Joint Southeast Campus Area Committee Update

Joint Southeast Campus Area Committee

November 26, 2007

1. Review of the PUD for Wisconsin Institute of Discovery

- Research facility

- Additional bike paths and ped pathways

- Historic preservation on N. Randall

- Increased collaborative and inviting open space

- Will not be the “home” to any specific department

- Green construction implementation

- Demolition begins Feb. 1

2. Peterson Building Demolition

- Recycle and reuse 75-85% of building

3. Charter Street Heating Plant

- Reduce coal usage by 15% in January

- Cannot close Charter St as it heats and cools campus, but there will be more efficient 21^st century updates

4. Education Building Addition and Remodeling

- 1974 historic building district

- Will work to protect and enhance historic character

- There will be an east wing addition and a center courtyard

- Views to Mendota enhanced

- Underground parking with green terrace on top

If you have additional questions or comments, please do not hesitate to contact me. Thanks!

University Honors Committee Assessment

The University Honors Committee is looking to assess all UW Honors programs. The main goal of this assessment is to determine what the results of an honors education are at UW as a whole and within specific colleges (Letters & Science, Nursing, Education, etc.). A sub-committee of the University Honors Committee will be meeting to begin formulating the assessment; though I am not the student representative on this sub-committee, I'd be happy to pass along any ideas or comments students have about University Honors.
The Committee also recently rewrote their mission statement and discussed the importance of the upcoming 2008 Undergraduate Symposium.

Labor Licensing Policy Committee January Meeting

We had our January meeting yesterday. We introduced a new member to the committee, a representative from AFSCME local 171. Next we had an update on the Designated Suppliers Program. Unfortunately, the letter we (the working group of schools that have signed onto the DSP) were hoping to receive from the Department of Justince stating that there would not be any anti-trust issues did not come through. Instead of a formal rejection that would hurt our case, we decided to withdraw the request until we get a less hostile administration. In the meantime, we talked about University Bookstores at DSP schools voluntarily doing a sort of "DSP-lite," that would be a step in the right direction, but just until the DSP goes through and can be implemented. Next we moved onto licensee updates. A student from our campus went on a USAS (United Students Against Sweatshops) delegation to New Era in Mobile, AL last weekend, and she reported on what some of the current and former workers have said about their issues including racism, favoritism, sexual harrassment, low pay, a bogus point system, as well as other concerns. Dawn Crim informed the committee that our university would not be cutting the New Era contract due to breach of contract over New Era refusing to fully cooperate with the WRC (Workers' Rights Consortium), because of legal issues, but we would instead be cutting the contract for no cause based on the fact that the University does not wish to have a relationship with brands like New Era who engage in these sorts of practices. Dawn informed us that the University would not be sending out a press release or anything about this issue but that she would answer questions that reporters or others may have on the issue. The situation for the former workers of Hermosa has not improved either. There are some things going on with the government that may recover some of the funds to give to the former employees, but those are still in the works. The hiring situation continues to point to a blacklist. On a day when an FLA (Fair Labor Association) ombudsman was to be at a nearby factory called Chi Fung, 21 former Hermosa employees went to try to apply for jobs. All of them but 5 or 6 were turned away immediately, told that they were not qualified even though they have been doing similar work for years, of the 5 or 6 who were allowed in to apply, only 1 was hired on probationary status and fired the next day. This left the workers humiliated (obviously), and only hurt the very limited trust they have in adidas. Next we discussed possible dates for Gregg Nebel (adidas big shot) and Scott Nova (director of the WRC) to come. It will probably be a mega-meeting on a Friday afternoon in March or April. I'll give an update on that when I find out for sure when it will be, because it might be interesting for other people to attend that meeting, and all our meetings are always open to interested students. The next regular meeting will be Friday 2/9 at 2:30 in 67 Bascom. That was pretty much all the interesting stuff.

E-mail us your comments about the next Chancellor

As we said in an earlier post, Erik and I are constantly looking for more student input and additional student perspectives to help us as we work with the rest of the Chancellor Search-and-Screen committee.

At Tuesday's Shared Governance meeting (Jan. 29, 5 pm, TITU), we will be beginning to cluster some organizations together to start planning manageable yet comprehensive listening sessions/open forums.

During the entire search process, we would love to hear what you have to say and what you would like to see in Mr. Wiley's successor. You can e-mail Erik and me at NextChancellorIdeas@gmail.com with your thoughts.

Student input for Chancellor Search and Screen

Erik and I sat down today and started talking about how best to hear from all different student perspectives during the selection of the next chancellor. We would like to do some listening sessions/open forums and solicit input and opinions from any student or groups of students.

We've brainstormed a list of groups that we would like to hear from. It's a rather lengthy list, and we won't be able to have a separate listening session for every group so we will be consolidating this current list into something a bit more manageable. And I'm sure that we have forgotten some.

Which groups should we be talking to that are not on this list yet? We need your help (and your input!).

Possible locations for potential forums:

• Red Gym/ MSC Lounge
• Memorial Union
• Union South
• Engineering Hall
• Chadbourne Main Lounge (or somewhere else in Housing)

Groups that we would like to approach through forums:

• MCSC
• International students
• LGBT Campus Center
  
• Special students
• Athletes
• Greeks/ IFC
• GSC (Graduate Student Collaborative)
• CALS (College of Agricultural and Life Sciences)
• School of Business
• School of Education
• College of Engineering
• School of Human Ecology
• School of Journalism and Mass Communication
• Law School
• College of Letters and Science
  
• School of Medicine and Public Health
• School of Music
  
• School of Nursing
• School of Pharmacy
• LaFollette School of Public Affairs
• School of Veterinary Medicine

Shared Governance selects student appointees

ASM received 43 applications for the student seats on the chancellor search and screen committee. Twelve applicants were interviewed tonight. Shared Governance selected two. Congratulations to Suchita Shah and Erik Paulson. More information on these these appointees will be posted here soon.

Beyond Chancellor Wiley...

When Chancellor Wiley announced his retirement last month, the Wisconsin State Journal wrote the next university head "will need the skills of a Fortune 500 CEO small-city mayor, big-money fundraiser, university professor and savvy politician -- all at once."

We can all agree that the next chancellor must be highly capable of wearing multiple hats, especially during this critical time for the university when biennial budgets are slumping, greater numbers of faculty are leaving, and research competitiveness is at an all-time high.

So, let's talk. What qualities should Wiley's successor possess, and what should be the university's priorities over his or her tenure?