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KULSS Exec

Meeting Minutes

Thursday, April 17, 2008
Watson Conference B, 10:00-11:30am

Present: Jill Becker (Chair), Nishon Hawkins (Vice Chair); Angie Rathmel (Secretary); Denise Swartz (Group 1); Julie Warrick (Group 3); Robert Szabo (Group 4)
Absent:

Approval of 3/7/08 meeting’s minutes.
DONE

Approval of previous meeting’s action items

WHO?	BY WHEN?	WHAT?
1. All Group Reps	ASAP	Add url to KULSS-Exec minutes page in your meeting announcement to your groups
2. Jill	3/6/08	Send reminder about SSEYA and call for committee volunteers
3. Angie	DONE (with more updates as well)	Add names to website - Krista
4. Denise	DONE	Order food for guest speaker event
5. Angie	DONE	Email discussion notes from last meeting to Jill to send to Kelly Krieg-Sigman
6.  Jill	DONE	Email Kelly Krieg-Sigman about KU Libraries info
7. Robert	DONE	Confirm with Kelly Krieg-Sigman details for presentation
8. Angie	DONE	John/Holly re: PRC description on LFA’s web.

Group Reports:
Grp 1:  Acq/Ser, Reference, Collection Development, Administration, Facilities

• Retirees:  Janet Revenew (effective 4/4/08); Kathy Lathrom (effective 6/27/08)
• New hires: Anne Hayden (temporary appt) in Serials Holdings Records
• New chairs and phones arrived.
• Sharon, Lanis, Denise attended Administrative Professional Day in Kansas City.

Grp 2: Cataloging

• Jeff Dutton was hired to filled Kevin’s position.
• 3 LA positions for Annex, pending permanent status, will be advertised.
• New chairs.

Grp 3: Access Services, Mail Room, ILL

• Alarm gate will move forward 3-4 feet for when the desk is moved to the North this summer.

Grp 4: Anschutz, Annex, Art, Engineering, Music, RCL, Spencer   

• ANSCHUTZ
• New chairs.
• ANNEX
• N/A
• ART (submitted by Ann Snow)
• Susan and Ann are sharing Heather's work responsibilities until someone new is hired. The search committee has reviewed the applications, and hope to start interviewing soon.
• Now a reader-printer for microforms in Art instead of the ancient film and fiche readers.

• ENGINEERING
• No report, but see update from Jeff McAdams

The end of the semester is nigh; for some reason it ends a lot earlier here than it seemed to in Kansas.  People are panicking about papers and resources, which proves to be a universal attribute of undergraduate students.  We are also finishing our library promotion game (http://lib.utsa.edu/News/Puzzle/).  I authored this last one, so feel free to email me with a correct answer and I'll send you a shiny penny in the mail via Robert.

Since the Final Four was in San Antonio, which is where I happen to live, and the Kansas Jayhawks were playing, I managed to get a ticket to the Championship Game.  It was as amazing as you can imagine.  The Jayhawk fans there were great and I was truly fortunate.  I'll send a picture sometime soon.  I hope there wasn't any looting in Lawrence.  :)

How are things going with KU Libraries?  I'll be attending ALA this summer, and I hope to see you there if you go.

Missing you all,
Jeff

• MUSIC (Submitted by Nancy Hawkins)
• N/A
• RCL
• N/A
• SPENCER (submitted by Mary Ann Baker)
• We

 

