Joint Restructuring Team Meeting Notes

Joint Restructuring Team Meeting Notes

April 19, 2018

UC 259, 9 a.m.

Present: Tanja Anderson, Matt Aschenbrener, Brent Bilodeau, Jackie Briggs, Charles Clark, Greg Cook, Joan Cook, Denise Ehren, Susan Elrod, Kristin Fillhouer, Patricia Fragola, Mike Gorman, Eileen Hayes, Jonathan Ivry, Julie Janiak, Tom Kind, Kim Kostka, Ana Mengibar, Russ Podzilni, Connie Putland, David Travis, Abbie Windsor

Provost Elrod updates

Faculty Senate and Collegium both approved the college organizational structure.

The name of University of Wisconsin – Whitewater at Rock County was also approved and now goes to the Rock County Board. The Provost clarified that if the Rock County Board changed the name, both the Faculty Senate and Collegium would have to re-approve it.

System has confirmed that we will transmit the names of UW-Rock County tenured faculty to the Board of Regents for approval of their new tenure home, along with the normal transmittal of newly-tenured UW-W faculty, for Board of Regents (BoR) approval at the June meeting. Two faculty from the Online AAS will likely need to be added to our current list. The Provost from UW Colleges needs to identify Online AAS faculty names to be reassigned to campus locations. May 9 is target date for submitting the list to the Board of Regents.

The Online AAS degree may not be managed by CEOEL, though their staff may continue to support selected functions. This topic is still under discussion.

The revised UWW mission statement was sent to UW - Rock County for approval.

There will be one more Joint Restructuring Committee meeting in May. This meeting will likely be last of the academic year. Other meetings will be scheduled on an as-needed basis.

Curricular Issues: Greg Cook

The Crosswalk curriculum group is working with a UW Colleges spreadsheet of all courses. UW-Rock County faculty are proofing the spreadsheet and will send the list to the main campus. The results will be distributed to relevant UW-W department chairpersons for further review and recommendations on direct and near-equivalencies. The Registrar’s Office would like to have all of the courses loaded by August.

The AAS and BAAS degrees will be on the agenda of the Faculty Senate in their May meeting under New Business: University Curriculum Committee’s transmittal of UCC actions.

Nursing and engineering collaborative degrees are being studied. Two meetings are coming up with partners for those degrees. The degrees will entail two very different conversations and sets of facilities. Both MOUs need to be revised over time, though the BTC nursing MOU is going to be extended one year pending the Chancellor’s approval.

Fees: Brent Bilodeau

The working group is developing a comprehensive inventory of what fees are being charged. Bilodeau got a list from UW System of all fees charged by UW-W and UW Colleges for the past five years. The list is “extensive.”

The Provost suggested that the focus should be primarily on branch campus fees rather than main campus fees at this point.

Provost Elrod discussed progress regarding tuition. She referenced a plateau-related policy (805) identified by Dave Carlson at Rock County. UW System may review this plateau policy.

UW System Chancellors are exploring several models for tuition. Through email, Smith shared the tuition proposal from the Chancellor. Aschenbrener participated on a System wide tuition task force and so has understanding to share as needed.

A discussion of cross-campus enrollment resulted in several questions and concerns.

Faculty at both the main and branch campuses are concerned about cross-campus enrollments depleting or overloading classes.
Kind noted the extensive array of extracurricular activities that the main campus offers that appeal to and are funded by current students. It likely isn’t “fair” to offer those activities at the same price to branch campus students since they do not fund them.
Aschenbrener indicated that main campus lower classmen are required to live on campus and so may be less interested in attending the branch campus even with its lower tuition.
Ivry noted the importance of clear design of the web pages outlining the differences between the campuses and courses.
Bilodeau asked for clarification on the fees working group as to whether they should be focusing on tuition or just on fees in their working group. Provost Elrod said that we need UW System guidance on the tuition issues but the group could begin by digging more deeply into the fees for student “types” using a variety of scenarios.
J. Cook asked whether the tuition difference for the campuses would be maintained past a certain date. No clarification was immediately available except that tuition is maintained for courses that are “currently” offered.
Ivry: Where do fees intersect across the two campuses? Should those fees be standardized across campuses (e.g., online course fee)?
Travis: Is there a discussion on forgiveness of fees, due dates of fees? These topics should be explored.
Mengibar: Is there flexibility on what fees can be charged? Could they be standardized or used to level the fees across the two campuses?
Provost Elrod: UW-W can theoretically move away from the plateau policy now even before System rules on the plateau policy.

