Draft Minutes

Tuesday, July 12, 2005

10:00am – 12:00 noon by audio conference

1. Call to Order and Roll Call

Members present:

Lisa Sporleder, Chair; President, Statewide Administration Assembly

Jeri Carey, President, UAS Staff Council

Betty Dupee for Lori Merdes, Vice President, Statewide Administration Assembly

Bob Kizer, President, UAA APT Council

Jana Ring, Vice President, UAS Staff Council

Kimberly Stanford, President, UAA Classified Council

Jeff Stepp, President-Elect, UAF Staff Council

Others present:

Pat Ivey, Executive Officer, System Governance

Hans Gunderson, Administrative Coordinator, System Governance

Mike Humphrey, Director, Benefits

Jeannine Senechal, Director, Compensation

2. Adopt Agenda

MOTION: Moved by Stanford, seconded by Stepp, passed without objection

“The University of Alaska Staff Alliance moves to adopt the agenda for the July 12, 2005 meeting. This action is effective July 12, 2005.”

3. Approve June 14, 2005 minutes

http://gov.alaska.edu/staff/minutes/2005/06-14.html

MOTION: Moved by Cary, seconded by Stanford, passed without objection

“The University of Alaska Staff Alliance moves to approve the minutes of the June 14, 2005 meeting. This action is effective July 12, 2005.”

4. Acceptable Academic Degrees

http://gov.alaska.edu/Faculty/Minutes/2005/05-10.html

MOTION: Moved by Stanford, seconded by Stepp, passed without objection

“The University of Alaska Staff Alliance moves to support the Faculty Alliance motion related to acceptable academic degrees as follows:

MOTION: passed as amended without objection

“The Faculty Alliance moves to accept the acceptable academic degree proposal as amended to insert ‘appropriate’ between ‘The’ and ‘Provost’ in item 7 and to change actability to acceptability in item 11, with the recommendation that it be adopted as university regulation. This action is effective May 10, 2005.”

Revised proposed regulation:

1. An academic degree acceptable to the University of Alaska (UA) is one that has been issued by a degree-granting institution identified by UA Anchorage (UAA), UA Fairbanks (UAF or UA Southeast (UAS) either generally or with respect to a specific degree as actable, or one that has been accredited by an accrediting agency identified as acceptable to UA.

2. Only accrediting agencies that have been approved by the U.S. Department of Education, or which have been deemed acceptable by this policy or by the UAA, UAF or UAS Chancellor or Provost are acceptable to UA.

3. UA identifies as acceptable degree-granting institutions those that are accredited by an acceptable accrediting agency or those which are listed in the American Association of Collegiate Registrars and Admissions Officers International Registry of degree-granting institutions.

4. The holder of a degree or credits issued by an institution that is not identified as acceptable as set forth above may seek identification of the degree or credits as acceptable by providing a transcript and an evaluation made by either

(a) the American Association of Collegiate Registrars and Admissions Officers, or

(b) the World Education Services that states the degree in question is in fact equivalent to a degree granted by an accredited U.S. institution. A copy of this transcript evaluation should be filed with the individual’s Dean. Unless and until the Provost or the Chancellor determines in writing that the degree or credits are acceptable, they will not be considered acceptable for use within UAA, UAF, or UAS provided, however, that unless otherwise directed by the Chancellor or Provost, a Dean may determine in writing that the degree or credits are acceptable solely for use within the academic unit of the Dean.

5. Only academic degrees and credits earned from acceptable degree-granting institutions may be used for the purposes of identification, credit transfer, hiring, promotion, or tenure at UA.

6. UA employees and students who possess academic degrees that do not qualify as acceptable to UA are forbidden to indicated that they possess such degrees in any official UA context, including—but not limited to—UA classes, UA syllabi, UA web sites, and at meetings where they are identified as UA employees or UA students; provided, however, that they may state that they hold the degree if they also qualify the statement with a statement that the degree is not acceptable to UA. “Indicating” one possesses a degree includes—but is not limited to—using the title “Dr.” or other degree-related title before one’s name or listing the degree abbreviation (e.g., B.S., M.S., PhD) after one’s name.

7. The appropriate Provost, after approval of the UAA, UAF, or UAS Faculty Senate, is authorized to develop and revise lists of accrediting agencies and/or degree granting institutions that are acceptable and/or unacceptable to UAA, UAF, or UAS as necessary and appropriate to advance the business of UA.

8. The policy on the Identification and Use of Invalid Academic Degrees is applicable only to UA employees hired and students enrolled after the effective date of approval of this policy by the Board of Regents; with the exception of those UA employees hired and students enrolled prior to the effective date of approval of this policy who have, in any way, misrepresented their credentials, records, or any other professional information to the university.

9. This policy shall not be applied retroactively to any UA employee hired or student enrolled prior to the date of approval by the Board of Regents, except for the conditions specified in number (8) above. Nor shall this policy be used as part of any UA employee or student evaluation in the event that an accredited institution from which an employee or student had graduated subsequently lost accreditation.