Committee Reports

Univserity Support Staff Senate (submitted by Mary Ann Baker)
2 and 9 April 2008 -- Most of the time of both the Executive Committee and full Senate meetings were taken up with elections and transitioning to the new governance year which starts in May. You will probably have noticed the names of the officers for the next year in the mailing we recently sent out and in the most recent Oread. Yours truly was elected to serve as a representative to not only the University Senate but also to the Executive Committee of the University Senate (SenEx).
I would like to urge all library support staff to fill out the preference sheet sent out in the recent mailing. You are assured of serving on any of the 5 USS Senate committees -- Elections, Legislative, Communications, Personnel, Information Access and Public Relations. If you are interested in serving on a university-wide committee, please also voice your preference for that. Service terms on most of the university-wide committees are usually 2-3 years so there may not be an immediate opening for the one you request. Still, your preference will be noted and should an opening, unexpected or not, occur, you will be notified if you've been appointed. If you serve on a university-wide committee you will be required to submit a monthly report of the activities of the committee to the USS Senate. Please feel free to ask me any questions you have about the committees and consult these websites for information as well:
USS Senate committees -- http://www2.ku.edu/~clsenate/committees.shtml
University-wide committees -- http://www2.ku.edu/~clsenate/univcomm.shtml
The full Senate also discussed differences in shared leave policy implementation, ramifications of criminal background checks and the possibility of phased retirement for support staff.

University Senate (Submitted by Mary Ann Baker)
March 24th -- All the constituent Senates (Faculty, Student, Unclassified staff, Support staff) reported that they were having elections and organizing for the next academic year.

Rick Levy, President of Faculty Senate, also reported that the Faculty Senate had created a task force to do an extensive review of the Faculty and Unclassified Staff Handbook. They might just start all over.

Levy, as a member of the Council of Faculty Senate Presidents (CoFSP) then reported on the Board of Regents (BoR) proactive involvement in addressing some federal higher education discussions of measuring outcomes and accountability. The BoR is asking 5 strategic questions (which really translate into goals) to determine policy direction. To begin discussions and gather data, the BoR asks, are we satisfied with/that:
1) high school graduates are ready to go to college and be successful there
2) the diverse demographics in higher education
3) institution retention and completion (keeping students in college and having them complete their degree work)
4) outcomes (no college student left behind) -- that students leave college and are successful in work and life -- there is a need to develop a mechanism for measuring -- this is key -- KU is addressing this issue with the work of the Learner Outcomes Task Force
5) we are producing students for the workforce demands of Kansas -- do we have the right programs, resources and incentives -- Levy noted that Kansas needs more than just "workers", e.g., artists, good citizens, etc.
The CoFSP has drafted a statement on the broad values of higher education (13 Feb 2008 DRAFT):
The ultimate goal of higher education is to enhance the personal growth and development of each individual student. Thus, in addition to providing a venue for the acquisition of basic competencies and career skills, education is about fostering moral and ethical thinking, increasing awareness of the world around us and developing lifelong habits of learning.
The CoFSP hopes to relate this statement of broad values of higher education to the BoR's 5 questions/goals.

Kathleen McCluskey-Fawcett, Senior Vice Provost, then led a discussion on FERPA (Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act) and the need for training to abide by the act's stipulations. For the most part this act relates to students' right to privacy. Some examples of activities that fall afoul of the act are posting student grades with any identifiable name or number, passing back graded papers from student to student, disposing of records incorrectly, etc. KU will soon begin requiring anyone (faculty, staff, other students) that works with student records, electronic or paper, to take a tutorial. The Senate agreed that requiring the tutorial was a good idea.

Under "new business", Student Senator Emily Williams urged faculty to encourage their students to vote in the Student Senate elections coming up shortly.

