June 2022 Staff Council Newsletter

Officers’ Reports President Ronnie Houchin Ronnie Houchin had the opportunity to participate in the search for a new executive assistant for the Chancellor. They were able to find two really great candidates. We have hired Amy Cyr as the Chancellor’s Executive Assistant and Claire Baalke to serve as the Provost’s Executive Assistant.  Ronnie states he has been working on the orientation and onboarding committee that was put together by Vice Chancellor Queen. The charge for that committee is to make recommendations to improve onboarding and orientation specifically for UAF. They have been having conversations with Ahmbra Austin, the UAA onboarding manager. They plan to send out a survey to anyone hired in the last five years to collect recent feedback.  The Staff Alliance recently discussed staff recognition and development day and opportunities to coordinate additional activities across the UA system.  Staff alliance submitted a proposal on strengthening shared governance within the system. A recommendation to adopt a common table model was suggested. President Pitney is proposing putting together a working group of faculty, staff, and student stakeholders to work with President Pitney and Vice President Layer to start these conversations and provide input.  As we are nearing the end of the fiscal year we would like to acknowledge Raina Collins for managing the allocation of the Staff Development funds this year. Staff Development funds are included in the budget for next year as well and staff alliance will start having conversations on how to best utilize these funds. If you have ideas, comments or suggestions please email those to uaf-staff-council@alaska.edu.  Vice President Kari Mellmer Kari Mellmer states she is getting settled in her new position at the Office of Finance and Accounting. She has been coordinating her efforts as the new Staff Council Vice President and is looking forward to working more closely with all the staff council committees.  If you have any questions Kari can be reached at kamellmer@alaska.edu.

June Meeting Highlights and Announcements New Business: Motion to transfer UAF Staff Council Authority  Staff Council Year in Review: Michael Szidloski states we remitted a resolution for annual leave cash in. This would allow for a supplemental cash in for FY22 up to 40 additional hours. This was a beneficial opportunity for staff. Janene McMahan states it has been a joy to work with staff council and putting faces to names. Kari Mellmer is glad to have the breakout and planning sessions for Staff Recognition and Development Day. It is important to recognize our staff and hope they feel appreciated. Deana Fitzgerald would like to say she is grateful to be part of staff council . She enjoys how the group works together to bring items to the table and propose solutions. Alda Norris would like to mention the opportunity for the staff tuition support and how that benefited her work professionally. This allowed her to take a science writing class and she went on to have a publication in her unit's forestry newsletter. Ronnie Houchin would like to mention the staff council unit restructure and how this large revision has been successful. As well as the rural staff spotlight, that allows us to highlight our staff in our community campuses and the work that they do. Felicia Burud is excited to announce she took a new position on campus as the Alumni Relations Manager. She will now be representing her new unit and they are glad to have involvement in staff council.

 

Vice Chancellor Queen

Thank you to everyone that worked together to help facilities services with flower planting day here on the Troth Yeddha campus in Fairbanks.  

We are near the end of the FY22 fiscal year, and the FY23 budget is still under review at the state level. Once the budget is transmitted to the governor’s office he will have a time period to review. The governor retains the authority to do line item vetoes. We are eager to see the budget outcome. The university is in a great spot for much more stable footing than we've seen in prior years with an operating budget increase that supports some fixed costs as well as some staff compensation increases and a capital budget that includes deferred maintenance. As well as other research centered projects here in Fairbanks but several across the US system that really directly support initiatives at the State of Alaska and help fuel the state economy. 

In respect to annual leave our leadership teams have been sending out reminders to those that may be near their annual leave cap of 240 hours. Please consider using those hours before the end of the fiscal year. You may be eligible to cash out some of your acquired leave hours. This year an additional 40 hours were approved for the cash out opportunity if you meet those conditions. 

The Board of Regents recently met in Anchorage. They voted unanimously to approve the Troth Yeddha Indigenous Study Center. This effort has already raised donor funds and now they have the approval to move forward with schematic design. Vice Chancellor Charleen Stern, the user committee and the legacy committee will be coordinating that effort. This is more than a facility, this will support culture, language, and indeguous people from Alaska and beyond. 

The Rasmussen library sixth floor student success center was approved. This will allow restructure to that area with modernization and a service concept for our students. 

In regards to academics the Board of Regents approved the BA in Computer Science, and the Master in Marine Policy. 

The Budget and Planning Committee reviewed the funding requests for FY24. The committee provided ranking and comments and will be preparing a memo with Provost Prakash to submit recommendations to the Chancellor. Along with a list of strategic enrollment requests that have been ranked by this committee. We are waiting on some refined guidance from the system office. We are largely expecting it to align with the UA goals and measures. More guidance will be coming soon on the FY24 budget.

Human Resources

The UAF HR Senior Business Partner has been hired. Brian Hoppough will start July 18th. In the interim Nickole Conley is serving as the UAF SBP. 

Memry Dahl the new Chief Human Resources Officer joins us today to give a brief introduction to her philosophy and the onboarding process. HR is a service industry and we are in the people business. Our customers are our employees and we are the conduit to getting people to come to the organization. Memry states she has a people first philosophy and would like employees to feel they are always treated fairly. HR is usually the first touchpoint of hiring and the last touchpoint. Memry’s priorities are customer service, determining who and where to go for HR related questions. Her second area of focus is building efficiencies and creating best practices. Her third goal is having the right people in the right seat in her department. We need to function at a high level in HR and the leadership team will be meeting next week to work on these efforts. 

Michelle Pope from HR joins us to discuss the transition from Spoke. The Spoke system will no longer be available in the fall and they will implement a new tool in July. The Enterprise Service Management (ESM) will be more customizable to our needs with personal interactions. The new ESM will be embedded within the HR website. Spoke currently receives about 1500 requests every month so we want to be able to provide a similar resource.