10. All provisions stated in this policy for UA apply to the four Major Administrative Units (MAUs), i.e., UAA, UAF, UAS, and the UA Statewide Administration.

11. Any special considerations made by the Chancellor or Provost of UAA, UAF, or UAS pertaining to the acceptability of a particular degree are not binding to the other MAUs.

This action is effective July 12, 2005.”

This motion will be sent to the Faculty Alliance and forwarded with the original Faculty Alliance motion and Coalition discussion on to President Hamilton for implementation as university regulation. Information about this also needs to be included in student, faculty and staff handbooks and communicated widely once the regulation is implemented.

5 Chair’s report – Lisa Sporleder

I addressed the Board of Regents during public testimony at their meeting last month. I thanked them for resolution of the issues we brought before them this past year, namely the annual grid adjustment for inflation and the Governance Policy change and regulation guidance. It’s a good thing the annual grid adjustment got approved when it did, because I’m not sure the university would be able to approve such a plan in the future if it doesn’t get some legislative help on PERS/TRS issues. Money could get very tight if retirement assistance doesn’t happen soon.

The last item I brought up was the Senior Citizen Tuition Waiver. It was clear to me that the Board is accepting as fact what the Executive Staff has told them, and appear more interested in eliminating the program than in fixing any remaining problems. They believe that $350,000, the tuition amount currently offset by the waivers, is theirs for the taking just by making this one small change. They assume that everyone taking classes with the waivers will continue taking those classes at full tuition cost. They also brought up problems with the system that should have been resolved years ago when they were first realized; for example, that classes are being held because they are being padded with waiver students, when there would otherwise not be enough students to hold the class. They also seem to think that seniors are taking seats away from paying students. These two problems have been addressed by procedure. If they are not working the way they were supposed to, I think we need to fix the problem, not eliminate it!

Still, with the chancellors, the executive staff, and the Board of Regents against the continuation of senior citizen tuition waivers, I am not sure this is a battle we can win, if indeed we chose to take it on, regardless of unified governance support of the waiver system. President Rogers said that the new generation of senior citizens will be a much larger percentage of the population, and changing the system now will set the precedent that everyone pays for college courses. He said that seniors would be eligible for federal grants, so poorer people could still attend classes without the cost of tuition. It may have been a few years since I was in college, but at that time, the only way I could get a grant was as an independent student. My mother, supporting me on a single salary, and part-time at that, made too much money and was expected to put me through school by the federal financial aid powers that be. And I can just imagine how easily senior citizens who are trying to figure out how to get into a computer class in the first place is going to be able to navigate any available assistance in filling out the form in the first place! Brian Rogers also mentioned that future seniors will be better financially prepared than the generations before them. He said they will be well able to afford the tuition, and then said that the change would better be made sooner than later.

I’m not heartened by this response. I had hoped for some decent dialogue in the questions I received, not the comments I got saying the next generation of seniors are rich enough to pay, so we must charge them tuition. Even if we cannot preserve the current system, perhaps there is a way to institute tuition waivers for UA retirees. I don’t know. But first, we need to agree on how to proceed. We will talk more about that later in the meeting.

6. Public Comments

There were no public comments.

7. Staff Governance Reports - SW, UAS, UAA, UAF

The UAS Staff council has not met since the last Staff Alliance meeting but plans to meet July 21. UAS-Juneau has a new 790 prefix and some numbers are changing.

The new UAS Juneau phone directory is posted on the web at http://www.uas.alaska.edu/search/JuneauByDept.pdf

The UAA Classified Council and the UAA Assembly do not meet during the summer. Bob Kizer and Kim Stanford are on the search committee for a new governance coordinator for UAA. Interviews will be held the end of this week. Stanford was at the wellness conference and that went fairly well. UAA Classified Council is involved in setting up a Seawolf Readers Book Club and the governance office will be setting up a listserve for the group. Kizer and Stanford meet with UAA Faculty Senate President Greg Protasel tomorrow to talk about goals for the coming year.

Jeff Stepp, UAF Staff Council Vice President, said he was glad to be participating on the Staff Alliance and had nothing to report.

The Statewide Administration Assembly has not met since the last Staff Alliance meeting but will be meeting tomorrow. Lisa Sporleder is in two transition teams for the IT merger.

8. Employee Relations

8.1 Retirement Update

http://gov.alaska.edu/staff/2005-06-22.BOR-HRretirement.pdf

http://www.alaska.edu/opa/regentrecap/regentspdf/jun05.pdf

Mike Humphrey updated the group on retirement changes. In June, the Board of Regents approved creating new provisions in the Optional Retirement Program (ORP) for new hires after June 30. The new ORP, like the current ORP, will be an option in lieu of joining the Public Employees’ Retirement System or Teachers Retirement System, and will have an employer contribution rate of 12 percent, according to the Regents Recap.