10 April 2008 -- All the constituent Senates are transitioning to the new governance year. May 1st the US will elect the new president-elect and faculty members of SenEx. US committees have begun to send in their final reports to SenEx. The Faculty Senate Task Force on the Assessment of Teaching and Learning has completed it's recommendations and will forward it's work to the Faculty Senate Executive Committee (FacEx). The USS Senate is exploring the possibility of having phased retirement for support staff and discussing shared leave options and the ramifications of criminal background checks.
Most of the US meeting was taken up with discussions of proposed amendments to US Rules and Regulations which will be voted on at our next meeting April 24th.
The first discussion, on changes to the withdrawal policy, included whether it was better for a student to have just a W (Withdrawn [from the class] -- newly proposed, actually reverting to old practice) or to have either a WP (withdrawn passing) or WF (withdrawn failing) -- old practice, at least for the last 5 or 6 years -- on his or her transcript. The proposed changes also make it so that the student follows the withdrawl procedures of the school or College in which he or she is enrolled.
The second discussion was about the guidelines for dealing with scientific/scholarly misconduct. Most of the changes suggested came because of changes in the guidelines for federally funded research. The KU regulation had to be changed so much that the task force assigned to investigate this just rewrote it. Members of the US had concerns about retaliation and false or misleading complaints as well as the issue of confidentiality.
The KU Governance website, http://www2.ku.edu/~unigov/, has specific information about both these regulation changes.

University Committee on Libraries (UCL)
Lorraine Haricombe, Library Dean, gave her report on recent news and initiatives:
The National Institute of Health (NIH) Open Access recently announced a requirement that all funded research have peer-reviewed work posted on the web or future funding may be in jeopardy. The KU Libraries support the NIH initiatives to archive, advance and provide access to research in a timely manner and will assist KU faculty and graduate students to meet necessary requirements.
The Copyright Symposium on campus attracted 170 attendees even during bad winter weather and while KU was well represented among the attendees, the Dean wishes that more KU faculty were able to attend. The Provost has asked the Libraries to lead the effort to compose an institutional policy regarding compliance with copyright regulations.
Michéle Cloonan, Dean of the Graduate School of Library and Information Science at the Simmons College in Boston will be on campus April 3rd to give a talk about the devastating effects of war on Iraq's libraries, "Libraries and Human Rights: Iraq in the Crossfire" at 3:30 pm in KU's Spooner Hall. Earlier in the day in Alderson Auditorium in the Kansas Union, she will facilitate a discussion on the skills and education of new librarians for librarians and prospective librarians.
The Libraries are working on responses to a consultant's report on Spencer Research Library (SRL). Some staff vacancies will be addressed soon but the interim leadership arrangement will probably continue for another year. As for the facility itself, the fire alarm system is being renovated and ideas are being examined as to whether the building might be renovated to be more user-welcoming and friendly or even possibly rebuilt at a new location. Staff at SRL are researching which collections are used most and will focus on building up unique collections. Outreach initiatives will include digitizing collections. University Archives will assist the University's Information Management initiative with regard to electronic issues.
The Libraries will begin to weed reference collections (including the one in the East Asian Library) with faculty consultation in order enhance user space and move less-used material to the stacks or Annex.
The Libraries will launch a fund-raising program this summer and solicit "advocates" across the country to assist in identifying significant donors and tell the KU Libraries story.
Also this summer, the Libraries will set up a new service desk on the 3rd floor of Watson Library. Leslie Tuttle, Humanities representative, noted that better lighting was needed and that faculty would be apt to accept the social/coffee house atmosphere of Watson 3rd floor if somewhere else in the building the atmosphere said "research library".
Tenure has been awarded to Deb Ludwig, Librarian II and to Brian Rosenblum, Librarian II and tenure with promotion from Librarian I to Librarian II was awarded to Ada Emmett.

David Holmes, committee chairperson, remarked that there had been no problems with the Libraries this past year and praised the Dean for the good work she had done all year.

Tuttle thought that the UCL should ask the University Senate Executive Committee (SenEx) about the structure of the UCL and wondered whether it might be a good idea to hold open forums (1-2 times per semester) so that other KU community members can express concerns and make suggestions.

As this was the final meeting of the UCL for this academic year, Holmes noted that he would write up the report of the committee's activities for SenEx. When he pondered as to whether anyone would ever read the report, both the Dean and I, almost simultaneously, said, "Bill Crowe [University Senate President] will read it". And, no doubt, he will.

Diversity Committee
No report.

IS Development Council (ISDC)
Kick-off event scheduled for May 1st to provide details for upcoming events in late May.

