate on a given issue will be limited to 30 minutes. If at the end of 30 minutes the body is not ready to conclude debate, the Chair will entertain a motion to postpone further debate either to the next meeting or to the end of the current meeting.

 

Senate Actions signed off by the Chancellor - none

 

Open Forum Items and Miscellaneous Business from Senate Executive Committee Meeting minutes

 

1.        Open Forum

·         Concern expressed about unavailability of hard copies of class schedules for registration and advising

  • Format is extremely hard to use for advising and requires additional faculty time to navigate
  • Question what input faculty had in decision to quit printing schedules
  • Change was processed through associate deans group, which is not governance group
  • Instituted to save money (approximately $10,000 per year) and because paper version is wrong as soon as printed because of number of changes; printable version currently still available – don’t know if it is up-to-date
  • Consensus to refer issue to Academic Policies Committee because has considerable affect on faculty workload

 

2.        Miscellaneous Business

·         Question raised about discrepancy between salaries offered new hires across campus

  • Hard to explain $89,000 assistant professor salary in business to people attempting to hire in other areas; wondering if it is just a matter of some departments being better at negotiating
  • Setting of starting salaries done between departments, deans, and provost – field-specific market data of peer institutions across country often used
  • Are cases of other departments where offers cannot come close to salaries people able to attain elsewhere
  • Becomes serious concern and morale issue
  • Topic can be put on agenda for future chair’s meeting by the provost

·         Concern raised about whether senator use of UWEC.SENATE email distribution list to send out information about topic currently on senate agenda violates open meeting laws

  • Consensus reached that this is form of information distribution regardless of content or viewpoint of material being distributed

 

Other Items discussed with the Chair

 

The election results for nominations to be forwarded to system for consideration for the Chancellor Search and Screen Committee have been tabulated and are as follows:

Four from University Academic Staff: Kristina Anderson (Admissions), Sue Moore (Registration), Patricia Quinn (Educational Access), and Mike Rindo (University Communications)

Ten from College of Arts and Sciences: Mickey Crothers (Psychology), Brady Foust (Geography and Anthropology), Scott Hartsel (Chemistry), Robert Hooper (Geology), Irene Lazda (Foreign Languages), David Shih (English), Alex Smith (Mathematics), Susan Turell (Women's Studies), Anne Utschig (English), and Marty Wood (English)

Two from College of Education and Human Sciences: Linda Carpenter (Communication Disorders) and Carol Koroghlanian (Foundations of Education)

Two from College of Nursing and Health Sciences: Doug Olson (Public Health Professions) and Cecilia Wendler (Nursing Systems)

One from the Library: Karen Pope

These nominees join the two submitted from the College of Business: Ken De Meuse (Management and Marketing) and Ingrid Ulstad (Accounting and Finance).

The Chancellor, in consultation with the Senate Executive Committee, will be adding the name of one more faculty member.

In addition, the Chancellor will be sending down the names of four community members, two administrators, and the names of four students submitted by the Student Senate.

 

Faculty Reps Meeting – next meeting via teleconference, Friday, April 29

 

Board of Regents Meeting – next meeting at Stout, May 5th & 6th

 

Legislative Update – Portions from the Legislative Update prepared by UW System staff

 

1.     Participants in a Business Roundtable discussion April 20 concluded that the University of Wisconsin System may be too tightly controlled by the administration and legislature. Participating were Todd Berry, president of the Wisconsin Taxpayers Alliance, and Arturo Perez, senior fiscal analyst for the National Conference of State Legislatures.

    The Wisconsin State Journal reported they said that lawmakers often see public higher education as a discretionary expense, unlike the more politically popular areas such as corrections, health care and K-12 education. Lawmakers also know that colleges and universities can raise revenue through tuition increases, making the university a first stop for budget cuts, they said. Wisconsin’s governor and legislature control how much tuition can increase.

    State rules in hiring, wages and building construction further constrain system decision-making, the speakers said, putting the state firmly in control of university business even as taxpayer dollars funded less than 25 percent of system costs for the first time this budget cycle.

    A protest by unionized workers over the lack of a contract led to a major protest outside the Capitol on Thursday. One result of the protest was the first public disclosure by the administration of Gov. Jim Doyle on the potential pay plan for faculty and academic staff.

    The Wisconsin State Journal reported that Karen Timberlake, director of the Office of State Employment Relations, said the administration is proposing 2005-07 pay raises for non-represented state employees and UW System faculty and academic staff of 2 percent in July of this year, 2 percent in July 2006, and 1 percent in April 2007.The Legislature’s Joint Committee on Employment Relations could hold hearings in early May on the proposal.

    The Wisconsin Taxpayer newsletter, citing a study by Illinois State University, reported that the UW System has seriously lagged behind the nation in funding per capita for the past 11 years. During that period Wisconsin spending per capita on higher education rose 17.9 percent while the rest of the nation averaged 53.6 percent. During the last two years, Wisconsin dropped 8.9 percent while the rest of the nation went up 1.4 percent. Currently, the spending is $200.33 per capita, an increase of $15 since 1993. Nationally, the increase was $56. Wisconsin ranks 32nd in the nation in this category for ranking a state’s commitment to public higher education, the study said.

 

2.     Joint Finance Committee Co-Chairs Dean Kaufert and Scott Fitzgerald began executive action on the budget bill to begin on Tuesday, April 19. The UW System budget isn’t expected to be acted on until May. In action this week the committee approved a sum sufficient appropriation to fund tuition benefits for returning veterans. It is not clear what impact this will have on two bills that were considered in public hearings this week by the Assembly Veterans Affairs Committee.

 

3.     The Senate Committee on Veterans, Homeland Security, Military Affairs, Small Business and Government Reform conducted a public hearing on tax credits to businesses on April 21. The UW System registered in support of SB 152, a bill to offer tuition tax credits to businesses that pay the tuition of low-income employees. UW System testimony by Margaret Lewis, associate vice president for government relations, indicated this would help to address the disturbing trend of a 7 percent decline in the percentage of system incoming freshmen from low income families in the last decade. The legislation will particularly help non-traditional students. The bill can be found at http://www.legis.state.wi.us/2005/data/SB152hst.html

 

4.     AB-343 Morning After Pill (LeMahieu) Prohibits the UW System from advertising the availability of, prescribing and dispensing on any campus a hormonal medication or combination of medications for postcoital control of fertility to any registered student or other person entitled to university health care services.

 

5.     AB-349. UW System Credit Transfer (Wieckert) Transfer of certain program credits within the UW System. AB-350. Nursing Credit Transfer (Wieckert) Transfer of nursing course credits between the UW System and Technical College System.