The Board of Regents has also asked that the university also consider options for a healthcare provision similar to a flexible spending account; the difference being that the ORP account balance would be carried forward from year to year and only made available when the employee retires. Other concepts being explored include added flexibility for employee choices, and an on-line financial plan modeling so employees can explore various scenarios. A lot more communication is required before changes can be put into effect.

Plans are underway to invite current eligible employees to opt out of PERS/TRS and join NORP. There are, however, many issues to be resolved before implementation, a few of which have been identified, such as:

· level of governance participation in the development of NORP,

· legal issues,

· Banner implementation and

· how to fund a health care component

No meetings of the task force have been set yet but there probably will be meetings in August and September.

It is not the intent of the university that the supplemental pension plan be eliminated.

8.2 New Human Resource Regulations

http://gov.alaska.edu/staff/2005-05-27.RecruitingRegsDraft.pdf

Jeannine Senechal emailed the proposed recruitment regulations to Pat Ivey right after the June Staff Alliance meeting, but they were not received apparently because of email glitches. They will be resent to Ivey after this meeting and distributed to the Alliance for comment via the Staff Alliance listserve staff@gov.alaska.edu for compilation and directly to jeannine.senechal@alaska.edu. The regulations and compiled comments will be added to the August 9 Staff Alliance agenda.

8.3 Wellness Project Update

The wellness group met June 25 with consultants from Premera Blue Cross and other governance leaders. Premera presented four program packages that run from basic to everything under the sun. Plan 1 is a basic package which includes assessment and monitoring only, Plan 2 includes risk coaching for “high-risk” people, and Plan 3 adds coaching for people at moderate risk plus a communications package of about 24 communications per year to employees’ home addresses, and Plan 4 is a deluxe plan which includes a communications plan of approximately 52 communications per year. The group is leaning toward the Plan 3, the enhanced plan. During the assessment phase, employees and spouses will be asked to complete a rather extensive questionnaire. The incentive for employees to do this will be a $100 reimbursement for each one. The entire program will cost approximately $1 million dollars, $433,000 of which is for the actual program and the rest goes toward the $100 incentive. Presumably this will help change people’s behavior and save money. A generic report with no names will go to the university and an individualized report will go to the employee. The target date for the program rollout is October 1.

8.4 Tuition Waivers for Retired Employees

News article

http://www.anchoragepress.com/archives-2005/flashlightvol14ed27.shtml

Memo from President Hamilton: see p. 2

http://gov.alaska.edu/net/2005-04-12.tuition-adj-notice-ay2007-2008.pdf

Backup Data

http://gov.alaska.edu/net/2005-04-22.tuitionsummarymemo.html

http://gov.alaska.edu/net/2005-04-18.senior_citizen_tuition_waiver.pdf

At the last Staff Alliance meeting, members received news that the both administration and the Board of Regents were adamant that they would go forward and eliminate tuition waivers for seniors despite public opinion to the contrary. The Alliance also received the news that perhaps they would stand a better chance of asking for educational benefits for university retirees. Today, the Alliance decided that they would stick to their position that senior citizen tuition waivers not be eliminated and asked that institutional research be contacted and asked to define closed classes, i.e., seniors participating in closed classes. Alliance members also examined the policy which does not prohibit seniors from participating in closed classes, nor does it prohibit faculty from padding classes with non-paying seniors in order to have enough students to teach the class. Both prohibitions were intended in the original policy but the wording is not clear. Given that policy is intended to be a general directive and the details are supposed to be in regulation which currently does not exist, Alliance members thought that a better way to go was to develop regulations which include prohibitions against including tuition-waivered seniors in closed classes unless all other fee paying students are seated first, and secondly, to prohibit inclusion of tuition-waivered seniors in the headcount for the purposes of determining whether or not there are enough students to teach the class. As far as the supposition that seniors will not take classes if the tuition waiver is taken away, Alliance members suggested that the seniors be surveyed to find out for sure.

This item is scheduled for further discussion at the August retreat.

8.5 Other Employee Relations Items

There were no other employee relations items.

9. Advocacy

9.1 Employee Communications Specialist

Pat Ivey was directed to ask the statewide public relations director about the search committee process for recruiting and hiring the new employee communications specialist, and the university’s level of commitment to continued funding for the position

9.2 Other Advocacy Items

There were no other advocacy items.

10. President’s Retreat Monday and Tuesday, August 8 and 9, 2005, Fairbanks

President Hamilton’s retreat with staff governance leaders will take place Monday and Tuesday, August 8 and 9, 2005 in Room 501 of the International Arctic Research Center. Staff governance leaders will arrive Sunday evening and retreat activities will begin at approximately 9-9:30am on Monday.

11. Agenda items for next meeting, August 8 and 9, 2005

Agenda items may include but may not be limited to election of the chair, human resources regulations, senior tuition waivers, wellness and retirement program issues, and other items of interest.

12. Other items of interest

There were no additional items of interest.

13. Comments

There were no additional comments.

14. Adjourn

The meeting was adjourned at 12:10pm.