Human Resources: Connie Putland

All employees at Rock County will receive letters with official notice of “what happens” on July 1, 2018. Drafts have not been shared yet. Two committees have been formed: (1) Transactional Team (seamless transition for employees) and (2) Transformational Team (after a year of “business as usual,” who will process payroll, etc.?) The HR group continues to ask for further data on employees.

Windsor: IT will likely move branch campus employees to POI (person of interest) status.

Information Technology: Jackie Briggs and Abbie Windsor

This group discussed timelines and ordering of processes. Questions arose about how students are identified with a campus (handout shared and attached to email). PRISM used on UW Colleges will continue to be used for next three semesters. Student record transitions are complex. The goal is to have all students active on WINS for fall of 2019.

In Fall 2018, students will continue to use Rock County identifiers and email. Sometime between January and April 2019, existing branch students will begin to move to UW-W IDs and WINS use. In spring, they will register for fall classes using WINS. New students will be in WINS as they enroll. In July 2019, all students will be in placed in WINS with common email addresses.

Canvas Learning Management System: The main campus will be using this tool in fall but will be delayed for one year for the branch campus. Nicole Weber is in charge of the transition on main campus. It would be appropriate for branch campus faculty to contact her about the possibility of piloting Canvas as well as accessing training methods.

HLC: Joan Cook and Kim Kostka

They are waiting for a teaching staff list for the HLC AAS submission. Faculty Senate will have BAAS and AAS degrees on their May 8th agenda. When can HLC documents be sent forward? Collegium has endorsed the fact that the main campus will offer the AAS and BAAS. Discussion ensued on whether the HLC change application could be sent forward before the Faculty Senate meeting. There is hope for a desk review from HLC. Perhaps the submissions could be forwarded with caveats noting that Faculty Senate will not meet until May 8.

Student Affairs, Enrollment Management, & Admissions: Matt Aschenbrener, Brent Bilodeau, Kristin Fillhouer

The group is holding regular meetings alternating campuses with 15 working groups at the regional level. They are developing timelines and specific milestones and discussing needs for services and their delivery on the branch campus.

The teams are using the MOU for guidance in development of priorities and timelines. Groups are creating lists of additional needs for services or purchases of training, software, and other tools. Sequential relationships and reporting out are important.

Student Governance: Tom Kind

The student body of the main campus approved constitutional changes. Presidential elections are at the branch campus are this week. Kind was re-elected as main campus student body president. The branch campus should also approve constitution.

Academic Staff: Patricia Fragola

In midst of elections at this point.

University Staff: Denise Ehren

Changes to bylaws are approved and will be loaded to Google drive. Elections are also occurring. Ehren will step off her role on the Restructuring Committee because she is becoming an academic staff member. She is finding a replacement.

Faculty: Jonathan Ivry

Faculty Senate approved the structure of the new college organization on April 10.
They will be voting on the UCC transmittal of AAS and BAAS degrees on May 8.
The branch campus will submit a candidate name for Colleges of Integrated Studies constituency representation to the Faculty Senate after July 1.
The branch campus is rewriting tenure promotion standards for the College of Integrated Studies. Greg Cook volunteered to consult with the group to make sure the standards and procedures conform with UWW Faculty Personnel Rules. Louise Tourigny would also be a resource.
Current tenure-track faculty at U Rock have the option to continue their probationary period under the standards in existence at the time of their hiring; alternately, they will have the option to elect to be considered under the new standards, when they are approved. If current probationary U Rock faculty choose to be considered under the new standards, they will need to indicate that choice in writing.
Post-tenure review documents at the main campus are posted online. Branch campus faculty will adhere to the main campus post-tenure review. Greg Cook volunteered to meet with branch campus faculty.

The meeting closed at 10:56 a.m.