Planning & Resources Committee (PRC)
2nd annual “On the job at KU” planned in June.

 

Meeting Updates
Management Council 4/10/08

1.  The Provost wants to create a central Policy Library on the KU web site containing all general interest policies.  The library will be contributing to this and Lorraine asks all units who have "higher level, broad interest" policies to forward them to administration.  Example:  circulation policies.  [My comment:  I don't think we have anything like this.]

2.  Mike Broadwell reported on status of the 7 personnel searches that are underway.  On Friday he sent kulib-l an email with the same info plus more detail, so you can refer to that if interested.

3.  Mary Roach talked about student wage levels and related policies.  There are 4 student wage levels based on skill levels.  The policy allows for a 50 cent differential if the student has additional *special* skills required for the job (e.g., language, technology).  In addition, a 25 cent longevity increase is added at the start of each fiscal year.  Shannon will soon be sending us a list of our current students so that we can adjust and document the pay level of each student.  For the future, when creating new student position descriptions, we need to decide on the level up front, after defining the job duties.  Jennifer Church-Duran proposed that we always try to hire work-study first.  (Actually, this is already the policy.)  There was quite a bit of discussion on promoting student jobs to get larger pools and more work-study eligible students; defining special skills.

4.  Lorraine announced that the summer retreat will be June 10.  It is targeted to Management Council but will be open for broader participation.  It will begin with presentations by a grad student panel.  More info will be forthcoming.

5.  Lorraine will be sending out a list of all standing committees that are not governance and soliciting names for new members so that all non-governance committee appointments will run on the same July-June calendar.

6.  Rebecca Smith reported that work is continuing on developing a library web page where people will be able to donate $ to the library.  It will soon be available for testing and input. 

The next Management Council meeting will be Wednesday May 28. 

Meeting w/ the Dean 3/24/08
See notes

Staff Development Speaker  - Review Feedback/Discuss Future Plans

 

Spring To Do’s
Student Picnic
May 9th, 12pm

Grievance Committee
Information on the history of this committee from Sandy Gilliland, former Libraries HR Director. Requesting information from Mike Broadwell, Libraries HR, to find files Sandy is referring to in order to clarify. Also find out from University HR what Grievance policies are now in place, do they duplicate the purposes of this committee? See Agenda items for the Dean.

Spring Meeting
June 12, 2008 10-12

Elections
Colored bag lunches in May 1-15th to discuss committees
Ballot out May 26th, due June 9th

 

Agenda items for next meeting with the Dean.

 Grievance Committee

• Requesting information from Mike Broadwell, Libraries HR, to find files Sandy is referring to regarding Grievance Committee in order to clarify (just for evaluation disputes, or for everything but evaluation disputes)
• Also what Grievance policies are now in place in University HR, do they duplicate the purposes of this committee?
• Provide examples of Grievances forwarded (albeit without policy) to Administration in the past 3 years.

Committee Chart Update

• Status of including the ‘terms of appointment’
• Status of changes (final version not shown to Mgmt Council at 4-10 mtg -- will we see the document before its sent via email to all staff)?
• We are planning Colored Bag lunches to talk about help get members for Committees in weeks of May1-15th.

Merit

• When will it be announced. 
• Will you have an open meeting or attend our general meeting for current questions and follow-up of last year's discussion of merit?

 

Action Items for next meeting:

WHO	By WHEN	WHAT
Denise		Add Anne Hayden to Group 1 email list.
Sarah		Resend feedback from SD Speaker
Angie		Send Sarah additional feedback
Denise		Reserve Jun 12th General Meeting
Jill		Gather Staff Development documentation

Next meeting will be May 1st 1-2:30 at Milton’s in the Union.

PARKING LOT:

• Colored Bag Lunch for upcoming election (May 1st agenda item)
• Grievance Committee (April 17th agenda item, Agenda item for the Dean)
• Make up a written plan for Staff Development for future KULSS (May 1st Action Item)